§ 2. All claimants shall, within six months from the time of recording their claims, make permanent improvements upon the same, by building or enclosing, and also become an occupant upon said claim within one year from the date of such record, or in case not occupied, the person holding said claim shall pay into the treasury the sum of five dollars annually, and in case of failure to occupy, or on failure of payment of {186} the sum above stated, the claim shall be considered as abandoned: provided, that no non-resident of this territory shall have the benefit of this law: and, provided further, that any resident of this territory, absent on private business for two years, may hold his claim by paying five dollars annually to the treasury.
§ 3. No individual shall be allowed to hold a claim of more than one square mile, or six hundred and forty acres, in a square or oblong form, according to the natural situation of the premises. Nor shall any individual be allowed to hold more than one claim at the same time. Any person complying with the provisions of these ordinances, shall be entitled to the same recourse against trespass as in other cases by law provided.
§ 4. Partnerships of two or more persons shall be allowed to take up a tract of land not exceeding six hundred and forty acres to each person in said partnership, subject to all the provisions of the law; and whenever such partnership is dissolved, the members shall each record the particular parts of said tract as may be allotted to him: provided that no member of said partnership shall hold a separate claim at the time of the existence of said partnership.
§ 5. The boundary lines of all claims shall hereafter conform, as near as may be, to the cardinal points.
§ 6. The officers elected at the general election, held on the first Tuesday in June, 1845, shall be the officers to act under this organic law, and their official acts, so far as they are in accordance with this compact, are hereby declared valid and legal.
§ 7. Amendments to this instrument may be proposed by the House of Representatives, two-thirds of the members concurring therein; which amendments shall be made public in all parts of Oregon, and be read at the polls at the next succeeding general election, and a concurrence of two-thirds of all {187} the members elected at said election, may pass said amendments, and they shall become a part of this compact.
Certificate
I, John E. Long,[230] secretary of Oregon territory, do hereby certify, that the foregoing is a true and correct copy of the original law, as passed by the representatives of the people of Oregon, on the fifth day of July, A. D. 1845, and submitted to the people on the twenty-sixth day of the same month, and by them adopted and now on file in my office.