Page:History of Iowa From the Earliest Times to the Beginning of the Twentieth Century Volume 1.djvu/362



, after its adjournment, he reappointed Joseph Williams, John F. Kinney and George Greene. An act was passed at the extra session for the appointment of a commission to prepare a complete code of laws for the new State. The commissioners selected for the work were Charles Mason of Burlington, William G. Woodward of Muscatine and Stephen Hempstead of Dubuque. Their work when completed embraced a careful compilation of all laws then in force and a code of civil and criminal practice which was known as the “Code of 1851.” The principal provisions of their work remained in force until the adoption of the Constitution of 1857 required a revision.

The commissioners chosen at the regular session of 1847 to locate the permanent Capital of the State, selected a location remote from any town, river, grove or settlement, possessing no natural advantages for a city or State Capital. It was in Jasper County, which at that time had a population of but five hundred and sixty persons. The site chosen was the west half of sections three and ten, and all of sections four, five, eight and nine in Congressional township, seventy-eight north, in range twenty, west of the 5th principal meridian. It was five miles west of the Skunk River and about two miles southeast of the present town of Prairie City. The commissioners laid out a tract two miles north and south, by two and a half miles east and west in size and named it “Monroe City.” They advertised a sale of lots to begin October 28, 1847 and continue from day to day. The sale opened with a large attendance and continued until the 3d of November. Four hundred and twenty-five lots were sold for an aggregate sum of $6,189.72, or a little more than $14 a lot; $1,797.40 only was paid in cash, notes being given for the balance, payable in two, four and six years. Two of the commissioners showed their confidence in the new city by purchasing fifty-two lots. Some of the favorite lots sold at from one hundred to three hundred dollars each. The