United States Statutes at Large/Volume 2/10th Congress/1st Session/Chapter 9

2477871United States Statutes at Large, Volume 2 — Public Acts of the Tenth Congress, 1st Session, IXUnited States Congress


Jan. 9, 1808.
[Obsolete.]
Chap. IX.—An Act extending the right of suffrage in the Mississippi territory; and for other purposes.[1]

Qualifications of electors of representatives to the general assembly of the Mississippi territory.
1804, ch. 57, sec. 7.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That every free white male person in the Mississippi territory, above the age of twenty-one years, having been a citizen of the United States, and resident in the said territory, one year next preceding an election of representatives, and who has a legal or equitable title to a tract of land, by virtue of any act of Congress, or who may become the purchaser of any tract of land from the United States of the quantity of fifty acres, or who may hold in his own right a town lot of the value of one hundred dollars within the said territory, shall be entitled to vote for representatives to the general assembly of said territory.

General assembly may apportion representatives.Sec. 2. And be it further enacted, That the general assembly of the territory aforesaid, shall have power to apportion the representatives of the several counties therein, or which may hereafter be established therein, according to the number of free white male inhabitants above the age of twenty-one years in such counties:Not more than 12 nor less than 10 representatives until there shall be six thousand free inhabitants in the territory. Provided, that there be not more than twelve, nor less than ten of the whole number of representatives; any act or acts to the contrary notwithstanding, until there shall be six thousand free male white inhabitants of full age, in said territory; after which time the number of representatives shall be regulated agreeably to the ordinance for the government thereof.

A delegate to Congress to be elected at the time of the general election.Sec. 3. And be it further enacted, That the citizens of the said territory, entitled to vote for representatives to the general assembly thereof, shall, at the time of electing their representatives to the said general assembly, also elect one delegate from the said territory to the Congress of the United States, who shall possess the same powers heretofore granted to the delegates from the several territories of the United States; any thing in the ordinance for the government of said territory, to the contrary notwithstanding.

Approved, January 9, 1808.


  1. By the act of March 1, 1817, chap. 23, Mississippi was admitted into the Union as a State.