effect of the eighth section of the first article of the constitution of government of the United States;

And the Congress of the United States by their act passed the 16th day of July, 1790, and entitled, "An act for the temporary and permanent seat of the government of the United States," authorized the President of the United States to appoint three commissioners to survey under his direction, and by proper metes and bounds to limit, a district of territory, not exceeding ten miles square, on the river Potomac, at some place between the mouths of the Eastern Branch and the Conococheague, which district, to be so located and limited, was accepted by the said act of Congress, as the district for the permanent seat of the government of the United States;

Now, therefore, in pursuance of the powers to me confided, and after duly examining and weighing the advantages and disadvantages of the several situations. within the limits aforesaid, I do hereby declare and make known, that the location of one part of the said district of ten miles square shall be found by running four lines of experiment in the following manner, that is to say, running from the Court-House of Alexandria in Virginia, due southwest half a mile, and thence a due southeast course, till it shall strike Hunting Creek, to fix the beginning of the said four lines of experiment;

Then beginning the first of the said four lines of experiment at the point on Hunting Creek, where the said southeast course shall have struck the same, and running the said first line due northwest ten miles; thence the second line into Maryland, due northeast ten miles; thence the third line due southeast ten miles; and thence the fourth line due southwest ten miles, to the beginning on Hunting Creek.

And, the said four lines of experiment being so run, I do hereby declare and make known, that all that part within the said four lines of experiment, which shall be within the State of Maryland and above the Eastern Branch, and all that part within the same four lines of experiment, which shall be within the Commonwealth of Virginia, and above a line to be run from the point of land forming the upper cape of the mouth of the Eastern Branch due southwest, and no more, is now fixed upon, and directed to be surveyed, defined, limited, and located for a part of the said district accepted by the said act of Congress, for the permanent seat of the government of the United States; hereby expressly reserving the direction of the survey and location of the remaining part of the said district, to be made hereafter contiguous to such part or parts of the present location, as is or shall be agreeable to law.

And I do accordingly direct the said commissioners, appointed agreeably to the tenor of the said act, to proceed forthwith to run the said lines of experiment, and, the same being run, to survey, and by proper metes and bounds to define and limit, the part within the same, which is herein before directed for immediate location and acceptance; and thereof to make due report to me, under their hands and seals.

In testimony whereof, I have caused the seal of the United States to be affixed to these presents, and signed the same with my hand. Done at the city of Philadelphia, this twenty-fourth day of January, in the year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred and ninety-one, and of the independence of the United States the fifteenth.

GEORGE WASHINGTON.*

*For another Proclamation concerning the District of Columbia, dated March 30th, 1791, see Vol. X. p. 148.

PROCLAMATION

OFFERING A REWARD FOR APPREHENDING PERSONS,

WHO HAD COMMITTED OUTRAGES UPON THE CHEROKEE INDIANS.

Whereas I have received authentic information, that certain lawless and wicked persons, of the western frontier in the State of Georgia, did lately invade, burn, and destroy a town belonging to the Cherokee nation, although in amity with the United States, and put to death several Indians of that nation; and whereas such outrageous conduct not only violates the rights of humanity, but also endangers the public peace, and it highly becomes the honor and good faith of the United States to pursue all legal means for the punishment of those atrocious offenders; I have, therefore, thought fit to issue this my proclamation, hereby exhorting all the citizens of the United States, and requiring all the officers thereof, according to their respective stations, to use their utmost endeavours to bring those offenders to justice. And I do moreover offer a reward of five hundred dollars for each and every of the abovenamed persons, who shall be so apprehended and brought to justice, and shall be proved to have assumed or exercised any command or authority among the perpetrators of the crimes aforesaid, at the time of committing the same.

In testimony whereof I have caused the seal of the United States to be affixed to these presents, and signed the same with my hand. Done at the city of Philadelphia, this 12th day of December, in the year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred and ninety-two. GEORGE WASHINGTON.*

The celebrated Proclamation of Neutrality, dated April 22d, 1793, is contained in Vol. X. p. 535.

PROCLAMATION

WARNING THE INSURGENTS IN THE WESTERN PARTS OF PENNSYLVANIA TO DESIST FROM THEIR OPPOSITION TO THE LAWS.

Whereas combinations to defeat the execution of the laws laying duties upon spirits distilled within the United States and upon stills, have from the time of the commencement of those laws existed in some of the western parts of Pennsylvania;

And whereas the said combinations, proceeding in a manner subversive equally of the just authority of government and of the rights of individuals, have hitherto effected their dangerous and criminal purpose, by the influence of certain irregular meetings, whose proceedings have tended to encourage and uphold the spirit of opposition; by misrepresentations of the laws calculated to render them odious; by endeavours to deter those, who might be so disposed, from accepting offices under them, through fear of public resentment and of injury to person and property, and to compel those, who had accepted such offices, by actual violence to surrender or forbear the execution of them; by circulating vindictive menaces against all those, who should otherwise directly or indirectly aid in the execution of the said laws, or who, yielding to the dictates of conscience and to a sense of obligation, should themselves comply therewith; by actually injuring and destroying the property of persons who were understood to have so complied; by inflicting cruel and humiliating punishments upon private citizens for no other cause, than that of appearing to be friends of the laws; by intercepting the public officers on the highways, abusing, assaulting, and otherwise ill-treating

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them; by going to their houses in the night, gaining admittance by force, taking away their papers, and committing other outrages, employing for these unwarrantable purposes the agency of armed banditti disguised in such manner, as for the most part to escape discovery;

And whereas the endeavours of the legislature to obviate objections to the said laws by lowering the duties and by other alterations conducive to the convenience of those, whom they immediately affect (though they have given satisfaction in other quarters), and the endeavours of the executive officers to conciliate a compliance with the laws, by explanations, by forbearance, and even by particular accommodations founded on the suggestion of local considerations, have been disappointed of their effect by the machinations of persons, whose industry to excite resistance has increased with every appearance of a disposition among the people to relax in their opposition, and to acquiesce in the laws; insomuch that many persons, in the said western parts of Pennsylvania have at length been hardy enough to perpetrate acts, which I am advised amount to treason, being overt acts of levying war against the United States, the said persons having on the 16th and 17th of July last past proceeded in arms (on the second day amounting to several hundreds) to the house of John Neville, inspector of the revenue for the fourth survey of the district of Pennsylvania; having repeatedly attacked the said house with the persons therein, wounding some of them; having seized David Lenox, marshal of the district of Pennsylvania, who previous thereto had been fired upon, while in the execution of his duty, by a party of armed men, detaining him for some time prisoner, till, for the preservation of his life and the obtaining