Union and Democracy | Page 5

styled, "sections,"
one mile square. After satisfying the claims of the soldiers of the
Continental Army, Congress proposed to distribute these lands among
the States, to be sold at auction for a minimum price of one dollar an
acre, reserving certain sections in each township and one third of the
mineral ore which might be found. The sixteenth section in each
township was to be set aside for the support of education. Each
purchaser was to receive with his deed a definite description of his
holding. Subsequent amendments to the Land Ordinance made the

terms of purchase somewhat easier. Instead of making an out-and-out
purchase, prospective settlers might pay one third in cash and receive a
credit of three months for the balance of the purchase price. Yet even
with these inducements only seventy-three thousand acres had been
sold to individuals down to 1788. The hazards of western settlement
were still too great.
Disappointed in the sales under the Land Ordinance, Congress was
persuaded to consider the alternative course of selling large tracts to
companies. The collapse of national credit left the public domain
almost the only available source of revenue. Early in 1787 the Ohio
Company offered to purchase a tract of land between the Ohio and
Muskingum Rivers. The promoters of this company had been interested
in an earlier project of army officers for the founding of a military
colony beyond the Ohio. Organized at Boston in March, 1786, with a
nominal capital of one million dollars, it had within a year raised one
fourth of that amount and sent first General Samuel Parsons and then
the Reverend Manasseh Cutler to secure the desired grant from
Congress. The labors of this astute divine at the seat of government
form an interesting chapter in the evolution of American legislative
methods. By devices well known to the modern lobbyist he not only
secured the grant of land, but also took a hand in the shaping of a new
ordinance for the Northwest Territory. In order to secure the grant to
his associates, he had to resort to log-rolling and agree to procure for a
group of land speculators an option to lands on the Scioto River. The
grant to the Ohio Company contained a million and a half acres; that to
the Scioto Company, five million acres. But while the one paid down
half a million dollars, the other made no payment, expecting to dispose
of their "rights" before the first payment was due. In the following year
a third grant of a million acres on the Great and Little Miami Rivers in
Ohio was made to John Cleve Symmes.
From these sales Congress expected to realize over three and a half
million dollars in public securities and at the same time to satisfy
military bounty warrants amounting to about eight hundred thousand
acres. The actual amount realized was less than six hundred thousand
dollars. The Scioto Company succeeded in disposing of rights to about

three million acres to a company organized in France, which in turn
sold them to unsuspecting royalist emigrants. Neither company ever
secured a clear title to these lands, and Congress had eventually to
come to the relief of the unhappy French settlers with a donation of
twenty-four thousand acres. Unforeseen circumstances prevented either
the Ohio Company or Symmes from complying with the conditions of
sale; and in both cases Congress consented to alter the terms of
contract.
On July 13, 1787, Congress adopted the ordinance which it had long
had under consideration. The authorship of this "charter of the west,"
after long controversy, is still in dispute. Like all legislative measures it
bears the mark of many hands. Certain features of Jefferson's ordinance
reappear: the provision for temporary government and eventual
statehood, and the fundamental articles of compact. Other provisions
are stated in a detailed fashion and suggest the probability that
Congress had definite conditions to meet. The ordinance took final
form while the Reverend Manasseh Cutler was representing the Ohio
Company in New York. Perhaps the most striking departure from the
Ordinance of 1784 is the provision for not less than three nor more than
five States north of the Ohio, where Jefferson planned for ten.
Admission to the Union was to be gained only after the population had
reached sixty thousand. Temporary government was to consist of a
governor, a secretary, and three judges appointed by Congress, who
were to adopt such laws from other States as they believed suited to
local conditions. In each and every case Congress reserved the right to
disallow these laws. Whenever a territory attained a population of five
thousand, it was to pass to the second grade of government, with a
representative assembly, an appointive council, and a delegate in
Congress.
Six articles of compact were also written into