Page:Messages and Letters of William Henry Harrison Vol. 1.djvu/112

74 the people of Indiana to the suspension of the sixth article of compact between the United States and the people of that territory: also, a memorial and petition of the inhabitants of the said territory; made the following report: "That the rapid population of the State of Ohio sufficiently evinces in the opinion of your committee, that the labor of slaves is not necessary to promote the growth and settlement of colonies in that region. That this labor, demonstrable the dearest of any, can only be employed to advantage in the cultivation of products more valuable than any known to that quarter of the United States: that the committee deem it highly dangerous and inexpedient to impair a provision wisely calculated to promote the happiness and prosperity of the Northwestern country, and to give strength and security to that extensive frontier. In the salutary operation of this sagacious and benevolent restraint, it is believed that the inhabitants of Indiana will, at no very distant day, find ample remuneration for a temporary privation of labor and of emigration.

On the various objects of the memorial, your committee beg leave to observe:

That, an appropriation having been made, empowering the Executive to extinguish Indian titles to lands within the limits of the United States, the particular direction of that power rests entirely with that department of the Government; that, to permit the location of the claims under the resolve of Congress of the 29th of August, 1788, and the act of the 3d of March, 1791, (of whose number and extent the committee are entirely ignorant) in the mode pointed out in the memorial, would be an infringement upon that regular mode of survey and of location which has been so happily adhered to in relation to the public lands. At the same time, the committee are of opinion that, after those lands shall have been surveyed, a certain number of townships should be designated, out of which the claims aforesaid ought to be satisfied. In a country abounding in new and unsettled lands, it is presumed that every individual may become a proprietor of the soil; and inasmuch as the people of Indiana will at a period not far distant, be enabled to establish the right of suffrage on such principles as the majority may approve, the committee deem it inexpedient to alter a regulation whose