USA > Vermont > Vermont state papers; being a collection of records and documents, connected with the assumption and establishment of government by the people of Vermont; together with the first constitution, and the laws from the year 1779 to 1786, etc > Part 23
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And be it further enacted by the authority aforesaid, That all persons now actually occupying, possessing and improving, lands within the said district of country, or who did, at any time, before the passing of this act, actually occupy, possess and improve lands therein, not heretofore grant- ed by any late colony, shall be, and they, and their legal representatives, respectively, are hereby confirmed in such their respective possessions and improvements, and shall have, and receive, patents therefor, front the government of this state, without paying for such patent any fee or re- ward, the expence of surveying such lands excepted ; provided, that no such patent as last aforesaid, shall issue, for more than the quantity of five hundred acres of land ; and where such occupant, possessor or improver, or legal representatives, shall not have possessed the said quantity of five hundred acres of land, he or she shall, respectively, be allowed and granted such additional quantity of land, out of any vacant, unappropria- ted lands, lying contiguous to such possession, as shall be equal to the de- Gciency,
And whereas, it is the intention of the Legislature, that such parts of this act as relate to quieting or confirming titles and possessions, within the district of country, as aforesaid, shall not take effect, and that the in- habitants residing within the said district of country, should not have the benefits thereby intended, unless they should agree to renounce the said assumed government, and return to their allegiance to the government of this state :
Be it, therefore, further enacted by the authority aforesaid, That, upon application of commissioners or agents, authorised and appointed by the inhabitants residing in the said district of country, or by the inhabitants of any town or towns, or district or districts therein, to the person adminis- tring the government of this state, for the time being, touching or concern- 'ing the ratifying, confirming and quieting any titles to, or possessions of, lands within the district aforesaid, in cases not provided for by this act, and of and concerning the mode, manner, terms and conditions, agreeable to, and on which, the inhabitants within the district of country aforesaid, shall agree to renounce thie said assumed government, and acknowledge allegiance to the government of this state, it shall and may be lawful for the person administring the government of this state, for the time being, by and with the advice and consent of the council of appointment, to ap- point and commissionate, under the great seal of this state, three com- missioners to meet, confer and agree with such commissioners or agenty,
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authorised and appointed by the said inhabitants of the said district of country, or by the inhabitants of any town or towns, or district or districts ' therein, on all and singular the matters and things above mentioned ; and all compacts, agreements and acts, entered into, made or done by the said commissioners to be appointed on behalf of this state, or any two of them, of or concerning the premises, shall be finally conclusive and bind- ing on tlre government of this state : provided nevertheless, that nothing in this act contained, shall be construed to authorise the said commission- ers to agree to cede or relinquish the jurisdiction of this state over the dis- trict of country aforesaid, or any part thereof, to any people, assemblies of people, or person or persons whatsoever, or to consent or agree that any part of the constitution of this state, shall be altered or changed.
And be it further enacted by the authority aforesaid, That nothing in this act contained, shall be deemed, construed or taken, to restore any person or persons, or his or their heirs, to his or their estate within the said district of country, who now stand attainted by the government of this state, for adherence to the king of Great-Britain, or whose estate or estates have, or shall, become confiscate for such adherence, by virtue of any law of this state."
Notwithstanding the unsettled and embarrassing state of her external relations, the internal tranquility of Vermont had, for some time, re- mained undisturbed. Her political institutions had been gradually ma- turing, and had assumed the tone of a regularly organized government ; which, though its constitution and administration were materially defec- tive, commanded the submission and respect of the great body of the citizens. New-York abstained from any direct interference with the in- ternal government of the state, contenting herself with a general claim of jurisdiction, and an opposition to the admission of Vermont into the union. There were some, however, who yielded a reluctant submis- sion to the government of Vermont, and who, as we shall soon sce, were ready to embrace any favorable occasion to renounce their allegiance to the state.
