by John Marshall

“ Nothing can be more apparent than the intention of the legislature to order their commissioners to make the allotment, and to give the land when allotted to General Greene.
The 11th section authorizes the commissioners to appoint surveyors, for the purpose of surveying the lands given by the preceding sections of the law.
In pursuance of the directions of this act, the commissioners allotted 25,000 acres of land to General Greene, and caused the tract to be surveyed. The survey was returned to the office of the legislature, on the 11th of March, in the year 1783. ”

“ The proposition is believed to be perfectly correct, that the act of 1783, which opened the land office, must be construed as offering for sale those lands only which were then liable to appropriation, not those which had before been individually appropriated. Whatever the legislative power may be, its acts ought never to be so construed as to subvert the rights of property, unless its intention so to do shall be expressed in such terms as to admit of no doubt, and to show a clear design to effect the object. ”

“ The court will not inquire whether this averment is founded on an apparent misconstruction of the law, and is, therefore, to be disregarded; or is the averment of a fact compatible with the law; because the fact itself does not essentially affect the case.
If the place in which lands were reserved generally for the officers and soldiers, but not individually appropriated, was changed; the individual appropriation made for General Greene, within their original limits, was not also changed. ”