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Congress on the 18th of April, 1806,185 had passed an act entitled "An act to authorize the State of Tennessee to issue grants and perfect titles to certain lands therein described, and to settle claims to the vacant and unappropriated lands within the same."

This act, for the purpose of defining the limits of the vacant and unappropriated lands in the State of Tennessee, thereafter to be subject to the sole control and disposition of the United States, established the following described line, viz: Beginning at the place where the eastern or main branch of Elk River intersects the southern boundary of Tennessee; running thence due north until such line shall intersect the northern or main branch of Duck River; thence down the waters of Duck River to the military boundary line established by North Carolina in 1783; thence with the military line west to the place where it intersects Tennessee River; thence down the waters of Tennessee River to where it intersects the northern line of Tennessee. The act further provided that upon the execution by the State of Tennessee (through her Senators and Representatives in Congress, duly authorized thereto) of a deed of relinquishment to the United States of all the claim of that State to lands lying south and west of the described line, the United States should thereupon cede and convey to the State of Tennessee all claim to the land north and east of the line, with certain conditions and limitations therein prescribed, and with the proviso that nothing contained in the act should be construed to affect the Indian title.

Predicated upon this act of Congress, the legislature of Tennessee passed an act, on the 3d of December, 1807,186 appropriating $20,000 for the purpose of holding a treaty or treaties with the Cherokees (when authorized so to do by the Federal Government) for the purpose of extinguishing their claim to all or any part of the lands within the territorial limits of Tennessee lying to the north and east of the line described in the act of Congress just mentioned.

Congress having assented to the request of Tennessee, the Secretary of War appointed187 Return J. Meigs a commissioner to superintend the negotiations with the Cherokees about to be held with them by the two commissioners appointed on the part of that State. Mr. Meigs was advised that all the expenses incident to the holding of the treaty, as well as any consideration that should be agreed upon in case of a cession by the Indians, should be borne by the State of Tennessee, and that the only lands the commission were authorized to treat for was that portion of the territory described in the act of April 18, 1806, as being ceded to Tennessee which should be found to lie east of the line established by Robertson and Meigs, running from the upper part of Chickasaw Old Fields northwardly so as to include all the waters of Elk River. The jealousy with which the Cherokees regarded a proposition for the sale of more land, and their especial aversion toward the people and government of Tennessee, prevented success from attending these negotiations in any degree.