Exposed to invasion from the enemy in Canada, and left unprotected by the withdrawing of the continental troops from the northern frrontier, the government of Vermont found it necessary to order a draft of militia, . for the purpose of defence. This draft was resisted by sundry disaffect- ed persons in the southeastern part of the State, who were encouraged in their opposition, by the Governor of New-York. To several of these persons, civil and military commissions were given by the government of that state, and an attempt was made to enforce its laws upon the citizens of Vermont.
To the force raised to effect this treasonable purpose, it was found ne- cessary to oppose the prompt and rigid execution of the law. Five of
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the principal persons engaged in opposition to the authority of- Vermont, were arraigned before the Supreme Court, and sentenced to be punished by banishment and confiscation of their estates. They immediately for- warded to Congress a remonstrance, in which they claimed the interfe- . rence of that body, on the ground that their resolutions of the 24th of September, 1779, and 2d of June, 1780, had been violated ; inasmuch as the government of Vermont had " exercised authority over inhabi- tants, holding themselves to be subjects of, and to owe allegiance to, the state of New-York." This remonstrance appears to have been second -- ed by a letter from the Governor of New-York, of the 16th of Septem- ber, 1782.
On the 5th of December following, the subject came before Congress ; at which time the following resolution was adopted :
"Whereas, it appears to Congress, by authentic documents, that the people inhabiting the district of country on the west side of Connecticut river, commonly called the New-Hampshire Grants, and claiming to be an independent state, in contempt of the authority of Congress, and in direct violation of their resolutions of the 24th of September, 1779, and of the 2d of June, 1780, did, in the month of September last, proceed to exercise jurisdiction over the persons and properties of sundry inhabi- tants of the said district, professing themselves to be subjects of, and to owe allegiance to the state of New-York, by means whereof divers of them have been condemned to banishment, not to return on pain of death and confiscation of estate, and others have been fined in large sums and otherwise deprived of property ; therefore,
Resolved, That the said acts and proceedings of the said people, be- ing highly derogatory to the authority of the United States, and danger- ous to the confederacy, require the immediate and decided interposition of Congress, for the protection and relief of such as have suffered by tbem, and for preserving peace in the said district, until a decision shall be had of the controversy, relative to the jurisdiction of the same :
That the people inhabiting the said district, claiming to be indepen- dent, be, and they are hereby required, without delay, to make full and ample restitution to Timothy Church, Timothy Phelps, Henry Evans, William Shattuck, and such others as have been condemned to banish- ment and confiscation of estate, or have otherwise been deprived of pro. perty, since the first day of September last, for the damages they have sustained by the acts and proceedings aforesaid ; and that they be not molested in their persons or properties, on their return to their habitations in the said district :
That the United States will take effectual measures to enforce a com- pliance with the aforesaid resolutions, in case the same shall be disobeyed by the people of the said district:
That no persons holding commissions under the state of New-York, or under the people of the said district claiming to be independent, ex- ercise any authority over the persons and properties of any inhabitants
y
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in the said district, contrary to the forementioned resolutions of the 24th of September, 1779, and the 2d of June, 1780 :
That a copy of the foregoing resolutions be transmitted to Thomas Chittenden, Esq. of Bennington, in the district aforesaid, to be commu- nicated to the people thereof."
ยท By this extraordinary resolution, Congress evinced a determination to persist in the fatal error which produced the resolutions of the 24th of September, 1779, and 2d of June, 1780,-that of assuming the prerog- ative of legislating upon the rights of Vermont, and even controlling her internal police, without her consent.
Those who have become acquainted with the statesmen of that peri- od, by an attentive perusal of the documents we have recorded, will be prepared for the following remonstrance which this act of Congress drew from his Excellency Governor Chittenden. Its force of reasoning, and severity of rebuke, could hardly have been exceeded.
BENNINGTON, January 9, 1783.
