The salt springs had been vested in the state of Illinois with the provision that no part of the reservations should be sold. Large reservations were made at the Saline River salt works and at the Vermilion saline near Danville, the object being to reserve a supply of wood for the making of salt. Upon the discovery of coal near the springs the state was permitted to sell not more than thirty thousand acres of the Saline River reservation.[362]
Illinois as a landowner sometimes mingled church and state. The original proprietors of Alton having donated one hundred lots, one-half for the support of the gospel, and one-half for the support of a public school, the state vested the donated lots in the trustees of the town, upon its incorporation in 1821. A similar donation made by the proprietors of Mt. Carmel was confirmed in the same [pg 143] manner.[363] The Cumberland Presbyterians having built a church on a school section, the state provided that for ninety-nine years the building should be used as a schoolhouse also, the school being under the joint direction of the trustees of the township and the church society.[364]
The receipts for public lands in 1828 and 1829, respectively, were:
| 1828 | 1829. | |
| Kaskaskia | $ 4,639.82 | $ 10,503.99 |
| Shawneetown | 7,250.28 | 16,058.79 |
| Edwardsville | 23,536.49 | 38,001.35 |
| Vandalia | 4,489.71 | 24,258.13 |
| Palestine | 25,671.62 | 59,026.81 |
| Springfield | 56,507.63 | 108,175.47 |
| $122,095.55 | $256,024.54[365] |
The receipts for 1828 were for 96,092.91 acres; of 1829, for 196,324.92 acres.[366] From October 1, 1829, to September 30, 1830, sales, receipts, and prices were:
| Acres. | Average Price per Acre. | ||
| Illinois | 291,401.28 | $364,369.87 | $1.2504 |
| Indiana | 413,253.63 | 521,715.13 | 1.2624 |
| Alabama | 233,369.27 | 291,715.20 | 1.25 |
| Missouri | 182,929.63 | 228,748.12 | 1.2505 |
| Michigan | 106,201.28 | 132,751.68 | 1.25 |
| Ohio | 160,182.14 | 201,923.50 | 1.2606 |
| Mississippi | 103,795.61 | 130,475.87 | 1.257[367] |
The northward movement of population in Illinois is well [pg 144] indicated by the figures for 1828 and 1829. The Indian barrier was being pushed back, and the Sangamon country, with its land-office at Springfield, was a favorite place for settlement. The rapid increase in the amount of land sold is also striking. As the third decade of the century closed Indiana was the favorite place for frontier settlement. The sales of public lands in Ohio were diminishing. A prophetic glance would have seen that as the ever-shifting frontier passed westward Illinois was to overtake and then to far surpass Indiana in number of settlers.
The period from 1818 to 1830 saw the Indian title to a great fertile tract of land in Illinois extinguished, the price of all public lands lowered and the land offered for sale in smaller tracts, the right of preemption granted to squatters who had settled before 1830, considerable grants of land made to the state for internal improvements, the great salt spring reservations reduced. These changes did much to make Illinois a more attractive place for settlement. When a committee of workingmen in Wheeling, Virginia, made a report, in October, 1830, on a method of escaping from the ills of workingmen, they presented an elaborate plan for buying land and forming a colony in Illinois.[368] The experience of the squatter who settled with four or five sows for breeders and in four years or less drove forty-two fat hogs to market and sold them for $135, with which he bought eighty acres of land and paid his debts, was not a rare one.[369]
As 1830 closed there were still problems connected with the land to solve. The Indian question persisted, non-resident landholders were troublesome, and the state [pg 145] would still seek grants for internal improvements, but none of these was to be long a serious impediment to settlement.