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principle upon which we take this step goes the full length I have stated, and may, if adopted in relation to the Territory, be applied to all the States. The powers of the Territory are, on this head, as complete as those of the States. If we interfere with the first, we may interfere with the last."

At a public meeting of the citizens of Dayton, and its vicinity, held at Dayton, on the 26th of September, 1802, a resolution was adopted unanimously, and published by order of the meeting, in the Western Spy, from which the following is an extract:

"We consider the late law of Congress for the admission of this Territory into the Union, as far as it relates to the calling a Convention, and regulating the election of its members, as an act of legislative usurpation of power properly the province of the Territorial Legislature, bearing a striking similarity to the course of Great Britain imposing laws on the provinces. We view it as unconstitutional, as a bad precedent, and unjust and partial as to the representation in the different counties.

"We feel for our fellow-citizens in the county of Wayne, who have relinquished their allegiance to the crown of Great Britain, and become American citizens, firmly attached to the interests of this Territory; and we hope they may not be transferred against their wishes to the Indiana Territory, at the moment they expect with us to enter into an independent State government, and to enjoy the privileges of a free people. We conceive that Congress was unwarranted in transferring that portion of the Territory, against its consent, from the last step of the second grade of government back to the first, and transferring them to another government and another people.

"We wish our Legislature to be called immediately to pass a law to take the enumeration; to call a Convention; and to regulate the election of members to the same, and also the time and place for the meeting.

"Under the existing laws, we are not enabled to elect members to the Legislature and to the Convention, as the elections for both are ordered on the same day, and as to us, at places fifty miles apart."

The resolution also expressed a wish that the Convention, when met, should ask of Congress an alteration of the Ordinance relating to the division of the Territory, so as to include the country to the foot of the rapids of the Ohio in one State, subject to become two States, as soon as a majority of the citizens inhabiting the same might deem it expedient.

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