At different times different non-claimant
States took the lead in pushing the various schemes for nationalizing
the western lands; but Maryland was the first to take action in this
direction, and was the most determined in pressing the matter to a
successful issue. She showed the greatest hesitation in joining the
Confederation at all while the matter was allowed to rest unsettled; and
insisted that the titles of the claimant States were void, that there
was no need of asking them to cede what they did not possess, and that
the West should be declared outright to be part of the Federal domain.
Maryland was largely actuated by fear of her neighbor Virginia.
Virginia's claims were the most considerable, and if they had all been
allowed, hers would have been indeed an empire. Maryland's fears were
twofold. She dreaded the mere growth of Virginia in wealth, power, and
population in the first place; and in the second she feared lest her own
population might be drained into these vacant lands, thereby at once
diminishing her own, and building up her neighbor's, importance. Each
State, at that time, had to look upon its neighbors as probable
commercial rivals and possible armed enemies.
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