John Archibald Campbell

“ The act of 1812 makes no requisition for a concession, survey, permission to settle, cultivate, or possess, or of any location by a public authority as the basis of the right, title, and claim, upon which its confirmatory provisions operate. It may be very true that there could have been originally no legitimate right or claim without some such authority. Congress, however, in this act, was not dealing with written or formal evidences of right. Such claims in Missouri have been provided for by other acts. ”

“ Proof of inhabitation, cultivation, or possession, is all that the law requires, and, when made, establishes a title from the 13th June, 1812, which is superior to a confirmation by the act of April, 1816, unaccompanied by evidence of inhabitation, cultivation, or possession, prior to 20th December, 1803. ”

“ Louis prairie fields, the Grand prairie fields, the Barrier des Noyer prairie fields, and the Cul-de-sac prairie fields, were all worked at the same time, until the common fence fell down and was neglected to be repaired, and Paul Guitard cultivated the land lying adjoining and north of the said Chouteau mill tract until the common fence fell down. His cultivation was towards the west on the hill, and he did not cultivate the land on the very eastern end, because it was rather low ground there. ”

“ We think it proper to state, that we express no opinion upon the effect of the evidence to establish the plaintiff's title as a subsisting title, and none upon the claim to such of the land as lies beyond the boundary line, settled by the survey of the United States under the first section of the act of 1812. ”

“ Defendant's instructions. 1. If the jury believe, from the evidence, that the cultivation by Paul Guitard, testified to by the witnesses, was on a tract of land called a Cul-de-sac common field, and if the jury shall also believe, from the testimony, that the Cul-de-sac common fields, including the one cultivated by Paul Guitard, were at a place to the south-west from the premises sued for, and that neither of said Cul-de-sac common fields include the premises in question, then the plaintiff cannot recover in this action. ”

“ Rep. 368, the court says, 'the great object of the act was to quiet the villages in their titles to property (so far as the government was concerned) which had been acquired in many instances by possession merely, under an express or implied permission to settle, and which had passed from hand to hand without any formal conveyance. ”

“ The act itself, with all the circumstances of the inhabitants before and at the time of its passage, have formed the subject of legal judgments and professional opinions upon which mighty interests have grown up and now repose. ”

“ Starke, 1 Pet. 98, a question arose upon an act of Congress which confirmed to 'actual settlers' within a ceded territory all the grants legally executed prior to a designated day, and this court held that the fact of 'a settlement on that day' must be established, and proof of occupancy and cultivation was adduced. In the city of Mobile v. Eslava, 16 Pet. 235, certain water lots were confirmed to the proprietors of the front lots adjacent thereto, who had improved them before the passage of the act of Congress, and this court sustained the title upon parol proof of location and improvements. ”

“ In every case where it is declared that claims 'shall be confirmed,' provision is made for an investigation and adjudication. None such is made by the act of 1812, in relation to the village claims confirmed by the first section. By the fourth section the recorder is required to extract from the books of the commissioners the donation claims directed to be confirmed by the third section. ”