upon your attention the importance of improving the navigation of the Mississippi river, by removing the obstructions at the rapids. It is well known to your honorable body that the only obstruction to the navigation of the Mississippi river, from its mouth to the Falls of St. Anthony, are the Des Moine rapids near the southern boundary of lowa, and the Rock river rapids about one hundred and fifty miles above. These rapids cut off the navigation of the river for steam boats, except at periods of high water, in general not exceeding two months per year. During the greater part of the season, all freight passing up or down the river has to be towed over the rapids in keels, at great risk, delay, and expense, or transported by land a distance of about twelve miles. The extent of the obstruction to navigation is such as to make the cost of transportation from St. Louis to Galena, while the rapids are impassable for steam boats, double, and often four times as great as when boats can pass freely through. Many boats, also, are shattered, and large amounts of property destroyed every year in attempting to make the passage. When it is considered that the Mississippi river, for seven hundred miles above the lower rapids, runs through the most fertile and beautiful country in the west, and is the natural highway for all the commerce of that vast and teeming valley; when it is considered that all the produce of the lead mines, all the grain, and other productions of this region must seek a market, and all its supplies in return be borne upon the Mississippi; and when it is considered with what rapidity, hitherto unparalleled, this region is increasing in population and wealth, it will be seen what great interests, present an prospective, will be subserved by the improvement to which we have felt it our duty to call your attention. It is believed from careful estimates, that the annual loss to the people of Wisconsin, Iowa and Illinois, in the increased price of transportation caused by the rapids, amounts to as much as the whole cost of removing them, large though it be. Sound policy and the interests of the country evidently demand this improvement. That it is constitutional, that it is within the power, and is the duty of the general government to keep open the channel of this great arm of the ocean, seems to be agreed by those who contend for the most strict construction. Your memorialists therefore respectfully urge upon you the importance and necessity of this work, and pray that an appropriation may be immediately made to accomplish it. And the President of the United States is most respectfully requested to sanction the law making said appropriation, should one be made by congress. WILLIAM SHEW, Speaker of the House of Representatives. APPROVED, February 10, 1847. HENRY DODGE. President of the Council. MEMORIAL To congress on the subject of mail routes. To the Honorable Senate and House of Representatives in Congress assembled: The memorial of the Legislative Assembly for the Territory of Wisconsin respectfully represents : That a mail route is greatly needed from Prairieville, in Waukesha county, to Addison, viz: Clark's mills, Lisbon, Warren, Erin, Night's, terminating at Addison, on the Milwaukee mail route to Fond du Lac, distance about thirty miles from Prairieville. Also, a mail route from Mukwanago, viz: Summit, in Waukesha county, to Waupun, in Fond du Lac county. That the establishment of the above mail routes would be a very great convenience to numerous settlers and residents, in a prosperous and rapidly improving section of country, in affording them mail facilities of which they are now entirely destitute, short of traveling from five to fifteen miles to reach the nearest existing post offices. And your memorialists will ever pray. WILLIAM SHEW, Speaker of the House of Representatives. President of the Council. APPROVED February 11, 1847. HENRY DODGE. MEMORIAL To congress for the reduction of the price of even section lands on the Milwaukee and Rock river canal district. The memorial of the Council and House of Representatives of the Territory of Wisconsin to the Congress of the United States, respectfully sheweth: That congress, by an act approved February 18th, 1838, granted to the territory of Wisconsin, to aid in the construction of the Milwaukee and Rock River Canal, one half of a strip of land, ten miles wide, along the route of said canal, consisting of the odd numbered sections and embracing about one hundred and forty thousand acres. This grant seems to have been induced by the belief that by the aid thus given the canal would be speedily construct ed, and thereby the value of the public lands in its vicinity would be largely increased. Accordingly the minimum price of these lands, as well of the odd sections granted to the territory, as of the even sections retained by the government, was fixed by the act of congress at two dollars and fifty cents per acre. The project of constructing the canal, however, was found to be far beyond the available resources of the company and of the territory, and has long since been abandoned by both. In the mean time. however, large numbers of settlers, invited by the prospective improvement of the country by the construction of the canal, located upon these lands, and made valuable improvements thereon, awaiting the time when they should be offered in market at the enhanced price placed on them as aforesaid. The abandonment of the work has been to all these enter prising and meritorious individuals a source of deep disappointment and irreparable injury after many years of anxious suspense, the legislative assembly of the territory, at its present session has given relief to the settlers on the odd sections by passing an act authorizing the sale of all the unsold portions of the lands granted to the territory, at the minimum price of one dollar and thenty-five cents per acre. It is believed that a large portion of these sections will be sold during the ensuing year. The settlers on the even sections present equal claims to the interposition of congress for their relief. No reason seems to exist why these lands should be held at a higher price per acre than the adjacent portions of the public domain. On the the contrary, after many years of delay and suspense, it would seem that the government ought not to add to the disappointment arising from the abandonment of the canal, the further injury of demanding double the ordinary price of the public lands. The restoration of the even sections to the price imposed on them before the illusive promise of a public improvement to enhance their value, was held out, would seem to be the dictate equally of true equity and sound poli cy. Many of these lands were occupied by settlers prior to the act of 1838, by which they were taken out of the market and the settlers cut off from the ordinary pre-emption rights then existing by the laws of the United States. Justice requires that these settlers, and especially those who located before the act of 1838 should be restored to the rights enjoyed by settlers on all the other public lands. Your memorialists therefore ask that the even sections belonging to the canal tract aforesaid shall be placed in market at the same price and on the same terms and conditions in all respects as all the other public lands in the Milwaukee land district. They also respectfully represent that all such persons as may have heretofore purchased lands in said sections at the minimum price of two dollars and fifty cents per acre, being an increase of one dollar and twenty-five cents per acre, in consequence of the proposed improvements now abandoned, should be repaid the amount of such increased rates, on making due proof of the facts to the proper land officers. And your memorialists pray that provision may be made by law for the relief of purchasers in all such cases, by giving the actual settlers of the said even section lands one year preemption to the same. WILLIAM SHEW, Speaker of the House of Representatives. APPROVED, February 11, 1847. President of the Council. HENRY DODGE. |