nual appropriations than by the amount of business to be done. Unless all the acknowledged maxims of morals are false, the tendency of these things must be pernicious. Under a state government the people will exercise a more strict observance over the acts of their public servants; no wasteful expenditures will be treated with complacency; every department of the government will be held accountable to the people, and dishonesty will be more likely to meet its just rebuke at the ballot box. If the people wish to enjoy all the rights and privileges that appertain to freemen, and give to Wisconsin the true attributes of sovereignty, if they wish to exercise their proper franchise in the election of their rulers, they must assume the rank to which they are entitled among the independent states of the Union.

The confused and uncertain condition of our laws is another argument which should influence the people to the formation of a state government. Our territorial legislation is now regarded as only temporary; the necessity of a revision of our laws is felt and generally acknowledged; yet no one pretends that this desirable object will be accomplished until we become a state. Aside from other laws, those alone which relate to our common schools imperiously demand attention. The condition of our common schools is far from being creditable, and there is but little prospect of any permanent improvement while we remain a territory. We have no plan for common schools deserving the name of system, and the prevailing sentiment is that no effective system of education can be devised until we become a state. Wisconsin is hazarding much by neglecting the instruction of the rising generation; it may take years of arduous and persevering effort to repair the wrong. Without early and vigorous action to raise higher the standard of education, the prospective destiny of the state is dark and unpromising.

Whatever force there might have been in the objection heretofore urged-that our population was too small to form a state government-it certainly now has but little plausibility. The present number of inhabitants in this territory

probably does not fall short of 115,000, and should we come into the Union in the early part of the year 1847, we shall have a greater population at the time of our admission, with a single exception, than any of the new states which have preceded us since the confederation of the original thirteen.

There will probably never be a more favorable period for Wisconsin to come into the Union than the present: the political balance of power between the South and the North is now placed in an attitude which excites very general attention and solicitude throughout the Union. Florida and Texas have come into the great family of states, and the interests of the Republic seem imperiously to demand a speedy admission of Wisconsin. As great and momentous as are the questions growing out of northern and southern interests, it is not strange that the entire North is now inviting us to throw off our territorial government, and to assume the rights that pertain to a free and independent state. By order of the Committee,

M. FRANK.

ASSEMBLY RESOLUTIONS CONCERNING STATE

HOOD19

Resolved by the Council and House of Representatives of the territory of Wisconsin:

Section 1. That the delegate in Congress from this territory be requested to endeavor to procure at the present session of Congress the passage of an act providing for the admission of Wisconsin into the Union as a state, upon an equal footing with the other states of the Union, and upon the following principles, to wit:

These resolutions, accompanying the report of the joint select committee on state government, were not passed by the Assembly. The copy, together with the discussion here presented, is taken from the Madison Express, January 29, 1846. The document is of interest as showing the views of the joint committee concerning the action desired at the hands of Congress with respect to admission to statehood.

The boundaries of the state of Wisconsin shall be the same as those of the present territory of Wisconsin.

Section 2. The convention of delegates elected to form a constitution for the state of Wisconsin shall provide by an ordinance irrevocable without the consent of the United States, that the said state shall never interfere with the primary disposal by the United States of its lands within said state, nor with any regulations Congress may find necessary to make for securing the title in such lands to the bona fide purchasers thereof; and that no tax shall be imposed by said state on lands the property of the United States; and that in no case shall nonresident proprietors be taxed higher than residents; and that the bounty lands granted, or hereafter to be granted, for military services during the late war, shall, while they continue to be held by the patentees, or their heirs, remain exempt from any tax laid by order or under the authority of the state, whether for state, county, township, or any other purpose, for the term of three years from and after the date of the patents respectively.

Section 3. In consideration that the United States has heretofore attached to the states of Illinois and Michigan a portion of the territory which in justice should belong to and form a part of the fifth state to be formed and established in the Northwest Territory, according to the fifth article of the ordinance entitled "An ordinance for the government of the territory of the United States northwest of the river Ohio," made July 13, 1787, and in consideration of the aforesaid ordinance to be made by the delegates elected to form a constitution for the state of Wisconsin, the Congress of the United States shall pledge its faith to provide by law for the following: To complete the harbors which are commenced at Southport, Racine, and Milwaukee, and to construct a harbor at each of the following points in Wisconsin: Port Washington, Sheboygan, Manitowoc, Twin Rivers, and Kewaunee.

Section 4. To improve the navigation of the Neenah, or Fox and Wisconsin rivers and unite them by a canal, so that the said rivers and canal shall be navigable by steamboats of the class that navigate the Mississippi River above the Rock River Rapids, in low water.

Section 5. To grant to the state of Wisconsin, for the purpose of aiding in the construction of a railroad from Lake Michigan to the Mississippi River, all the land not heretofore sold to those sections and fractional sections which are numbered with odd numbers on the plats of the public surveys, within the breadth of five full sections, taken in north and south, or east and west lines, on each side of the main route of said railroad, from one end thereof to the other, and if any of said sections or fractional sections thereof have been sold by the United States, then to grant to the state of Wisconsin a corresponding amount of land, to be selected by the said state of Wisconsin, in any other part of the said state, in any legal subdivision, and for the purpose of further aiding in the construction of said railroad, the lands heretofore selected, appropriated, and granted to the territory of Wisconsin for the purpose of opening a canal to connect the waters of Lake Michigan with those of Rock River, by act approved June 18, 1838, are hereby granted to the state of Wisconsin free and clear of any restrictions contained in said act of June 18, 1838. Provided That the said state shall never impose any tax or charge upon the United States or those in its employ for the transportation of the United States mail, troops, arms, munitions of war, or other property of the United States, over or through said railroad, rivers, or canal.

Section 6. To bring into market and offer for sale, as soon as may be practicable, all lands owned by the United States in said state, and to issue patents for all lands in said state, which have been or which may be purchased by any person from the United States in good faith.

Section 7. To pay to the state of Wisconsin from and after the time of the admission of such state into the Union the sum of ten per centum upon the net proceeds of the sales of the public lands which subsequent thereto shall be made within the limits of said state, upon the same terms and conditions and with the same limitations as is provided for other states by the first section of an act entitled "An act to appropriate the proceeds of the sales of the public lands, and to grant preëmption rights," approved September 4, 1841: Provided That the aforesaid grants of land shall not be taken or considered as a part of the land to be granted to the said state by the eighth section of said last aforesaid act, but there shall in addition to the aforesaid grants be granted to the state of Wisconsin 500,000 acres of land to be selected and located according to the provisions of said eighth section.

Section 8. To pay to the state of Wisconsin five per cent of the net proceeds of the sales of all public lands lying within the state of Wisconsin, which have been or shall be sold by Congress, from and after the admission of said state into the Union, after deducting all the expenses incident to the same, which sum shall be appropriated for making public roads and canals within the said state of Wisconsin, as the legislature thereof may direct.

Section 9. That the said delegate be further requested to procure from Congress at its present session an appropriation of $30,000 to be paid to the treasurer of the territory and by him to be applied to the payment of the expenses of taking a census of the inhabitants of Wisconsin and the expenses of holding a convention to form a constitution for the state of Wisconsin, and that the said delegate be further requested to endeavor to procure the passage of a law providing that the state of Wisconsin upon her admission into the Union as a state shall be entitled to two senators in the Senate of the United States and two members of the House of Representatives of the United States.