The memorial of the General Assembly of the State of Illinois would respectfully represent that their constituents, the citizens of said State, have deeply regretted the [...?] ^unfortunate^ delay of the action of your honorable body upon the subject of the continuation of the national road from Vandalia to its ultimate destination. They have given multiplied manifestations ^proofs ^ of their desire that the said road should be speedily and suitably located so as to conform to the provisions of the Acts of Congress heretofore passed, to subserve the great and national objects for which it was intended, and to advance the interest and prosperity of their young and promising State. These unequivocal evidences of public sentiment have been repeatedly, and with almost u^n^precedented una^ni^mity, seconded by legislative memorials addressed to your Honorable body. And your memorialists persuade themselves that a review of the action of Congress ^and^ of the legislature, and of the People of the State together with the celebrated report of M^r Shriver, embodying the sense of all, and comprizing arguments of no little weight, cannot fail to conciliate your favor to the reasonable claim asserted in behalf of the State of Illinois.

On the 15^th day of May 1820 an Act of Congress was passed providing for the appointment of commissioners to examine the country between Wh Wheeling in the State of Virginia, and a point on the left bank of the river Mississippi between S^t Louis and the mouth of the Illinois river, said road to be on a straight line as nearly as a due regard to the nature and situation of the ground and water courses would permit, thus expressly excluding S^t Louis and the mouth of the Illinois river from being points at which said road should terminate, and authorizing a deviation from a straight line only upon account of physical obstructions.2 Said Commissioners,3 having partially examined said routes, reported on the 3^rd Jan.[January] 1821 that the point of termination of said road, pursuant to the provi-

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sions of the above act, should be made above the mouth of the Missouri river; but concluded by praying, for certain reasons, that S^t Louis might be included within their discretion. In full view of all these circumstances, and in direct consequence of, and reference to this report, the Congress of the U.S. on the 3^rd of March 1825 passed an Act requiring the Commissioners to complete the survey heretofore commenced, and extend the same to the permanent seat of government of the State of Missouri, and to conform strictly, in all respects, to the provisions of the first mentioned act except that it should pass by the seats of government of Ohio, Indiana and Illinois.4

In the year 1830 the People of the State of Illinois began to take the subject under serious consideration. Numerous and highly respectable meetings were held, in various and remote parts of our state, recommending with great zeal and earnestness the location of the national road on the route terminating at Alton. Many of the newspapers of the country sustained these recommendations by frequent and spirited articles evincing a most decided interest in this ^the^ question.

In accordance with this general expression of public sentiment through the medium of the press and of primary meetings, our legislature, at their session of 1831, addressed a memorial to your honorable body setting forth their views of the national as well as local importance of the measure. About this time M^r Shriver completed his survey and report of two routes; one by Eminence in the County of Green, and the other by S^t Louis. At the session of 1832, 3, the subject was again brought before the legislature of Illinois, and a committee appointed to prepare a suitable preamble and resolutions expressive of the sense of the people. Said Committee took under consideration the report of M^r Shriver, and demonstrably proved that his recommendation of the S^t Louis route was in direct violation of, and unauthorized by the ^above recited^ several acts of Congress, that his deductions were wholly at war with the facts set forth in his report, that these facts conclusively established,

1^st That the northern route is the most direct, being nearly on a straight line from Vandalia to Jefferson City.

2^nd That it has less extreme grade. N^o 9.

3^rd That the facilities for the construction of the road on the northern route are more abundant.

4^th That its construction would cost less by 11,200 dollars.

5^th That the northern route admits of vastly greater improvements, a more dense and numerous population with a soil more fertile and attractive to the agriculturalist.

6^th That, deducting the population of S^t Louis, the northern route contained, even at that early day, a greater number of inhabitants, by two thousand five hundred, than the Southern.

And in addition to the above it was insisted by the committee that the Alton route possessed numerous and highly important advantages over either of the routes before mentioned; which your memorialists believe will be fully verified by an actual survey of the same. This preamble and resolutions, ^to which your attention is earnestly solicited,^ passed through both branches of the legislature by an almost unanimous vote. At their next session the subject was, again, for the third time, brought under consideration when it was, by both houses, unanimously Resolved “That the consent of the State of Illinois is hereby given to the General Government to extend the national road through the said State so as to cross the Mississippi river at the town of Alton in said State, and at no other point.”

Your memorialists would respectfully represent that the foregoing resolution was dictated by no spirit of arrogant assumption, but by a deliberate conviction of right, and a thorough persuasion of the injustice of withholding that right, founded upon the views here presented in reference to the superior eligibility of the Alton route, its greater cheapness of construction, its directness &c[etc], its literal compliance with the requisitions of the several acts of Congress, its exact conformity with the great national object of a direct intercommunication between the waters of the Atlantic and those of the Gulf of Mexico, its uniform and oft repeated sanction by the legislature of our State, and by an overwhelming majority of the citizens thereof, and upon the unquestionable right of the State to give or withhold its consent as settled by the doctrine of the General Government and the practice of the States under it. It were an act of supererogation to remind [...?] your honorable body, to whom the political history

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of this question is so familiar, of the views entertained by M^r Jefferson which, though dissented from, in part, by M^r Madison, were subsequently concurred in by M^r Monroe, and have ever since received the acquiescence of every administration to the present time. Nor need we refer you to the act passed by the Virginia legislature yielding its assent, or to the right, claimed and exercised by other States, of controling the exit of the national road, in accordance with these acknowledged principles. Claiming, therefore, nothing more than what is ^has been^ conceded by the government, and practised upon by our sister States, and fortified, as we humbly conceive, by unanswerable argument, we appeal, with confidence to the sense of justice of your honorable body.

But independently of all these considerations, upon which they place great reliance, your memorialists would sanguinely hope that, in the bestowment of government favors, an equal and impartial regard would be had to the claims of different States, that the munificent patronage heretofore extended to S^t Louis ought to suffice for her, and that Illinois would not be denied a fair participation of benefits. S^t Louis has already been the recipient of numerous favors lavished upon her in the shape of Arsenals and military stores, Indian agencies, Indian annuities army[,] disbursements &c &c. Would it not, then savor of favoritism to give to S^t Louis this additional boon to the prejudice of the claims of Illinois? Has not your treasury been as much enriched by the unprecedented and, to her, impoverishing s[a]les of your public domain within her borders? Has not the value of your lands been equally enhanced by the labor of her enterprizing citizens? And have not her hardy and patriotic sons ever testified as ardent devotion to the honor and interests of our common country? All that we ask, all that we wish, all that we would be willing to receive would be an equal and impartial proportion of the public patronage.