To his Excellency the President of Congress : SIR,
Your Excellency's letter of the 11th ult. inclosing an Act of Congress of the 5th of December last, I have duly received, and have this day laid the same before the Council of this State, who agree in the opinion, that the interference of Congress to controul the internal police and gov- ernment of this State, is a matter too serions and extensive in its nature, to be determined, without consulting the Legislative Authority of the State, whose adjourned session is to be attended on the second Thurs- day of February next; at which time, I shall lay the same before them, and, as soon as may be, communicate to your Excellency their determi- nations on the premises. And, in the mean time, beg leave to lay before Congress the following remonstrance against their said Act, which is founded partly on a mutual agreement between Congress on the one part, and the State of Vermont on the other, that the latter should have been taken into the federal union of the United States, previous to the' date of the passing of the said Act; and partly on the impropriety of the claim of Congress to interfere in the internal government of this State. And,
1st. Congress is reminded of their solenm engagements to this State, in their public acts of the 7th and 21st* of August, 1781, which were officially transmitted to the Legislature of this State, and are in the words following :
[Here follow the resolutions of Congress of August 7th and 20th, 1781, as inserted above, pages 157, 159.] 1
* It seems from the proceedings of Congress on the 17th of April, that the resolution of the 20th of August 1781, was reconsidered and amended on the 21st. This fact ac. counts for its being referred to in different documents, under each of those dates The printed journal of Congress of the 21st, however, contains no notice of its reconsidera. Non or amendment.
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Confiding in the faith and honor of Congress in the foregoing reso- lutions, and, in consequence of advice received in a letter from his Ex- cellency General Washington, dated the 1st of January, 1782, which was publicly read and on which great confidence was placed, in which he says, " It is not my business, neither do I think it necessary, now to . discuss the origin of the right of a number of inhabitants to that tract of country, formerly distinguished by the name of the New-Hampshire Grants, and now known by that of Vermont. I will take it for granted, that their right was good, because Congress, by their resolve of the 7th of August implies it, and by that of the 21st are willing fully to confirm it, provided the new State is confined to certain described bounds. It appears, therefore, to me, that the dispute of boundary is the only one that exists, and that, that being removed, all further difficulties would be removed also, and the matter terminated to the satisfaction of all parties." His Excellency the General further observes ; " You have nothing to do, but withdraw your jurisdiction to the confines of your old limits, and obtain an acknowledgement of independence and sovereignty, under the resolve of the 21st of August, for so much territory as does not inter- fere with the ancient established bounds of New-York, New-Hampshire, and Massachusetts. I persuade myself, you will see and acquiesce in the reason, the justice, and, indeed, necessity of such a decision."
The Legislature of this State were induced to comply with the indis- pensable preliminary required of them, in the last recited act of Con- gress, as appears by the following, which is an extract of their proceed- ings.
[His excellency here recites the resolution of the Legislature of Ver- mont, of the 23d of February, 1782, by which the eastern and western unions were dissolved, and the proceedings of Congress, thercon, of the 17th of April following; for which the reader is referred to pages 169, 170, 171, and 172, of this collection.]
By the last mentioned motions, and the manner in which Congress left the matter, the Agents and Delegates, in behalf of this State, officially delivered to his Excellency, then President of Congress, a letter, of which the following is a copy.
[For this letter, see page 172.]
In consequence of this procrastination of Congress, the Agents of Vermont returned, and reported the aforesaid proceedings to the Legisla- ture of this State. And in October last, the said Legislature again ap- pointed Agents, with full powers and instructions, for the purpose of meeting Congress upon terms and articles of an admission of this State into the federal union, not conceiving that Congress would have de- parted from their agreement before recited ; but supposing their hitherto declining to execute it, might have been owing to a stretch of policy in- comprehensible to this government.
This being the confident disposition of the inhabitants of this State
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towards Congress; and a recognition of their independence and sove- reignty, and admission into the federal union, being thus secured by the promise and engagement of the United States, they could not, in this situation, be otherwise than alarmed, on receiving an act of Congress in the following words :
[For this act of Congress, see page 177.]
