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of acres, sold at that price amounts to the principal sum to be paid for the purchase of Louisiana; and four hundred and fifty thousand acres, sold annually, will amount to the interest, which is all we are at present called upon to pay. If then we must sell lands to pay this interest, let us continue to sell those first, which are nearest home, and which will command the best price. By so doing we shall not depreciate the value of the remainder, as we shall if we begin with selling those at a distance, and at an inferior price. Besides, the interest of the United States requires that our population, already infinitely too much dispersed, should, instead of being rendered still more dispersed, become as compact as the fertility of our lands and other natural or accidental advantages will admit of.—Possessing already one hundred and twenty acres of land for every individual in the United States, would it not be folly in the extreme to invite any of them to remove beyond our present limits? Ought we not rather to encourage, to the utmost, population within the present states until there shall be people enough to cultivate and improve the whole? Then, and not till then, would it seem prudent to turn our attention to the settlement of a remote territory, whose advancement must, till that period, inevitably retard the settlement and improvement of the country which we already occupy.
If it be admitted that a dispersed population is a disadvantage to a state, (and surely it requires no argument to prove it) nothing can contribute more to such a dispersion than throwing into the market so immense a quantity of land. Every day’s experience shews us that whenever new settlers, or purchasers of lands, are permitted to locate their purchases as they please, they make choice of the most fertile spots, only, neglecting the rest. Thus a very large portion of valuable land lies still waste and uncultivated;—whereas if new lands were only
