Papers Of Abraham Lincoln

In force, Feb.[February] 28, 1839.

AN ACT to vacate the town plat of East Lockport
1

Plat of town vacated.

Proviso.

Sec.[Section] 1. Be it enacted by the People of the State of Illinois, represented in the General Assembly, That the town plat of the town of East Lockport, in the county of Will, be, and the same is hereby, vacated and annulled, as though the same had never existed: Provided, however, That the assent of those interested in the said town plat to the vacation of the same be filed in the office of the recorder of Will county within twelve months from the passage hereof.

Sec. 2. This act to take effect from and after its passage.2

Approved, February 28, 1839.

1On January 24, 1839, Gholson Kercheval introduced HB 196 in the House of Representatives. On February 23, the House passed the bill. On February 26, the Senate passed the bill. On February 28, the Council of Revision approved the bill and the act became law.
Illinois House Journal. 1838. 11th G. A., 1st sess., 276, 416, 422, 484, 535, 554, 566; Illinois Senate Journal. 1838. 11th G. A., 1st sess., 386, 427-28, 449.

2Illinois experienced a time of intense land speculation in the 1830s that resulted in a number of “paper towns,” settlements that were platted and available for sale but where few or no people actually lived. Many of the proprietors of these settlements abandoned them during and after the Panic of 1837. As a result, the General Assembly received a large number of petitions for vacation during their sessions from 1838 to 1841. In 1841, the legislature passed an act setting parameters for proprietors to vacate town plats themselves. Vacating a plat gave owners greater flexibility in the use, fencing, and sale of the property.
An Act to Vacate Town Plats; Alasdair Roberts, America’s First Great Depression: Economic Crisis and Political Disorder after the Panic of 1837 (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2012), 19, 33, 38; James E. Davis, Frontier Illinois (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1998), 210-11; Robert P. Howard, Illinois: A History of the Prairie State (Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans, 1972), 196.