Papers Of Abraham Lincoln

In force, Feb.[February] 27, 1839.

AN ACT to locate a certain State road therein mentioned.
1

Com’rs[Commissioners] to locate road.

Course of road.

Sec.[Section] 1. Be it enacted by the People of the State of Illinois, represented in the General Assembly, That Curtis Clark, Andrew Cormish, and Benjamin Douglas , be, and they are hereby, appointed commissioners to view, mark, and locate a State road from the city of Chicago to the south line of the Territory of Wisconsin; said road to cross the Des Plaines river at

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Monroe, at or near the place where the present post-road crosses the same, by Elk grove, in Cook county, and Chrystal lake, in McHenry; thence to that point on the Territorial line which will be the most eligible for a continuation of said road, by the head of Geneva lake, to Madison, the capital of said Territory.

Time & place of meeting.

To be sworn.

Plat filed

Sec. 2. The commissioners, or a majority of them, shall meet in Monroe, at the house of Silas Meacham, on the first Tuesday in March next, or within three months thereafter, and, after being duly sworn before some justice of the peace faithfully to perform the duties required of them by this act, shall proceed to survey, mark, and locate said road as is provided in the first section of this act, having in view the public good; and shall, as soon as practicable thereafter, make, or cause to be made, a plat of said road, certified by them; which shall be filed in the clerk’s office of the county commissioners’ court of the several counties through which said road shall pass.2

Road vacated.

Sec. 3. All roads and parts of roads which shall begin and end in this said road, or shall tend to the same point, and not departing more than one mile from the same, shall be, and the same are hereby, annulled and vacated.

Compensation.

Sec. 4. The said commissioners shall be allowed two dollars each per day, while necessarily employed in said view and location, together with a fair allowance for such necessary hands as they may employ, to be allowed by the commissioners’ court of the several counties, in proportion to the length of said road in each of the same, through which the road shall pass. This act to be in force from and after its passage.

Approved, February 27, 1839.

1On December 17, 1838, Ebenezer Peck introduced SB 163 in the Senate. The Senate read the bill a second time, and referred it to the committee on Roads. On January 17, 1839, the committee reported back the bill without amendments. On January 21, the Senate read the bill a third time and passed the bill. On February 22, the House of Representatives passed the bill. On February 27, the Council of Revision approved the bill and the act became law.
Illinois House Journal. 1838. 11th G. A., 1st sess., 257, 307, 431, 484, 537; Illinois Senate Journal. 1838. 11th G. A., 1st sess., 73, 180, 198, 386, 436, 452.

2Subsequent legislation revived this act and extended the deadline for the commissioners’ first meeting to February 27, 1840.