Monday, September 11, 2017

Proclamation of Millard Fillmore Declaring the Act of 1850, Respecting the Boundaries of Texas, to be in Force, December 13, 1850

A PROCLAMATION by the President of the United States of America declaring act of 1850, respecting the boundaries of Texas, to be in force.

Whereas, by an act of the Congress of the United States of the ninth of September, one thousand eight hundred and fifty, entitled “An act proposing to the State of Texas the establishment of her northern and western boundaries, the relinquishment by the said State of all territory claimed by her exterior to said boundaries, and of all her claims upon the United States, and to establish a Territorial government for New Mexico,” it was provided, that the following propositions should be, and the same were thereby, offered to the State of Texas, which, when agreed to by the said State, in an act passed by the general assembly, should be binding and obligatory upon the United States and upon the said State of Texas: Provided, The said agreement by the said general assembly should be given on or before the first day of December, eighteen hundred and fifty; namely:

“First. The State of Texas will agree that her boundary on the north shall commence at the point at which the meridian of one hundred degrees west from Greenwich is intersected by the parallel of thirty-six degrees thirty minutes north latitude, and shall run from said point due west to the meridian of one hundred and three degrees west from Greenwich; thence her boundary shall run due south to the thirty-second degree of north latitude; thence on the said parallel of thirty-two degrees of north latitude to the Rio Bravo del Norte, and thence with the channel of said river to the Gulf of Mexico.”

“Second. The State of Texas cedes to the United States all her claim to territory exterior to the limits and boundaries which she agrees to establish by the first article of this agreement.”

“Third. The State of Texas relinquishes all claim upon the United States for liability of the debts of Texas, and for compensation or indemnity for the surrender to the United States of her ships, forts, arsenals, custom-houses, custom-house revenues, arms and munitions of war, and public buildings with their sites, which became the property of the United States at the time of the annexation.”

“Fourth. The United States, in consideration of said establishment of boundaries, cession of claim to territory, and relinquishment of claims, will pay to the State of Texas the sum of ten millions of dollars in a stock bearing five per cent. interest, and redeemable at the end of four£ years, the interest payable half-yearly at the Treasury of the United States.”

“Fifth. Immediately after the President of the United States shall have been furnished with an authentic copy of the act of the general assembly of Texas accepting these propositions, he shall cause the stock to be issued in favor of the State of Texas, as provided for in the fourth article of this agreement: Provided also, That no more than five millions of said stock shall be issued until the creditors of the State holding bonds and other certificates of stock of Texas for which duties on imports were specially pledged, shall first file at the Treasury of the United States releases of all claim against the United States for or on account of said bonds or certificates in such form as shall be prescribed by the Secretary of the Treasury and approved by the President of the United States. Provided. That nothing herein contained shall be construed to impair or quality any thing contained in the third article of the second section of the joint resolution for annexing Texas to the United States,” approved March first, eighteen hundred and forty-five, either as regards the number of States, that may hereafter be formed out of the State of Texas, or otherwise.”

And whereas it was further provided, by the eighteenth section of the same act of Congress, “That the provisions of this act be, and they are hereby, suspended until the boundary between the United States and the State of Texas shall be adjusted, and when such adjustment shall have been effected, the President of the United States shall issue his proclamation declaring this act to be in full force and operation:

And whereas the legislature of the State of Texas, by an act approved the twenty-fifth of November last, entitled “An act accepting the propositions made by the United States to the State of Texas, in an act of the Congress of the United States approved the ninth day of September, A. D. one thousand eight hundred and fifty, and entitled ‘An act proposing to the State of Texas the establishment of her northern and western boundaries, the relinquishment by the said State of all territory claimed by her exterior to said boundaries, and of all her claims upon the United States, and to establish a Territorial government for New Mexico,”— of which act a copy authenticated under the seal of the State has been furnished to the President, — enacts “that the State of Texas hereby agrees to and accepts said propositions, and it is hereby declared that the said State shall be bound by the terms thereof, according to their true import and meaning:”

Now, therefore, I, Millard Fillmore, President of the United States of America, do hereby declare and proclaim that the said act of the Congress of the United States of the ninth of September last, is in full force and operation.

Given under my hand, at the city of Washington, this thirteenth day of December, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and fifty, and the seventy-fifth of the Independence of these United States.

MILLARD FILLMORE.
By the President:
DAN'L WEBSTER,
Secretary of State.

SOURCE: Laws of the United States of a Local Or Temporary Character, and Exhibiting the Entire Legislation of Congress Upon Which the Public Land Titles in Each State and Territory have Depended. December 1, 1880, Volume 2, p. 1099-1100

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