256 READINGS IN RURAL ECONOMICS 



the territories cover 1,466,257 square miles, and the states 

 2,040,252. Since 1820 the area of the states taken together has 

 never been very far from one-half of the total area of the whole 

 United States. 



That part of the land within our boundaries which belongs 

 to the nation has by the Land Office been named the public 

 domain. The area is a ratio having two variables : at intervals 

 it is increased by cessions or annexations ; every year since 1799 

 it has been diminished by sale or gift. At the beginning of the 

 existence of the Confederation, in 1781, the government did not 

 control or own a single acre of land. Every part of the United 

 States was claimed by some state, and there were regions covered 

 by two or even three claims. With all its defects and its imbe- 

 cility, the Confederation did one great service to the nation and 

 to posterity : it succeeded in prevailing upon a number of the 

 states to waive their claims in behalf of the general government. 

 March i, 1784, the cession of Virginia gave to the United States 

 undisputed title to a large part of the region north of the Ohio 

 River. The previous cession of New York and the later cessions 

 of Massachusetts and Connecticut, in 1785 and 1786, completed 

 the title to the vast tract now occupied by six populous states. 

 In the South the process was slo\Ver. South Carolina ceded her 

 claim in 1787, North Carolina in 1790. It was not till 1802 

 that Georgia released her hold upon the region now taken up by 

 the states of Alabama and Mississippi. 



An inspection of Table I ^ will show that the United States 

 received title to less land than was included in the cessions. 

 In every case there were reservations. Thus Connecticut kept 

 for herself the Western Reserve. Virginia liberally provided a 

 bounty tract for her Revolutionary soldiers, north of the Ohio 

 River. North Carolina, with a great flourish of trumpets, yielded 

 the region now included within the state of Tennessee ; but it 

 was found later that the whole region was covered by state 

 land warrants, so that the United States never held an acre. In 

 addition to the reservations for the benefit of states and their 



1 Table will be found in the original article in the Quarterly Journal of 

 Economics, Vol. I, pp. 169-251, January, 1887. 



