The Fathers of the Constitution [20]
as first developed was to acquire revenue for the Government; but it was also evident that there was a distinct purpose of encouraging settlement. The two were not incompatible, but the greater interest of the Government was in obtaining a return for the property. The other committee of which Jefferson was chairman made its report of a plan for the government of the western territory upon the very day that the Virginia cession was finally accepted, March 1, 1784; and with some important modifications Jefferson's ordinance, or the Ordinance of 1784 as it was commonly called, was ultimately adopted. In this case Jefferson rendered a service similar to that of framing the Declaration of Independence. His plan was somewhat theoretical and visionary, but largely practical, and it was constructive work of a high order, displaying not so much originality as sympathetic appreciation of what had already been done and an instinctive forecast of future development. Jefferson seemed to be able to gather up ideas, some conscious and some latent in men's minds, and to express them in a form that was generally acceptable. It is interesting to find in the Articles of Confederation (Article XI) that, "Canada acceding to this confederation, and joining in the measures of the United States, shall be admitted into, and entitled to all the advantages of this Union: but no other colony shall be admitted into the same unless such admission be agreed to by nine States." The real importance of this article lay in the suggestion of an enlargement of the Confederation. The Confederation was never intended to be a union of only thirteen States. Before the cession of their western claims it seemed to be inevitable that some of the States should be broken up into several units. At the very time that the formation of the Confederation was under discussion Vermont issued a declaration of independence from New York and New Hampshire, with the expectation of being admitted into the Union. It was impolitic to recognize the appeal at that time, but it seems to have been generally understood that sooner or later Vermont would come in as a full-fledged State. It might have been a revolutionary suggestion by Maryland, when the cession of western lands was under discussion, that Congress should have sole power to fix the western boundaries of the States, but her further proposal was not even regarded as radical, that Congress should "lay out the land beyond the boundaries so ascertained into separate and independent states." It seems to have been taken as a matter of course in the procedure of Congress and was accepted by the States. But the idea was one thing; its carrying out was quite another. Here was a great extent of western territory which would be valuable only as it could be sold to prospective settlers. One of the first things these settlers would demand was protection--protection against the Indians, possibly also against the British and the Spanish, and protection in their ordinary civil life. The former was a detail of military organization and was in due time provided by the establishment of military forts and garrisons; the latter was the problem which Jefferson's committee was attempting to solve. The Ordinance of 1784 disregarded the natural physical features of the western country and, by degrees of latitude and meridians of longitude, arbitrarily divided the public domain into rectangular districts, to the first of which the following names were applied: Sylvania, Michigania, Cherronesus, Assenisipia, Metropotamia, Illinoia, Saratoga, Washington, Polypotamia, Pelisipia. The amusement which this absurd and thoroughly Jeffersonian nomenclature is bound to cause ought not to detract from the really important features of the Ordinance. In each of the districts into which the country was divided the settlers might be authorized by Congress, for the purpose of establishing a temporary government, to adopt the constitution and laws of any one of the original States. When any such area should have twenty thousand free inhabitants it might receive authority