Papers Of Abraham Lincoln

Sec [Section]1 An Act to amend an act entitled an act to establish the counties of Menard[,] Logan[,] and Dane.
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Be it enacted by the people of the State of Illinois represented in the General Assembly, That the boundaries of the county of Menard, as described in the first section of the act to which this is an amendment shall and the same are2 hereby declared to be the established boundaries of the said county of Menard, and so much of the fourth section of the said act to which this is an amendment as is contained in the first and second proviso’s of the is hereby declared to be repealed3

Section 2^nd This act to take effect from and after its passage.

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A bill for an Act to amend an act entitled an act to establish the counties of Menard[,] Logan[,] & Dane approved febr[February] 15^th 1839

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[01]/[15]/[1840]
& ord 2

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[01]/[29]/[1840]
Ind. post.[Indefinitely postponed]

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30

1On January 3, 1840, Thomas J. Nance in the House of Representatives presented the petition of citizens of Sangamon County in relation to a change in the Menard County boundary line. The House referred the petition to a three-person select committee that included Abraham Lincoln. In response to this petition, Nance of the select committee introduced HB 143 in the House on January 15. On January 29, the House refused to table the bill by a vote of 38 yeas to 42 nays, with Lincoln voting yea. Representatives offered amendments, and the House indefinitely postponed further consideration by a vote of 52 yeas to 30 nays, with Lincoln voting yea.
Illinois House Journal. 1839. 11th G. A., special sess., 122, 180, 281-82.

2“are” written over “is”.

3The original act establishing Menard County included a proviso that if commissioners located the county seat on the western side of the Sangamon River, approximately 22 sections west and north of Athens would remain in Sangamon County. The affected area did not include the town of Athens, which remained in Sangamon County. The commissioners located the county seat at Petersburg, on the western side of the river. However, the status of these 22 sections remained in question. This bill attempted to address the confusion by repealing the proviso and designating this area as part of Menard County. Despite two more attempts in 1841 to resolve the boundary between Sangamon and Menard counties, the General Assembly did not resolve the issue until it passed an act in 1843 adding land west of the Sangamon River to Menard County and an additional act in 1847 adding land east of the Sangamon River, including Athens, to Menard County.
An Act to Establish the Counties of Menard, Logan, and Dane (1839); A Bill to Extend the Boundaries of Menard County and for Other Purposes (1841); A Bill to Change the Boundary Lines of Menard County (1841); “An Act to define the boundary lines of Menard county,” 2 March 1843, Laws of the State of Illinois, Passed by the Thirteenth General Assembly, at their Regular Session (Springfield, IL: Walters & Weber, 1843), 94; “An Act to add part of Sangamon to Menard county,” 28 February 1847, Private and Special Laws of the State of Illinois, Passed by the Fifteenth General Assembly (Springfield, IL: Charles H. Lanphier, 1847), 39.