What would Clinton's "free college" plan mean?

For starters, let's be crystal clear.  This plan is probably DOE in DC.

But, hypothetically, what would free public higher education mean?

Here's what one commentator thinks.

As for me, I see the following:

1.  States would have to spread the cost of public universities and community colleges across the entire tax base in one way or another.  This would have to be via increases in property taxes along the lines that school districts are now supported, or via some other tax increase: income, sales, or sin.  Name your poison.  (I assume of course that the Fed would mandate but not compensate.   Some federal subsidy might come with the mandate, as per Obamacare as a model maybe.  But we the taxpayers would have to pony up regardless.)  Whether higher education is such a public good as to merit spreading its cost across the entire citizenry is a matter of public policy to be debated.

2.  Private higher education, except for those schools wealthy enough to provide free tuition, would most likely be doomed.  The private, non-profit sector is already in financial crisis.  This would be the end of the sector as we now know it.  Would it be worth it?  Or could some schools become parts of the public system in their states, or part of some federal system?  And if this could happen, would either "demise or become public" cost the country in any ways other than in the pocketbook?  I am wondering whether the private sector is a voice in the public discourse that ought not to be lost or muted.

These are profound questions that go not only to the core of the best higher education system the world has ever seen.  They go to the heart of Democratic discourse and the vitality of the Marketplace of Ideas in our Republic.