d States until Pinckney's treaty went into effect. It was the
United States and not Georgia that actually won and held the land in
dispute; and it was a discredit to Georgia's patriotism that she so long
wrangled about it, and ultimately drove so hard a bargain concerning it
with the National Government.

Claims to the Northwest.

There was a similar state of affairs in the far Northwest. No New
Yorkers lived in the region bounded by the shadowy and wavering lines of
the Iroquois conquests. The lands claimed under ancient charters by
Massachusetts and Connecticut were occupied by the British and their
Indian allies, who held adverse possession. Not a single New England
settler lived in them; no New England law had any force in them; no New
England soldier had gone or could go thither. They were won by the
victory of Wayne and the treaty of Jay. If Massachusetts and Connecticut
had stood alone, the lands would never have been yielded to them at all;
they could not have enforced their claim, and it would have been
scornfully disregarded. The region was won for the United States by the
arms and diplomacy of the United States. Whatever of reality there was
in the titles of Massachusetts and Connecticut came from the existence
and actions of the Federal Union. [Footnote: For this northwestern
history see "The Life, Journal, and Correspondence of Manasseh Cutler,"
by Wm. Parker Cutler and Julia Perkins Cutler; "The St. Clair Papers,"
by W. H. Smith; "The Old Northwest," by B. A. Hinsdale; "Maryland's
Influence upon Land Cessions," by Herbert Adams. See also Donaldson's
"Public Domain," Hildreth's "History of Washington County," and the
various articles by Poole and others. In Prof. Hinsdale's excellent
book, on p. 200, is a map of the "Territory of the Thirteen Original
States in 1783." This map is accurate enough for Virginia and North
Carolina; but the lands in the west put down as belonging to
Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Georgia, did not really belong to them
at all in 1783; they were held by the British and Spaniards, and were
ultimately surrendered to the United States, not to individual States.
These States did not surrender the land; they merely surrendered a
disputed title to the lands.]

The Non-claimant States.

All the States that did not claim lands beyond the mountains were
strenuous in belittling the claims of those that did, and insisted that
the title to the western territory should be vested i