Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly vol. 1.djvu/155

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Our Public Land System.
143

part of all the government lands for school purposes. As our land system developed, and states were parceled off one after another, the propositions offered to them more and more contained large donations for schools of different grades. The proposition to the State of Ohio, and the appropriations actually made in 1803, named the sixteenth section in every township in that part of the territory purchased of the Indians; the thirty-sixth part of the United States Military Tract; fourteen townships in the Connecticut Reserve; one thirty-sixth part in the Virginia Military Tract, and also one thirty-sixth part of all the United States lands in the State of Ohio to which the Indian title had not yet been extinguished, to be purchased of the Indians, to consist of the sixteenth section in each township. One entire township in the District of Cincinnati was offered for the establishment of an academy. John Cleve Symmes and his associates, who had purchased a tract in Ohio supposed to contain one million acres, received from congress, in addition, one entire township "for the purpose of establishing an academy and other public schools and seminaries of learning."

When the public lands in Louisiana were offered for sale there was excepted "section number 16 in every township, and a tract reserved for a seminary of learning." When Tennessee relinquished her claims to certain lands, the state was required to appropriate one hundred thousand acres in one tract for the use of two colleges, one to be located in East and one in West Tennessee. Another hundred thousand acres was to be appropriated for the use of an academy in each county in the state, the land not to be sold for less than $2 per acre; and the state should, in issuing grants and perfecting titles, locate one section in every township for