Whereas the State of Illinois is essentially an agricultural State, and the greater proportion of her inhabitants are deeply interested in every thing relating to the security and permanency of our land titles; and whereas the surveys of the lands in this State have been effected by an officer of the General Government, whose office is in another State, and over whom our courts of justice have no control; and whereas there is but a single complete copy of the original field-notes and plats of these surveys now in existence, by which the metes and bounds of our lands are to be ascertained, and their location identified; and whereas these field-notes and plats are constantly liable to be lost or destroyed by fire, abrasion from constant use, their corrosion by time, bad ink, and the various accidents to which pamplets and loose papers are constantly liable—many of which are now almost illegible; and whereas it frequently occurs, in the legal investigation of the titles to our lands, in our courts of justice, that certified copies of these field-notes are required as evidence; and whereas these field-notes and plats are beyond the control of the civil authorities of this State, and have to be procured by the parties litigant, at great expense of time and money, before they can with safety go to trial; and whereas we have heretofore indulged the well-founded hope that Surveyor General’s office would, before this time, have been established in this State by the General Government for completing the survey of our lands; and whereas these just expectations, so long and fondly indulged, are likely to be blasted, as appears by the recent recommendation of the Commissioner of the General Land Office at Washington to the chairman of the Committee on Public Lands, dated June 20, 1838, and also to the Hon. R. M. Young, dated January 3, 1839, in both of which he urges the necessity of attaching the State of Illinois to the Iowa and Wisconsin surveying district, the office of which is established at Du Buque, in the Territory of Iowa, for the more speedy survey of the lands in the State of Illinois; and whereas, by the removal from St. Louis, in the State of Missouri, of the original field-notes and plats of our lands to a Surveyor General’s office at Du Buque, in the Territory of Iowa, would make these necessary papers more inaccessible to our courts of justice—a measure directly opposed to the best interests of the State, and subversive of her best rights and reasonable expectations; and whereas if is of the utmost importance to the interests of this State to have the original field-notes and plats of survey on which the titles of our land are founded and their location ascertained, recorded and kept within this State, and always accessible to our courts of justice, placed as far as possible beyond the reach of accidents or loss: Therefore,

Resolved, unanimously, by the Senate and House of Representatives , That our Senators in Congress be instructed, and our Representatives requested, to use their utmost exertions to procure the passage of a law establishing a Surveyor General’s office in this State.

Resolved, That the Governor be requested to forward copies of the foregoing preamble and resolution to each of our Senators and Representatives in Congress, and to the Commissioner of the General Land Office.