Papers Of Abraham Lincoln

1
Resolved That the committee on Internal Improvements be instructed to report a bill, for the commencement of a general system of Internal Improvements, as follows:

The bill shall provide:

First, for the completion of the Illinois and Michigan Canal:

Second, for the construction of a Rail Road, from the termination of said canal, to the mouth of the Ohio river:

Third, for the construction of a Rail Road from Quincy, on the Mississippi river, eastward to the State line, in the direction to the Wabash and Erie Canal:

Fourth, for the improvement of the navigation of the Illinois and Wabash rivers:

Fifth, for making surveys and estimates of such other works as may be considered of general utility.

Resolved, That, as the basis of the system, the improvements shall be constructed and owned by the State exclusively.

Resolved, That, for the purposes aforesaid, a loan ofmillions of dollars, should be effected on the faith of the State, payable in such instalmements, and at such times, as shall be required in the progress of the work.

Resolved, That portions of the lands granted to the State to aid in the construction of the Illinois and Michigan Canal, should be sold from time to time, and the proceeds applied to the payment on the said loan, until the tolls on the proposed improvments, together with such other means as the State may provide, shall be sufficient to pay the interest on said loan[.]2

1On December 14, 1836, Stephen A. Douglas introduced the resolutions in the House of Representatives. The House referred the resolutions to the Committee of the Whole and made them the order of the day for December 19. On December 19, the Committee of the Whole reported that it had the resolutions under consideration and requested more time to consider the issue, which the House granted. The House took no further action.
Illinois House Journal. 1836. 10th G. A., 1st sess., 36, 79.

2The subject of internal improvements dominated the Tenth General Assembly, and Douglas’s plan was one of three separate proposals for a state-operated system of internal improvements introduced in the House of Representatives on December 14, 1836. Though the House did not adopt Douglass’s resolutions, several of his proposals found their way into the internal improvement act, which became the basis for the internal improvement system.
John H. Krenkel, Illinois Internal Improvements 1818-1848 (Cedar Rapids, IA: Torch, 1958), 66.