The Articles of Confederation gave Congress a big job: the land between the Appalachian Mountains and the Mississippi River that Britain gave up in 1783. Several states claimed parts of it. By the mid-1780s they had handed most of those claims to Congress. Two laws settled how the land would be sold and governed.
Key idea
The Land Ordinance of 1785 surveyed the land into square townships, six miles on a side, each cut into 36 sections of one square mile (640 acres), and set one section in each township aside for schools. The Northwest Ordinance of 1787 set the steps from territory to state: new states would join "on an equal footing with the original States," and slavery was banned in the Northwest Territory.
Why it works
A grid made land easy to sell: a buyer could name an exact square, and the sales gave the nearly broke Congress money. The path to statehood mattered even more. The old states could have ruled the West as their own colonies, the way Britain had ruled them. Instead the Ordinance promised that new states would be full partners. Every state since has joined on those terms.
Worked example: Reading Article 6
Article 6 of the Northwest Ordinance says: "There shall be neither slavery nor involuntary servitude in the said territory, otherwise than in the punishment of crimes." What did it do, and what did it leave out?
- "Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude": no one could be held as a slave in the territory.
- "Otherwise than in the punishment of crimes": forced labor as a punishment for a crime was still allowed.
- The same article required that people escaping slavery from the original states be returned.
- It covered only the land north and west of the Ohio River. Land south of the river was left open to slavery.
Answer: It banned slavery north of the Ohio River, with exceptions for criminal punishment and a duty to return people who escaped.
Common mistake
Some students think new western states joined as lesser members, like colonies of the original thirteen. The Ordinance says the opposite: new states are admitted "on an equal footing with the original States in all respects whatever." Quick check: does Ohio have fewer senators than Virginia? No. Both have two.
The Ordinance also promised that "the utmost good faith shall always be observed towards the Indians" and that their land would not be taken without their consent except in "just and lawful wars." In practice, the nations of the Ohio country, among them the Shawnee, Miami and Delaware, fought a long war against settlement, and most of their land was taken by treaties made after defeats.