Congress of the Confederation

“ That the settlers on any territory so purchased and offered for sale, shall either on their own petition, or on the order of Congress, receive authority from them, with appointments of time and place, for their free males of full age, within the limits of their state, to meet together, for the purpose of establishing a temporary government, to adopt the constitution and laws of any one of the original states ”

“ That which may lie beyond the completion of the forty-fifth degree between the said meridian shall make part of the state adjoining it on the south: and that part of the Ohio, which is between the same meridians coinciding nearly with the parallel of thirty-nine degrees, shall be substituted so far in lieu of that parallel as a boundary line. ”

“ That whensoever any of the said states shall have of free inhabitants, as many as shall then be in any one, the least numerous, of the thirteen original states, such state shall be admitted by its delegates into the Congress of the United States, on an equal footing with the said original states ”