Page:History of Iowa From the Earliest Times to the Beginning of the Twentieth Century Volume 1.djvu/319

CHAPTER XVIII HE boundary of Iowa as fixed by Congress would have taken eleven counties from southeastern Minnesota, extending the northern boundary of Iowa about forty-two miles farther north than now. But the western boundary was on the line of the west side of Kossuth County and thence south, dividing the counties of Calhoun, Greene, Guthrie and Adair, following the west line of Union and Ringgold to Missouri. This would have cut off from Iowa as now formed, thirty-one counties of the Missouri slope and the Des Moines valley. It would have brought the western boundary of the State within about forty miles of Des Moines. The State would have been about one hundred and eighty miles wide from east to west, and about two hundred and fifty miles long from north to south. This would have brought the geographical center near Cedar Falls and probably made that town or Waterloo the permanent Capital.

Hon. A. C. Dodge, the Iowa Delegate in Congress, opposed the change in boundaries with all the ability and influence he could command, but when it was finally approved by Congress and the President, he acquiesced, believing that no more acceptable boundaries could be obtained. He issued an address to his constituents advising them to accept the boundaries fixed by Congress and ratify the new Constitution. In that address he said:

“A majority of the Committee on Territories was composed of members from the slave-holding portion of the Union. The Delegate from Florida, supported by the members from the South, brought forward a proposition for a division of that State, although its whole territory was three thousand square miles less than that embraced within the constitutional boundaries of Iowa. The object of this move being to increase the number of slave