that purpose, full and correct minutes of their proceedings and decisions, together with the evidence on which such decisions are made; which books and papers, on the dissolution of the boards, shall be deposited in the respective offices of the registers of the land-offices; and the said clerk shall prepare two transcripts of all the decisions made by the said commissioners in favour of the claimants to land, both of which shall be signed by the said commissioners, and one of which shall be transmitted to the surveyor-general, and the other to the Secretary of the Treasury; and the lands, the claims to which shall have been thus affirmed by the commissioners, shall not be otherwise disposed of, until the decision of Congress thereupon shall have been made. It shall likewise be the duty of the said commissioners to make to the Secretary of the Treasury a full report of all the claims filed with the register of the proper land-office, as above directed, which they may have rejected, together with the substance of the evidence adduced in support thereof, and such remarks thereon as they may think proper: which reports, together with the transcripts of the decisions of the commissioners in favour of claimants, shall be laid by the Secretary of the Treasury before Congress at their next ensuing session. Each of the commissioners and clerks aforesaid, shall be allowed a compensation of five hundred dollars in full for his services as such; and each of the said clerks shall, previous to his entering on the duties of his office, take and subscribe the following oath or affirmation, to wit: “I, do solemnly swear, (or affirm,) that I will truly and faithfully discharge the duties of a clerk to the board of commissioners for examining the claims to land, as enjoined by an act of Congress, intituled An act making provision for the disposal of the public lands in the Indiana territory, and for other purposes.”
Sec. 5. And be it further enacted, That all the lands aforesaid, not excepted by virtue of the preceding section, shall, with the exception of the section “number sixteen,” which shall be reserved in each township for the support of schools within the same, with the exception also of an entire township in each of the three above-described tracts of country or districts, to be located by the Secretary of the Treasury, for the use of a seminary of leaning, and with the exception also of the salt springs and lands reserved for the use of the same as herein after directed, be offered for sale to the highest bidder, under the direction of the surveyor-general, or governor of the Indiana territory, of the register of the land-office, and of the receiver of public monies, at the places respectively, where the land-offices are kept, and on such day or days as shall, by a public proclamation of the President of the United States, be designated for that purpose. The sales shall remain open at each place for three weeks and no longer: the lands shall not be sold for less than two dollars an acre, and shall in every other respect, be sold in tracts of the same size and on the same terms and conditions as have been or may be by law providedAct of May 18, 1796, ch. 29.
Lands remaining unsold after three weeks may be disposed of at private sale.
Act of May 18, 1796, ch. 29. for the lands sold north of the river Ohio, and above the mouth of Kentucky river. All lands, other than the reserved sections and those excepted as above mentioned, remaining unsold at the closing of the public sales, may be disposed of at private sale, by the registers of the respective land-offices, in the same manner, under the same regulations, for the same price, and on the same terms and conditions, as are or may be provided by law for the sale of the lands of the United States north of the river Ohio, and above the mouth of Kentucky river. And patents shall be obtained for all lands granted or sold in the Indiana territory, in the same manner and on the same terms as is or may be provided by law for lands sold in the state of Ohio, and in the Mississippi territory.
