No New
Yorkers lived in the region bounded by the shadowy and wavering lines of
the Iroquois conquests. The lands claimed under ancient charters by
Massachusetts and Connecticut were occupied by the British and their
Indian allies, who held adverse possession. Not a single New England
settler lived in them; no New England law had any force in them; no New
England soldier had gone or could go thither. They were won by the
victory of Wayne and the treaty of Jay. If Massachusetts and Connecticut
had stood alone, the lands would never have been yielded to them at all;
they could not have enforced their claim, and it would have been
scornfully disregarded. The region was won for the United States by the
arms and diplomacy of the United States. Whatever of reality there was
in the titles of Massachusetts and Connecticut came from the existence
and actions of the Federal Union. [Footnote: For this northwestern
history see "The Life, Journal, and Correspondence of Manasseh Cutler,"
by Wm. Parker Cutler and Julia Perkins Cutler; "The St. Clair Papers,"
by W. H. Smith; "The Old Northwest," by B. A. Hinsdale; "Maryland's
Influence upon Land Cessions," by Herbert Adams.
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