Territorial cession

“ The object of cession is sovereignty over such territory as has hitherto already belonged to another State. As far as the Law of Nations is concerned, every State as a rule can cede a part of its territory to another State, or by ceding the whole of its territory can even totally merge in another State. However, since certain parts of State territory, as for instance rivers and the maritime belt, are inalienable appurtenances of the land, they cannot be ceded without a piece of land. ”

“ We are however, not only at liberty, but under a duty, to take account also of the quality and disposition of the people, and we have in one or two instances done so. The written constitution prescribes no rule for these cases. The question whether the United States shall hold conquered territory, or territory acquired by cession, without the consent of the people to be affected, is quite apart from the question whether, having acquired and incorporated such territory, we can govern it otherwise than under the limitations of the constitution. ”

“ The power to make acquisitions of territory by conquest, by treaty, and by cession is an incident of national sovereignty. The territory of Louisiana, when acquired from France, and the territories west of the Rocky mountains, when acquired from Mexico, became the absolute property and domain of the United States, subject to such conditions as the government, in its diplomatic negotiations, had seen fit to accept relating to the rights of the people then inhabiting those territories. ”

“ When it is borne in mind that large tracts of this territory were reserved for distribution among the Continental soldiers, it is impossible for me to believe that it was ever considered that the result of the cession was to take the Northwest Territory out of the Union, the necessary effect of which would have been to expatriate the very men who by their suffering and valor had secured the liberty of their united country. ”

“ It considers, on the one hand, that so vital is the question of incorporation that no alien territory may be acquired by a cession without absolutely endowing the territory with incorporation and the inhabitants with resulting citizenship, because, under our system of government, the assumption that a territory and its inhabitants may be held by any other title than one incorporating is impossible to be thought of. ”

“ The same principles were adopted in the United States vs. Percheman, and in language most emphatic and unequivocal, throughout the opinion delivered by the Chief Justice. After reciting the first clause of the second article, which ceded the territory in general terms, the Court observe: 'A cession of territory is never understood to be a cession of the property of the inhabitants.' 7 Peters, 87. ”

“ But they, as communal owners of the lands east of the Mississippi, at the time of the treaty of 1835, were equally interested, with the communal owners who were carried to the West, in the $5,000,000 fund which was the consideration of the cession, so far as it was to be distributed per capita. ”

“ To procure a cession of East Florida to the United States; 3. To settle the controversy as to the east boundary by a general cession and relinquishment of all the claims and pretensions of Spain east of the Mississippi ”

“ In relation to procuring cessions of land from the Indians, the Government has decided that it would be inexpedient to obtain any farther extinguishment of Indian title, except at the Sault de St. Marie, where it is the wish of the Department, that an inconsiderable cession, not exceeding ten miles square (unless strong reasons for a greater cession should present themselves from an actual inspection of the country) , should be acquired upon the most reasonable terms, so as to comprehend the proposed military position there. ”

“ Beyond these demands the British commissioners were not for the present to go, nor were they to ask for a direct cession of territory for Canada “with any view to an acquisition of territory as such, but for the purpose of securing her possessions and preventing future disputes;” [19] yet a small cession of land in Maine was necessary for a road from Halifax to Quebec, and an arrangement of the Northwestern boundary was required to coincide with the free navigation of the Mississippi. ”

“ It is what it purports, an amicable settlement of all past differences, without exception of persons or places, by a cession by one party of its rights to sovereignty, and the vacant land in the whole territory east of the Sabine river, which is not private property; what is private property is excepted from the cession by the terms of the second and third articles; and one of the conditions of the cession is, the confirmation and ratification of all grants made before ascertain time for lands in the ceded territories, excepting three. Compensation is made for mutual claims ”

“ In 1779, three years after the declaration of independence, and four years before the treaty of peace, the American Congress recommended to the several states in the union to make liberal cessions of their respective claims for the common benefit of the union, including the state making the cession. Thus early did our government assert the principle that the lands not held by occupancy belonged to the people for their use. ”

“ You can get no territory; indeed, the state of your military operations, however creditable, does not entitle you to demand any; and you only afford the Americans a popular and creditable ground, which, I believe, their government are looking for, not to break off the negotiations, but to avoid to make peace. If you had territory, as I hope you soon will have New Orleans, I should prefer to insist upon the cession of that province as a separate article than upon the uti possidetis as a principle of negotiation. ”

“ Neither party could so understand the cession; neither party could consider itself as attempting a wrong to individuals, condemned by the practice of the whole civilized world. The cession of a territory, by its name, from one sovereign to another, conveying the compound idea of surrendering at the same time the lands and the people who inhabit them, would be necessarily understood to pass the sovereignty only, and not to interfere with private property. ”

“ They are certainly very unlike the words used in the power granted to legislate over territory which the new Government might afterwards itself obtain by cession from a State, either for its seat of Government, or for forts, magazines, arsenals, dock yards, and other needful buildings. ”

“ The United States contends that the inclusion of fortifications, barracks, ports and harbors, navy and navy-yards, and docks in the cession clause of the Resolution demonstrates an intent to convey all interests of the Republic in the marginal sea, since most of these properties lie side by side, with, and shade into, the marginal sea. ”

“ It is painfully evident from a study of the treaty and of the descriptions of the scenes attending its negotiation which have come down to us, that the public sentiment of the frontier had become demoralized by the opportunities for dishonest gain afforded by the cession of the lands belonging to the red man. ”

