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Show 74 HISTORY OF PUBLIC LAND LAW DEVELOPMENT did not wish "to bind down the Legislature to admit Western States on the terms there stated."42 Morris, who was to be the guiding hand in the formation of Article IV, Section 3, beheld the West as a spectre that could destroy the government established by a more "enlightened" East. On July 11, he had said that "they [the westerners] would not be able to furnish men equally enlightened, to share in the administration of our common interests. The busy haunts of men, not the remote wilderness, was the proper School of political Talents." He warned that "If the Western people get the power into their hands they will ruin the Atlantic interests," alleging that "The Back members are always most averse to the best measures." He mentioned the case of Pennsylvania before it had adopted a more democratic constitution, saying that the "lower part of the State had the power in the first instance. They kept it in their own hands and the country was the better for it."43 Judging from these statements, Morris would have preferred to exclude the West from the Union perpetually. Notwithstanding his views, Morris redrafted what became in slightly changed form Section 3 of Article IV of the Constitution:44 New States may be admitted by the Congress into this Union; but no new States shall be formed or erected within the Jurisdiction of any other State; nor any State be formed by the Junction of two or more States, or Parts of States, without the Consent of the Legislatures of the States concerned as well as of the Congress. The small states, under the leadership of Charles Carroll of Maryland who had previously tried to strike out the clause requiring consent of a state to its being divided, made a final attempt to assure that the western lands would be vested in the United States and not retained by any individual state. He proposed a clause stating "that nothing in this Constitution shall be construed to affect the claim of the U.S. to vacant lands 42 Ibid., II, 454. 43 Ibid., I, 583. 44 Ibid., II, 455. ceded to them by the Treaty of Paris."45 This and a modification of it were quickly displaced in consideration by Gouveneur Morris' action in moving what is essentially Article IV, Section 3, clause 2: The Legislature shall have power to dispose of and make all needful rules and regulations respecting the territory or other property belonging to the U. States; and nothing in this constitution shall be so construed as to prejudice any claims either of the U.S. or of any particular State. Maryland alone dissented from this action.46 The Constitution was put into force upon ratification by New Hampshire as the ninth state in 1788, but for much of that document volumes of explanation of the legal meaning of its provisions lay in the future. Many difficult cases were to arise, requiring the Supreme Court to interpret the scope and effect of its provisions, not the least of which was the power conferred upon Congress "to dispose of and make all needful Rules and Regulations respecting the Territory . . . belonging to the United States." While the Convention was drafting the Constitution in Philadelphia, the Confederation Congress sitting in New York included in its last great act, the Northwest Ordinance, a number of provisions restricting the powers of the new districts or states over the public domain of the United States. Legislatures were never to interfere "with the primary disposal of the soil by [of] the United States . . . nor with any regulations Congress may find necessary for securing the title in such soil to the bona fide purchasers." No tax was to be "imposed on lands the property of the United States," and nonresident owners were to be taxed no higher than residents. In the Enabling Act of April 30, 1802, providing for the admission of Ohio, the first public land state, none of these features was included, perhaps because Congress thought the limitations in the Northwest Ordinance sufficiently binding.47 45 Ibid., II, 461, 465. i(iIbid., II, 466. 47 2 Stat. 175. |