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20 J. B. Sajiboni and the new territories.' So the holding of the pubhc lands for a comparatively high price would serve both the financial and the in- dustrial interests of the country, and no change in this policy was likely to come before the growth of the West had forced upon the East the necessity for such a change. This growth came much more rapidly than anyone had ex- pected. By 1820 the states which had been carved out of the public domain were seven in number (including Missouri) and had a population of 1,224,384, while Kentucky and Tennessee, with 986,906 inhabitants, were likely to add their weight to the interests of the land states. In most things pertaining to the disposal of the public domain the ideas of these new states were radically different from those of the states which had no public land within their boundaries. The new states did not regard with favor the existence in their limits of large tracts of unoccupied land, the policy of whose owner was to make as much money as possible from it, re- gardless of the rapidity of settlement. This land was only partially subject to their jurisdiction; over it they could exercise neither the right of taxation nor eminent domain. Any policy which would tend to rapid settlement would have been welcomed by the new states, as the lands would then be both occupied and under the jurisdiction of their laws. Two policies which would have tended towards that result were open to the government : the lowering of the price of the lands with an ultimate gratuitous distribution, or the cession of the lands to the states in which they were situated — the primary desire being to get the lands out of the hands of the government as soon as possible. The first of these policies contained in an imperfect form the homestead principle, although it was to be applied only to lands which had been long in the market and could presumably be disposed of in no other way. The policy of cession to the states would have allowed the lands to be disposed of at prices calculated to induce rapid immigration and would probably have led, through the almost inevitable competition, to state homestead laws. Of these plans the states preferred that of cession, as likely to serVe their immediate interests better ; but either was out of the question as long as they relied upon their own unaided efforts. They must appeal to the old states, and for this favor it was to the South rather than to the North that they turned. For the South had always shown evidences of a better feeling for and a more intimate connection with the Wegt. At the time 'See letters of Washington to Duane, September 7, 1783, Writings (Ford), X. 303 ; and to Williamson, March 15, 1785, ibid., AA^-iAl-