236 ILLINOIS STATE ACADEMY OF SCIENCE 



Also, because of the revenue which accrued to the state 

 from the Saline, certain persons not connected with the 

 works favored the legalizing of slave labor. For some 

 years after the transfer of the salt reservation to the 

 State in 1818,^* the rentals therefrom made up a consider- 

 able proportion of the entire income of the state. In 1821, 

 for instance, they amounted to over twenty-five per cent of 

 the total revenue.! 5 The claim of the leasees that without 

 slave labor the works could not be kept open was thus 

 regarded with much uneasiness by some of the inhabitants, 

 who, in the end, cast their lot with the pro-slavery party — 

 for the time being, at least. All such arguments were un- 

 availing in the final outcome, however. 



The later history of the Saline; its decline due to the 

 competition offered by Kanawha salt and the growing scar- 

 city of fuel nearby ; the gradual sale of the woodland reser- 

 vationi^ and then of the Saline itself, with the utilization 

 of the moneys received in public improvements ; the second 

 period of prosperity through which it passed after the dis- 

 covery that the coal which lay close at hand could be used 

 for fuel and that from deeper wells could be obtained 

 stronger brine, and then the rapid decline which followed 

 the coming of the railroad into the region, end the story 

 of man's response to one of the least of the state's resources 

 and yet one of the greatest measured in terms of influence 

 exerted. Only a few of the many influences have been 

 traced; the others await our inquiries. 



14. As the territories which contained salt sources became converted into states. 

 Congress transferred the salines to their jurisdiction and gave title to them. The 

 transaction was, in every case, part of a pact between the United States and the 

 state seeking admission to the Union, whereby, in return for the salt lands and 

 various other emoluments (school lands, funds for college, or for University, and 

 for the improvement of roads and canals), the state was to provide "by an ordinance, 

 irrevocable without the consent of the United States," for certain tax exemptions 

 in accordance with the government land policy. Illinois had to bind herself also to 

 the principle of equal taxation for resident and non-resident proprietors. (See 

 Thorpe, Constitution and Organic Laws, II., 969-970). 



15. Pease, Frontier State, «2. 



16. The reservation in 1816 covered 98,500 acres, of which a large part was wood- 

 land. At first, the wood was cut and hauled to the furnaces which were situated 

 near the wells. Later, the furnaces were moved back into the timber and th« 

 water was pumped to them through wooden pipes. 



