264 



HISTORY OF OHIO. 



Mr. Atwater, a member from Pickaway county, laid on the ta- 

 ble a resolution for appointing a committee of five members 

 on schools and school lands, which resolution also passed, and 

 a committee was appointed accordingly. This fact is brought 

 forward here, to show the entire harmony between those who 

 were endeavoring to bring about the great revolution in our 

 civil policy, which has succeeded the wretched state of things 

 before the canal, school and equitable mode of taxation, sys- 

 tems, were introduced among us. 



Mr. Williams and his committee, of whom he was the soul, 

 attended strictly to their duty. They had considerable diffi- 

 culty from various sources to contend with, but by address, 

 care, prudence and discretion, he and his committee overcame 

 all opposition. On the third day of January, 1822, he presen- 

 ted to the house an able and elaborate report recommending 

 the passage of a law, authorizing an examination into the prac- 

 ticability of connecting lake Erie with the Ohio river, by a 

 canaL He introduced a bill immediately after his report was 

 read, which embraced the views which his report recommended. 



To this bill, in all its stages on its passage through the house, 

 there was a steady hostility kept up by about thirteen mem- 

 bers, whose names will forever stand on the journal of that 

 house, in large capitals. We name them not. On Monday 

 January 21st 1822, Mr. Williams's bill passed the house on its 

 third reading. And it became a law, on its engrossment and 

 third reading in the senate on the 31st of January 1822. On 

 the same day, and hour, the joint resolution for appointing 

 seven commissioners of schools and school lands passed the 

 senate. The same messenger from the senate to the house 

 announced the final passage of both in the senate, in the same 

 message. 



Thus it appears that both these measures originated in the 

 house of representatives on the 6th day of December, and 

 that both became laws on the 31st of January thereafter; they 

 originated within fifteen minutes of each other, and they pass- 

 ed into laws simultaneously. 



By the passage of the act, for that purpose, a certain num- 



