Since the first quarters were built, more than one million dollars has been expended, until now "an entire village of brick has grown up and around the regimental flag, designed to accommodate 1200 cavalrymen, with their horses and general equipment." Fort Des Moines was dedicated amid much pomp, ceremony, and festivity. The post consists of an administration building, hospital, chapel, officers' quarters, subalterns' quarters, barracks, stables, and a parade ground one thousand by two thousand feet in area. In comparative luxury and in extent it offers a striking contrast to the primitive character of its predecessors of the pioneer period of Iowa history, and at the same time serves a far different purpose. Aside from a few disciplinary and public occasions and the recent expedition in defence of the Texas border against Mexican insurgents there has been little to disturb the monotony of camp life at Fort Des Moines.

THE STATE HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF IOWA

IOWA CITY IOWA

JACOB VAN DER ZEE

57 Brigham's History of Des Moines and Polk County, Iowa, Vol. I, pp. 600602. Mr. Brigham also furnished the information contained in the closing sentence of this article on forts.

THE DEFALCATION OF SUPERINTENDENT

JAMES D. EADS

By an act of Congress approved on September 4, 1841, there was set apart for "each new state that shall hereafter be admitted into the Union, five hundred thousand acres of land." The funds derived from the sale of this immense area were to be applied, within the intent of the act, to the construction of "drainage systems, roads, railways, bridges, and canals." This disposition of the public lands was made by virtue of what is known in governmental ethics as the right of primal ownership of the soil.

This doctrine was evidently ignored in an "ordinance" appended to the constitution for the proposed State of Iowa drafted in the fall of 1844. In this ordinance several propositions were made to Congress relative to a partial disposal of the public lands within Iowa, which propositions should be binding upon the people of the State, providing they received the consent of Congress. Among other things the ordinance proposed the setting apart by the United States of the sixteenth section of land or its equivalent in every township for school purposes, and that five per cent of the net proceeds of all sales of public lands lying within the proposed limits of Iowa should be granted to the State, the purpose for which such per centum was to be used not being stated.2

In an act of Congress approved on March 3, 1845, providing for the admission of Iowa and Florida, it was de

15 United States Statutes at Large 453-455.

2 Journal of the Iowa Constitutional Convention, 1844, p. 207.

clared that this ordinance was not to "be deemed or taken to have any effect or validity, or to be recognized as in any manner obligatory upon the Government of the United States. "'3

By an act supplemental to the above and of the same date Congress proposed a substitute for this ordinance and requested its acceptance or rejection by the Iowa legislature. This substitute approved the proposition of the rejected ordinance relative to setting apart the sixteenth section or its equivalent for the use and support of common schools. But it definitely directed "that five per cent of the net proceeds of sales of all public lands lying within the said State, which have been, or shall be sold by Congress, from and after the admission of said State, shall be appropriated for making public roads and canals within the said State, as the legislature may direct." There was also the further proviso that the "foregoing propositions herein offered are on the condition that the legislature of the said State, shall never interfere with the primary disposal of the soil within the same by the United States and that no tax shall be imposed on lands the property of the United States." No action was taken at this time by the Iowa legislature upon this proposed substitute.

.

In the late spring of 1846 a constitutional convention met in Iowa City to draft a second constitution for submission to Congress. This constitution stipulated in section two of article ten that not only should the proceeds derived from the sale of public lands granted expressly by Congress for the support of common schools be devoted to that purpose, but also that the five hundred thousand acre grant of September 4, 1841, and "such per cent. as may be granted by

35 United States Statutes at Large 742, 743. 45 United States Statutes at Large 789, 790.

Congress on the sale of lands in this State, shall be and remain a perpetual fund, inviolably appropriated to the support of common schools throughout the State." By "such per cent" was plainly meant the five per cent which Congress had previously directed should be used for the building of roads and canals. Congress, by an act approved on December 28, 1846, unconditionally accepted the proposed constitution, including this section relative to school lands. The inference was plain that Congress by such action had sanctioned the provision for the support of schools although it was directly at variance with the previous supplemental act of March 3, 1845.

Such at least was the view taken by the General Assembly of Iowa, which on February 25, 1847, two months after the admission of Iowa into the Union, passed an act which provided that it should be the duty of the State Superintendent of Public Instruction to receive the five per cent fund accruing to the State of Iowa from the sale of public lands within the limits of the State. Accordingly this official Mr. Thomas H. Benton, Jr., - applied to the proper United States officer for the fund then due. The application was denied, the denial being based upon the claim that this fund could only be paid for the construction of roads and canals as directed by the supplemental act of March 3, 1845.8

This denial, however, did not cause the General Assembly of Iowa to assume an attitude different from that expressed in the State Constitution. Instead, it passed an act, approved on January 15, 1849, which, while accepting the

5 The Iowa State Constitution of 1846, Article X, Section 2; Journal of the Iowa Constitutional Convention, 1846, p. xv.

69 United States Statutes at Large 117.

7 Laws of Iowa, 1846-1847, p. 163.

8 Report of the Superintendent of Public Instruction, 1850, p. 36.

Congressional proposals of March 3, 1845, did so with a reservation that the five per cent of the net proceeds of public land sales should be applied to the support of common schools and not to the building of roads and canals." Later, through the influence of the Iowa delegation in Congress, that body passed a declaratory act assenting to such an application of what had now become known as "the five per cent fund'.10 Thus was laid the basis of the permanent support fund of the common schools of Iowa.

Provision for the receipt and disposal of the fund was later embodied in the Code of 1851. The fund was to be paid into the hands of the State Superintendent of Public Instruction and by him "disposed of according to law”. It was to be apportioned to the various organized counties by this official in much the same manner as it is at the present time. This was to be done early enough in the year that it might be transmitted to the school fund commissioners and by them apportioned to the respective districts annually upon the first day of March.1

11

Owing to the rapid settlement of Iowa the sales of public lands increased at a rapid pace during the early fifties, thus causing this particular fund to increase by leaps and bounds from year to year. The fund being payable to the State Superintendent of Public Instruction, it would seem that the office was becoming one of very great financial responsibility, demanding for its occupant a person of considerable business acumen. Such was the rapidly increasing importance of the office when the campaign for nomination and election to fill the approaching vacancy in the office of Superintendent opened in January, 1854.1

Laws of Iowa, 1847-1848, pp. 121, 122. 10 9 United States Statutes at Large 349.

11 Code of 1851, Secs. 1056, 1080, 1098.

12

12 Owing to the election of the Superintendent on the first Monday in April, the nominating convention was customarily held some time during January.