THE BOUNDARIES OF COLORADO 89 



it was only after long and patient negotiations with John Quincy Adams, 

 Secretary of State, that a conclusion was reached. 1 While even then 

 the fears of Spain respecting South America were not satisfied. By the 

 treaty of February 22, 181 9, Spain, for a consideration, ceded the 

 Floridas to the United States, and a compromise boundary between 

 Louisiana and Mexico was agreed upon. The Louisiana enabling act 

 of February 20, 181 1, 2 had fixed for the western boundary of the State 

 the Sabine River up to the thirty-second parallel, and thence due north to 

 the thirty-third parallel. The new treaty started the western boundary 

 of the United States at the same point. 3 Beginning at the mouth of the 

 Sabine River, it followed the western bank of the same to the thirty-second 

 parallel of north latitude ; from this point it ran due north to Red River, 

 and followed the course of the river westward to the one hundredth 

 meridian west of London ; thence it went due north again to the southern 

 bank of the Arkansas River, followed this bank to the source of the 

 river "in latitude 42 north," and thence ran westward along the forty- 

 second parallel to the Pacific. For the first time a boundary of the 

 United States had been drawn through Colorado. 



The territory of Missouri, erected in 181 2, lasted until the act of 

 March 6, 1820, to enable the people of Missouri to form a state govern- 

 ment, reduced its boundaries to those of the present State of Missouri 

 without the " triangle." 4 The western lands were thus deprived of terri- 

 torial organization, coming so far as they had government at all undei 

 the military rule of the United States army on the frontier. Until the 

 acts of 1850 and 1854, dividing the western lands among Utah, New 

 Mexico, Kansas, and Nebraska, Colorado had no territorial government. 



But before 1850 the territory of Colorado was twice extended in its 

 dimensions. By the Spanish treaty its boundaries on west and south 

 were the Arkansas River and the meridian of its source. By the admis- 



1 Morse, John Quincy Adams, pp. 111-117; McMaster, IV, 474-83. 



2 Poore, I, 600; Gannett, no. 



3 Treaties and Conventions, p. 1017. After the independence of Mexico had been gained, a treaty was 

 entered into by the United States and Mexico, January 12, 1828, confirming this boundary. — Ibid., 661. The 

 Republic of Texas, by a convention of April 25, 1838, accepted this line and arranged for a joint survey com- 

 mission with the United States. — Ibid., 1070. 



* Poore, II, 1 102. The State of Missouri was admitted by proclamation, August 10, 182 1. — Richardson' 

 II, 96. 



