Alabama state intelligencer., 1831-01-08

March next, which was carried.
 | MT MARDIs, from the select committee to which was referred resolution on the sub- ject, reported a bill to provide for the holding an election for Representatives to Congress, and for other purposes; which was twice read and referred to select committee.
 MT BAKER made the following report:
 The Select Committee to which was referred that part of His Excellency's Message, transmitting the
 Resolutions of the State of Mississippi, claiming the right to the waste lands within said State, l have had the same under consideration, and have instructed me to report
 That they have bestowed upon the subject that attention which its importance demanded, and have been unable to discover any tenable ground upon which the General Government can claim to hold the waste lands within this State. Your Committee will only notice some of the prominent points which are involved in the subject matter; and which have induc- ed them to the conclusion. that the State of l Alabama is the sole and exclusive owner of | the lands in question. The declaration of the 4th of July, '76, declared the States not only independent of the crown of Great Britain, but also independent of each other; and the | treaty of 'S3 was only compulsion of Great Britain to an acknowledgment of that right. l By the establishment of their independence, l the States became owners of the soil, and so- vereign within their respective limits. In | 1776, the time at which the right of soil pass l ed to the States respectively, there was not even confederated head. Each State was distinct sovereignty and had they so chosen, might have continued. Had the Union not taken place, no doubt can exist but that each State would have retained to herself the ow- nership of the soil within its respective bounds.
 The confederation did not take place until '77; i; and no powers were then conferred except those erhressiy delegated! The object in forming the confederacy, was for the purposes
 ct the common defence; and every power
 necessary for that object was given But those powers were not left to conjecture. It
 was expressly declared, that no powers were given but those expressly named Your Com
 mittee look in vain among those delegations oF power, for the article which conveys to the General Government the right of soil but they confess their search has been fruitless. No such right is ceded and the right of the Government can be supported on no other ground than the exercise for a few years of
 the right claimed, which, in the opinion of your Committee, is a ground that a just and
 nagnanmous Government would not rely upon.
 | The idea of sovereignty forbids the suppo-
 sition, that the General Government could be
 owners of the soil. The right of soil and jul risdiction are too intimately connected to be separated. Without the right of soil no State can be sovereign To be sovereign, means the right of acting without restriction to have uncontrolled power over every thing within the territory claimed. To provide for the citizens of the country, and adopt mea- sures for the improvement of it, is not only the province, but the duty of a sovereign. | To the State of Alabama, in her sovereign character, does the citizen look for protec- tion, and an advancement of his condition. In the State depends it's own future improve ment. But how can that improvement take place, in what manner can the condition of l the citizens be benefited, while Congress claims the right of disposing of the public lands ? Our State is one purely agricultural, | and in the land her wealth consists. The | settling of the waste lands is a desirable ob- ject; and under the direction of the State that object could soon be accomplished. It is not only good policy, but a law of nature, that man should have the earth to till, and on as easy terms as possible. A sovereign, acting | on these principles, would divide out the public lands so as to ensure its speedy and dense population. The State of Alabama acting in good faith to its citizens, would so do; but is prevented by more sovereign so- vereign To admit the right in the Gene ral Government, is also to admit that the public lands might, for all time to come, con- tinue waste and that Congress has the pow CT to cripple a sovereign State, in all it's at tempts at improvement. Suppose Congress should refuse ever to sell any. more of the public lands, or even to permit its settlement, would not the State be materially injured and would not the extraordinary fact be pre- l sented, of one sovereign controlled in his em- pire by another sovereign, and each claiming to be independent By no principle of the law of nations, as laid down in Vattel, can State be said to be sovereign, which has not the two attributes of soil and jurisdiction and if the General Government has the right of soil in the State of Alabama, so far from be- ing free, sovereign, and independent State, she is in mere colonial dependence on the Go vernment.
 That neither Congress nor the thirteen old States regarded the crown lands as passing to the Government, by the treaty of peace of '83, is evident, from the recommendations of Congress to the States in relation to those lands, and the cession by States, and accep- tances by Congress, of them. The cession by Virginia of the northwestern territory by N. Carolina, of Tennessee ; and by Georgia, of all her territory from the Chattahoochie to the Mississippi rivers, furnishes to your Con- mittee conclusive testimony that Congress re- garded the right of soil as in the States; and that the States themselves never regarded it in any other light. And this brings them to the consideration of the cessicn made by Georgia in 1902.
 The inducements to the cession should first be inquired into, so as to arrive at a correct understanding of the agreement itself. The vast extent of country inhabited by savages. extending to the river Mississippi owned by the State of Georgia, admonished that State