“ The treaty of land-cession, commerce and alliance was signed May 21st, and ratified by the trustees of the colony of Georgia, October 18th, 1733. It stipulated a cession of the lands between the Savannah and Altamaha rivers, and of some islands on the Atlantic coast, to the British; it further stipulated promises to enter into a commercial treaty at a later date, to place themselves under the general government of Great Britain, to live in peace with the colonies, to capture runaway slaves and deliver them at Charleston, Savannah or Palachukla garrison for a consideration. ”

“ Lord Shelburne, President of the Board of Trade and a member of the Grenville ministry, and his colleagues were of the opinion that the annexation of the West to Canada might lend color to the idea that England's title to the West came from the French cession, when in fact her claim was derived from other sources; that the inhabitants of the province to which it might be annexed would [Pg 28] have too great an advantage in the Indian trade ”

“ ARID LANDS. We favor cession, subject to the homestead laws, of the arid public lands to the states and territories in which they lie, under such congressional restrictions as to disposition, reclamation, and occupancy by settlers as will secure the maximum benefits to the people. ”

“ In Great Britain it resides in the executive (see the parliamentary debates upon the cession of Heligoland in 1890) ; sometimes, however, it is shared for all purposes, as in the United States, or for certain purposes only, as in many countries of the European continent, by the legislature, or by a branch of it. (2) There must be an expression of agreement. This is not (as in private law) rendered voidable by duress; e.g. the cession of a province, though extorted by overwhelming force, is nevertheless unimpeachable. ”

“ Similar provisions were contained in the cession by Georgia of the Mississippi territory, now the states of Alabama and Mississippi. Such agreements were also expressed in the treaty of 1803, ceding Louisiana; that of 1819, ceding the Floridas, and in the treaties of 1848 and 1853, by which a large extent of territory was ceded to this country, as also in the Alaska treaty of 1867. ”

“ It is particularly illustrated by the stipulations of their most important treaties concerning those possessions, and the practice under them, viz., the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713, and that of Paris in 1763.”
[Pg 177] The practice of European nations has certainly recognised in the nation which has first occupied the territory of savage tribes, that live by hunting, fishing, and roaming habits, the sole right of acquiring the soil from the natives by purchase, or cession, or conquest, for the purpose of establishing settlements. ”

“ It there means Treaties of alliance or of navigation and commerce—Things which require a more profound deliberation than common acts do, because they entail on the parties a future reciprocal responsibility and become afterwards a supreme law on each of the contracting countries which neither can annull. But the cession of Louisiana to the United States has none of these features in it It is a sale and purchase. A sole act which when finished, the parties have no more to do with each other than other buyers and sellers have. ”

“ The reason is that territorial divisions prevent open competition, and where they are effected horizontally by manufacturers or by sellers who in the normal course of things would be competing among themselves, such restraints are immediately suspect. ”

“ Traversed by railroads that were built, in part, at least, with lands which this treaty enabled Congress to grant, the country is open to sale and pre-emption and homestead settlement, and will soon be occupied by a hardy and industrious people. ”

“ No. 53. Cession of November 28, 1840, of the residue of the "Big Reserve" (except the grant to Me-to-sin-ia's band No. 54) ; in townships 21 to 26 north, ranges 2 to 7 east, designated by yellow lines.
No. 54. By the Miami treaty of November 6, 1838, a reserve of ten miles square was made (out of the general cession) for the band of Me-to-sin-ia. By the treaty of November 28, 1840, the United States agreed to convey this tract to Me-shing-go-me-sia, son of Me-to-sin-ia, in trust for the band. ”

“ These instances go to show that the question of territorial extension is a question of expediency, and that it depends upon the occasion and upon the circumstances of the nation itself whether it is wise to extend territorial jurisdiction and responsibilities or not. In any case, those states only are prepared for colonization and foreign responsibilities whose internal cohesion is intense; for every extension of territory brings with it a strain upon the internal organism. ”

“ They shall be admitted under the same conditions of equality to the exercice and practice of all maritime, industrial, mining or commercial enterprises both on land and in the territorial waters, and no monopoly shall be established on any account or for any enterprise whatever. ”

“ Nor is this all: they must not be permitted to enter into any contracts in which they might be ignorant and unintentional authors of injuries to themselves. You will not, for example, purchase from them any territory, the retention of which by them would be essential or highly conducive to their own comfort, safety, or subsistence. The acquisition of land by the Crown for the future settlement of British subjects must be confined to such districts as the natives can alienate without distress or serious inconvenience to themselves. ”

“ In selling territorial rights it is a mistake to begin with the small places with the idea of working the business up and effecting larger sales on the basis of the smaller ones; it is better to shove the sales, as much as possible in the start, and afterp. 62 the more valuable portion of the territory is disposed of, proceed with the balance until it ceases to be profitable. ”

“ This, to a person ignorant of the peculiar arrangements of so monstrous a monopoly, will appear strange—that they should have an exclusive monopoly in trade in a country, and have not the courage or power to prevent its settlement, especially when such settlement interferes with its trade. So far as American territory was concerned, they were only permitted to have a joint occupancy in trade. The sovereignty or right of soil was not settled; hence, any open effort against any settler from any country was a trespass against the rights of such settler. ”

“ I have imagined that it might really be possible to treat the Colonies like counties of the country, not only in direct trade with the United Kingdom, but in commercial intercourse with each other, by free trade among ourselves, under a reasonable, moderate degree of protection from without, and so resolve the United Kingdom and all her Colonies and possessions into a commercial union such as might defy all rivalry and defeat all combinations. ”