said District for their due execution, shall hereafter be executed, as regards lands in the county of Washington and without the limits of the city of Washington, by the Secretary of the Treasury through the General Land Office, where applications shall be made for warrants, which warrants shall be directed to the surveyor for the county of Washington; who shall make return to the Commissioner of the General Land Office; and payment for said land, according to the said laws of Maryland, shall be made to the Treasurer of the United States, whose certificate of such payment shall be presented to the Commissioner of the General Land Office, who shall thereupon issue in the usual form of patents for lands by the United States, a patent for such land to the person entitled thereto; and the Secretary of the Treasury shall make such regulations as he may deem necessary, and shall designate the officers who shall carry the said acts into effect:Proviso. Provided, That any land which may have been ceded to, or acquired by the United States for public purposes shall not be affected by such acts.
Approved, February 16, 1839.
No. 4. A Resolution authorizing certain certificates of deposite to be cancelled and reissued.
Preamble.Whereas sundry persons have deposited sums of money in the Treasury of the United States, under the provisions of the second section of the act making further provision for the sale of the public lands, approved twenty-fourth of April,1820, ch. 51. eighteen hundred and twenty, and received certificates therefor, and, supposing the same to be assignable, have assigned the same, for a valuable consideration, to other persons; and whereas the said section is so construed by the Treasury Department, that such receipts or certificates are not available to the assignees; be it, therefore,
Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That the Treasurer of the United States be,Certificates, on presentation, to be cancelled, and new ones issued. and he is hereby, authorized and required, on the presentation of any such certificate by an assignee or bona fide holder thereof, to allow said assignee or holder to surrender the same to be cancelled, and to issue a new certificate in the name of said assignee or holder, in lieu of the one so surrendered; which new certificate shall be received in payment for public lands, in the same manner as the original would have been had it not been transferred by the person who made the deposite; but the certificates to be issued under this resolution shall not be assignable.
Approved, February 28, 1839.
No. 9. A Resolution to authorize the purchase of an island in the river Delaware, called the Pea Patch, and for other purposes.
Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,Sec. War to take measures to try the title of the U. S. to Pea Patch island―how.
If not in the U. S., authorized to purchase―how. That the Secretary of War be, and he is hereby authorized and required to take all necessary measures to try the title of the United States to the island in the Delaware commonly called the Pea Patch, by submitting all the questions growing out of the conflicting claims of the United States and the individual claimants, to the courts of law; and if it shall appear to the satisfaction of the said Secretary, that the title is not vested in the United States, and that the possession thereof is indispensable to the public interests, he is hereby authorized to purchase the same from the legal owner or owners thereof, either by appraisement or such other manner as he may deem most expedient; subject to the approval of Congress.
