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ASTRONOMY DETERMINES THE MEASURE OF LANDS, AND IS THE BASIS OF THE PUBLIC SURVEYS.

After having determined the relations of place on the surface of the earth, and the quantity of that surface in the aggregate, there still remained a problem of geographical relations to be determined by astronomy, whose results entered into the business of every-day life. It was one of vast practical utility, and to no country more so than to that in which we live. That problem was, to give exact measurement and precise locality to those pieces of land distributed by legal title among the individuals of each particular nation. The solution of this problem has a direct and immediate value; it gives accuracy to the description of lands, and stability to the tenure of legal titles. In no part of the world has this been done with more strict method, with more harmony of parts, or with more symmetry of proportion, than in the survey of the public domain in the Northwestern Territory of the United States. The value of that survey to the public interests, the simplicity of its arrangements, and its immediate connection with the scientific history of the West, make it especially proper that I should make a brief statement of the astronomical survey of the northwestern states.

It was in May, 1785, now sixty-five years since, Congress adopted by law the plan of laying out the public lands in six miles square, by rectangular coordinates. In June, 1787, they passed the ordinance.

for the government of the Northwestern Territory. So it is the northwestern states which have been the chief theatre for the practical development of that system.

This ordinance for the division of the public lands, one of the most important in the history of the United States, was not the work of a moment, or adopted on slight consideration. It was wisely planned, and deliberately considered. It was before Congress, and fully debated during three months. In the debates, a motion was made to strike out the clause relating to this mode of surveying and subdividing lands, and the motion received the support of four states. This plan was, therefore, an act of deliberate wisdom.*

* The following brief history of the origin of the present admirable system of land surveys, adopted by the United States government, would be out of place here, but that it is a part of the history of the country very little known, and which reflects honor on the men of science, and the education of this country during the last generation.

The ordinance for the sale and distribution of lands in the Western Territory, preceded the ordinance of 1787, for the government of the Northwestern Territory, and was in fact the first great movement made after the cession of Virginia, for the future settlement of the northwestern states. A brief history of this ordinance is not altogether disconnected from the subject of Astronomy.

March 4, 1785, “An Ordinance for ascertaining the mode of locating and disposing of lands in the Western Territory," was read the first time in Congress.

March 16, it was referred to a committee of one member from each state. This committee consisted of Mr. Long, Mr. King, Mr. Howell, Mr. Johnson, Mr. R. R. Livingston, Mr. Stewart, Mr. Gardner, Mr. J. Henry, Mr. Grayson, Mr. Williamson, Mr. Bull, and Mr. Houston.

The connection of this mode of surveying with astronomy is obvious. An exact meridian line for

April 14, this committee reported an ordinance for "ascertaining a mode of disposing of lands in the Western Territory."

April 20, 21, 22, 23, 26, this ordinance was discussed. On the 26th, a motion was made by Mr. Grayson, to recommit the ordinance, which failed.

April 27 and 28, the ordinance was further discussed.

May 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6, various motions were made as to the mode of offering the lands for sale, and they were debated.

May 19th, the ordinance was again taken up, and on the 20th of May, 1785, it was finally passed, having been amply debated during nearly three months. This ordinance contains the following paragraphs:

1. The surveyors, as they are respectively qualified, shall proceed to divide the said territory in townships of six miles square, by lines running due North and South, and others crossing these at right angles, as near as may be, &c., &c.

2. The plats of townships, respectively, shall be marked by subdivisions into lots of one mile square, or 640 acres, in the same direction as the external lines, and numbered from 1 to 36, &c.

The first of these, it will be observed, is the system of rectangular co-ordinates. The second is the system of sections, as the land is now sold by.

This system, however, was not universally approved of, because its tendency was to delay the sales of public lands till they could be correctly measured, and the title perfectly ascertained. By this very procedure, so favorable to the people generally, and to the public prosperity, speculation in land warrants, and the irregular surveys and locations afterwards adopted in Kentucky and in Virginia lands, was prevented.

In the Madison papers, vol. 2, pages 637 to 639, Mr. Madison says, that the Eastern States favored the plan adopted, while the southern people were for “indiscriminate locations." These indiscriminate locations were precisely the evil which was sought to be avoided. In

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any given spot is determined by astronomical observation. Through this spot is drawn another line at right angles. This last line is parallel to the equator, because that also is perpendicular to the meridian. Here, then, we have two fixed astronomical lines at right angles to each other. The first of these is the meridian line, and the second is called the base line. They make the two standard lines from which all others in the survey proceed. From these, lines are run, at any required distance, by the common compass. The intersections of these lines determine the locality of every spot in the immense surface covered by the northwestern states. The result is, that the whole country is divided into squares of any size which the government or the holders of lands may choose.

In carrying out this plan, it was not enough to declare, as in the ordinance of 1785, that the lands should be surveyed in certain described squares of townships and sections. It was required that astronomy should be called in to determine the standard lines, and fix, with permanency and certainty, the true meridians, and the latitudes of certain principal

Kentucky they have occasioned endless litigation, while the lands of Ohio and Indiana, surveyed by the United States, have been comparatively without any legal difficulty.

At the period Mr. Madison wrote (1787), about six hundred thousand acres of the public lands had been surveyed under the ordinance

of May, 1785.

points. In the year 1803, the late Colonel Jared Mansfield was appointed Surveyor-General of the northwestern states and territories, by President Jef ferson. He was not appointed for the purpose of practical surveys, as they are now carried on, but for the purpose of determining astronomically certain lines of latitude, and the principal meridians on which the surveys were thereafter to proceed, and in fact have ever since proceeded, with precision and scientific exactitude.*

* In Niles' Register, volume 16, page 363, is a letter of Mr. J. Meigs, the Commissioner of the Land-Office, in which he describes the principal meridians that were run by the Surveyor-General, on which to base systems of surveys. The first principal meridian passed through the mouth of the Great Miami, and extended to the northern boundary of the United States.

The second principal meridian commences at a point five miles southwest of the confluence of Little Blue River with the Ohio, and extends to the northern boundary of the United States. At thirty miles from its commencement it is crossed bythe base line, a parallel to the equator.

The third principal meridian commences at the confluence of the Ohio and the Mississippi.

There are other meridians surveyed since. Mr. Meigs says, that "the principles of this system have governed the public surveys in Alabama, Mississippi, and Louisiana, and will unquestionably be adhered to until the public surveys shall reach Astoria, at the mouth of Columbia River, in longitude 48 degrees west of the capital."

In volume 12, page 97, of Niles' Register, will be found another letter from Mr. Meigs, in which this species of surveys is particularly described. In the same volume, page 407, Mr. Meigs thus speaks of the authorship of what may be called the ASTRONOMICAL SYSTEM OF SURVEYING; (for the reader will observe, it was one thing to divide

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