From the before recited resolutions of Congress, the journals of the Legislature of this State, and the after transactions between the United States in Congress assembled, and the Agents or Delegates from this State, the following inferences are deduced, to wit; the last mentioned resolutions of Congress of the 5th of December, 1782, are altogether predicated on other resolutions of theirs, of the 24th of September, 1779, and 2d of June, 1780, which prescribed to this State, in part, a desisting from the exercise of civil government; in which intermediate space of time, between the passing of the said resolutions of the 24th of Septem- ber, 1779, and 2d of June, 1780, and those of the 5th of December, 1782, a confederation or foderal nnion between the United States, repre- sented in Congress, and the Legislature of this State, had been mutually agreed upon between them; which agreement absolutely nullifies the force and validity of those resolutions of Congress of the 24th of Sep- tember, 1779, and 2d of June, 1780, on the supposition, that they were originally binding on this government (which is by no means admitted.) And inasmuch as the said last resolutions of Congress of the 5th of De- cember, 1782, are essentially founded on those antecedent resolutions of theirs, of 1779, and 1780, which were disannulled by the same authority that resolved them, in consequence of a subsequent mutual agreement of a federal union between the United States and this State, as aforesaid, and necessarily invalidates the last resolutions of Congress of the 5th of December, 1782 ; for they cannot be of any more validity than those other resolutions of 1779, and 1780, on which they were predicated; for, the before recited preliminary agreement, proposed on the part of Congress, of a federal union of the United States with this, and in the fullest and most explicit manner, acceded to, on the part of this State, is something or nothing. If it amounts to any thing, it supercedes and invalidates all antecedent and subsequent resolutions of Congress, re- specting this State, and renders them nugatory, and is still binding on the part of Congress; but if such solemn agreements are nothing, all faith, trust or confidence in the transactions of public bodies, is at an end. So certain as the plighted faith of Congress, in their said stipulated agree- ment with this State, was originally binding on them, the obligation still remains the same, which, of necessary consequence, invalidates all other resolutions of Congress respecting this State, until it is ratified by an ad- mittance of this State into the confederation of the United States, on their part. I have argued thus far, on Congress' own principles ; and proceed, next, to the second part of the argument, predicated on the im- propriety of the pretensions of Congress to controul the internal police of this State. Congress will not (it is presumed) pretend to unlimited
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power, or to any other than what has been delegated to them from the United States; nor will they pretend, that their articles of confederation will warrant them in interfering with, or controuling, the internal police of the United States; wlience, then, did they obtain a rightful prerogative over the internal police of this State, from which they have never received any delegated power? This State, (on revolution principles) has as good a right to independence as Congress, and has an equal right, (or rather po riglit,) to pass resolutions prescribing measures to Congress, as Con- gress has to prescribe to this State, to receive their banished, and make restitution to them and other criminals, of the property, which, by a le- gal process, has been taken from them, for their enormities heretofore committed against the laws and authority of this State. Formerly, it has been argued by Congress, and that justly, "That if Great Britain had a right to tax the" (then) " American Colonists, as they pleased, without representation, the Colonists could not call any part of their cash their own, since it might be taxed from them without their consent." The same argument will apply against the right of Congress to controul the civil authority of this State; for, if they may, in one instance, do it, they may in another, and so on, till they suppress the whole. But should they endeavor to frustrate the independence of this State, which has as good a right to it as themselves, it would be a manifest departure from their original design of liberty. Congress opposed the arbitrary, as- sumed prerogative of the British government, to make laws to bind the (then) colonists, or to controul their internal police, and have brought about a revolution, in which the people of this State have signalized themselves.
