ils of
slavery would be mitigated by its diffusion.(111) The first panic of the
French only gradually subsided and the question of slavery was a
persistent one.

One of the most industrious of those interested in the sale of Spanish
lands was George Morgan, of New Jersey.(112) In 1788, he tried to secure
land in Illinois also. He and his associates petitioned Congress to sell
them a tract of land on the Mississippi. A congressional committee found
upon investigation that the proposed purchase comprised all of the French
settlements in Illinois.(113) Thereupon was passed the Act of June 20,
1788. According to its provisions, the French inhabitants of Illinois were
to be confirmed in their possessions and each family which was living in
the district before the year 1783 was to be given a bounty of four hundred
acres. These bounty-lands were to be laid off in three parallelograms, at
Kaskaskia, Prairie du Rocher, and Cahokia, respectively. They were to be
bounded on the east by the ridge of rocks--a natural formation trending
from north to south, a short distance to the east of the French
settlements. Morgan was to be sold a large described tract for not less
than sixty-six and two-thirds cents per acre. Indian titles were to be
extinguished if necessary.(114)

The Act of June 20, 1788, is an important landmark in the settlement of
Illinois. The grant of bounty-lands was made for the purpose of giving the
French settlers a means of support when the fur-trade and hunting should
have become unprofitable from the advance of American settlement. This was
a clear acknowledgment that the Indians were right in believing, as they
did, that the American settlement would be fatal to Indian
hunting-grounds. The Indians were soon bitterly hostile. Then, too, the
claims of the settlers to land, founded upon French, British, or Virginia
grants, were to be investigated. This investigation dragged on year after
year, even for decades, and as it was the policy of the United States not
to sell public land in Illinois until these claims were settled, the
country became a great squatters'(115) camp. The length of the
investigation was doubtless due in part to the utter carelessness of the
French in giving and in keeping their evidences of title.

By a congressional resolution of August 28, 1788, it was provided that the
lands donated to Illinois settlers should be located east, instead of
west, of the ridge of rocks. As this would throw the