See also Donaldson's
"Public Domain," Hildreth's "History of Washington County," and the
various articles by Poole and others. In Prof. Hinsdale's excellent
book, on p. 200, is a map of the "Territory of the Thirteen Original
States in 1783." This map is accurate enough for Virginia and North
Carolina; but the lands in the west put down as belonging to
Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Georgia, did not really belong to them
at all in 1783; they were held by the British and Spaniards, and were
ultimately surrendered to the United States, not to individual States.
These States did not surrender the land; they merely surrendered a
disputed title to the lands.]
The Non-claimant States.
All the States that did not claim lands beyond the mountains were
strenuous in belittling the claims of those that did, and insisted that
the title to the western territory should be vested in the Union. Not
even the danger from the British armies could keep this question in
abeyance, and while the war was at its height the States were engaged in
bitter wrangles over the subject; for the weakness of the Federal tie
rendered it always probable that the different members of the Union
would sulk or quarrel with one another rather than oppose an energetic
resistance to the foreign foe.
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