How inconsistent then, is it in Congress, to assume the same arbitrary stretch of prerogative over Vermont, for which they waged war against Great Britain? Is the liberty and natural rights of mankind a mere bub- ble, and the sport of state politicians ? What avails it to America to es- tablish one arbitrary power on the ruins of another? Congress set up as patriots for liberty ; they did well,-but pray extend the liberty, for which they are contending, to others. The inhabitants of the territory of Vermont have lived in a state of independence from their first settle- ment, to this day. Their first mode of government and management of their internal police, was very similar to that of the United States, in their first separation from the British government. They were governed by Committees of Safety, and Conventions; which last was their high- est judicature for the security of their just rights against the oppressions of the (thien) province of New-York, (the principal officers of the Green Mountain Boys being then judges in the said Territory ) and which, on the 15th day of January, 1777, declared themselves to be a free and in- dependent State, and have, from their first settlement of the country, maintained their independence, and protected their lives and properties, against all invaders, and date their freedom from the royal adjudication of the boundary line between New-York and New-Hampshire, the 20th July, 1764, and are now in the eighteenth year of their independence, and cannot submit to be resolved out of it, by the undue influence, which the State of New-York (their old adversary) has in Congress. This is
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too much,-heaven forbid it! The feelings of the citizens of Vermont, over which I have the honor to preside (1 am persuaded) will never give in to it ;- they are free, and in possession of it, and will remain indepen- dent of New-York, notwithstanding their artifice or power. This State have no controversy with the United States, complexly considered, and is, at all times, ready and able to vindicate their just rights and liberties, against any usurpations of the State of New-York.
To return to the transactions of Congress, particularly their resolves of the 5th of December, 1782. "Resolved, That the said acts and pro- ceedings of the said people,"-(which was that of their courts of jus- tice punishing delinquents, in due form of law," " being highly deroga- tory to the authority of the United States, and dangerous to the confede- racy, require the immediate and decided interposition of Congress, for the protection and relief of such as have suffered by them, and for pre- serving peace in the said district, until a decision shall be had of the con- troversy, relative to the jurisdiction of the same." That the exercise of civil law in this State is derogatory to the authority of the United States, considered as such, or that it should be thought dangerous to the onfed- eracy, is paradoxical; or that the interposition of Congress in t' is mat- ter, would be a means of restoring peace in this State, is equally so. Law, peace and order was established in this district, previous to the late resolves of Congress ; what discord they may occasion, time must de- termine. It is a general opinion, that a ratification of the said stipulated agreement would have had a more salutary tendency to peace, than the late resolutions. And as to the decision of the jurisdiction of the terri- tory of this State, Congress, in their resolutions of the 7th and 21st of August, 1781, did determine the limits, which they would guarantee to" the States of New-Hampshire and New-York, by virtue of the articles of confederation of the United States ; which is as follows ;- " By the Uni- ted States in Congress assembled, August 21, 1781. It being the fixed purpose of Congress to adhere to the guarantee of the States of New- Hampshire and New-York, contained in their resolutions of the 7th in- stant," to wit, that " they will consider all the lands belonging to New- Hampshire and New-York, respectively, without the limits of Vermont aforesaid, as coming within the mutual guarantee of territory contained in the articles of confederation, and that the United States will, accord ingly, guarantee such lands, and the jurisdiction over the same, against any claims or encroachments from the inliabitants of Vermont aforesaid." Thus far the resolutions of the 7th of August, referred to in the reso- lutions of the 21st ; the latter of which proceeds to point out the particu- lar boundaries of the guarantee to the States aforesaid, to wit; To the State of New-Hampshire all the lands "on the east side of the west banks of Connecticut river ;" and to the State of New-York all the lands "on the west side of a line beginning at the northwest corner of the State of Massachusetts, thence by a line, twenty miles east of Hud. son's river, so far as said river runs northerly in its general course, thence by the west bounds of the townships granted by the late government of New-Hampshire, to the river running from South Bay to Lake Cham- plain, thence along the said river to Lake Champlain, thence along the
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