9. The first meeting of the Legislature under this Constitution shall be on the first Monday in November following its ratification by the people, at Iowa City, in Johnson county, which place shall be the Seat of Government of the State of Iowa, until the year eighteen hundred and sixty-five, and until removed by law.

DONE in Convention at Iowa City, this first day of November one thousand eight hundred and forty-four, and of the Independence of the United States of America the sixty-ninth. IN TESTIMONY WHEREOF, We have hereunto subscribed our

WILLIAM R. HARRISON, JOHN HALE, JR.

THEOPHILUS CRAWFORD, J. C. BLANKINSHIP,

LUMAN M. STRONG,
SAMUEL W. MCATEE,
C. B. CAMPbell,
RALPH R. BENEDICT,
SULIFAND S. Ross,

ENOCH ROSS,

JOHN H. RANDOLPH,
STEPHEN B. SHELLEDY,
RICHARD QUINTON,
JONATHAN E. Fletcher,

-Reprinted from Journal of the Convention for the Formation of a Constitution for the State of Iowa, begun and held at Iowa City on the first Monday of October, 1844, p. 187.

AN ORDINANCE.

BE IT ORDAINED, By the Convention assembled to form a Constitution for the State of Iowa, in behalf and by the authority of the people of said State, that the following propositions be made to the Congress of the United States, which, if assented to by that body, shall be obligatory on the State.

I. Section number sixteen in every surveyed township of public lands, and where such section has been sold or otherwise disposed of, other lands equivalent thereto, and as contiguous as may be, shall be granted to the State for the use of Schools.

2. The seventy-two sections of land set apart and reserved for the use and support of a University, by an act of Congress approved on the twentieth of July, one thousand eight hundred and forty, entitled an act granting two townships of land

for the use of a University in the Territory of Iowa, shall, together with such further quantities as may be agreed upon by Congress, be conveyed to the State, and shall be applied solely to the use and support of such University, in such manner as the General Assembly may prescribe.

3. That five entire sections of land, in addition to the one heretofore granted, to be selected and located under the direction of the Legislature, in lega' divisions of not less than one quarter section, from any of the unappropriated lands belonging to the United States, within this State, shall be granted to the State for the purpose of completing the public buildings of the State at the seat of government, to be applied in such manner as the General Assembly may direct.

4. One township of any of the public lands within this State not otherwise disposed of, for the purpose of finishing the Penitentiary of the Territory of Iowa, to be selected as the General Assembly may direct.

5. That all salt springs within the State, with six sections adjoining or as contiguous as may be to each, shall be granted to the State for its use, to be selected by the Legislature.

6. That five per cent. of the nett proceeds of the sales of all public lands lying within the State, which shall be sold by Congress, after the admission of the State into the Union, shall be granted to the State.

7. That thirty-six sections of land be granted to the State for a lunatic assylum; thirty-six sections for an assylum for the deaf and dumb, and thirty-six sections for an assylum for the instruction of the blind, to be selected from any of the United States lands within the state of Iowa, that may be subject to private entry, to be selected in not less quantities than the legal sub divisions of quarter sections, in such manner as the Legislature may direct.

8. One quarter section of land in each township for the purpose of purchasing a library for the benefit of the township. That in consideration of the grants specified in the eight foregoing propositions, it is declared that this State will never

interfere with the primary disposal of the soil within the same by the United States, nor with any regulations Congress may find necessary for securing the title in such soil, to the bonafide purchaser thereof, and that no tax shall be imposed on lands, the property of the United States, and that in no case shall non-resident proprietors be taxed higher than resident.

-Reprinted from Journal of the Convention for the Formation of a Constitution for the State of Iowa, begun and held at Iowa City on the first Monday of October, 1844, p. 207.

A MEMORIAL

TO THE SENATE AND HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES OF THE UNITED STATES.

The Convention for the formation of a Constitution for the State of Iowa, having performed that duty, herewith present the Constitution which they have adopted, and ask to be admitted into the Union of the States.

A large majority of the votes in every county in this Territory were given at the township elections in April last, for a convention to form a Constitution for a State government, and in pursuance of that determination, delegates were elected on the first Monday in August last, who met at Iowa City on the first Monday of the present month, and will close their labors with this address.

The population of the Territory, as will appear from an abstract of the census, was, in the month of May last, upwards of eighty thousand, and having conformed to the principles of the Federal Constitution, we confidently rely upon the guarantee in the third article of the treaty between the United States and France, for admission in the Union of the United States at as early a day as possible. Liberal donations of land for education, internal improvements, seats of government, for ameliorating the condition of the deaf and dumb, the blind

and the insane, have invariably been made by Congress to the new States, and this well settled precedent, fraught as it is with incalculable benefits, and based upon considerations extending far beyond the mere limits of the particular State to which such grants may be made, it is confidently believed, will not be departed from now, to the detriment and injustice of Iowa.

The Delegate to the Congress of the United States from this Territory, is fully acquainted with the several objects for which donations should be made; and without further specification upon this subject, we submit it to the magnanimity and justice of Congress, trusting that in this, and all other respects, we shall be placed upon an equal footing with the States which have preceded us.

The revenue for the support of a State government must necessarily be derived, to a great extent, from a tax upon real estate; and for this State to be deprived of the right of taxing the lands of her citizens for five years from the time of sale, by the general government, would place a heavy and unjust burden where there is less ability to bear it. Against this restriction, contained in the compacts with many of the new States, this Convention would respectfully protest, as one that would be calculated, if applied to Iowa, to affect unjustly and unequally, portions of her citizens, and greatly retard the prosperity of the State.

-Reprinted from Journal of the Convention for the Formation of a Constitution for the State of Iowa, begun and held at Iowa City on the first Monday of October, 1844, p. 208.

THE VOTE IN APRIL, 1845, ON THE CONSTITUTION OF 1844.

The Act of the Legislature of the 12th of February 1844, "to provide for the expression of the opinion of the people of the Territory of Iowa upon the subject of a State Constitu