How many acres was the louisiana purchase

It also found the part of the Sac and Fox cession west of the Mississippi had a market value of 60 cents an acre in To make the Sac and Fox whole, the commission ordered an additional payment of That was hardly the worst of it. In , the Blackfeet, Blood, Gros Ventre, and Piegan successfully sued the United States for seizing more than 12 million acres in Montana by executive order in They had received nothing at all for a tract nearly twice the size of Vermont.

But in calculating the final payout, the court reduced the judgment by requiring the plaintiff tribes to pay back past government expenditures for their benefit, in this case, for the salaries of federally employed Indian agents, teachers, police, and interpreters; for the construction and maintenance of Indian agency buildings; for land surveys; and perhaps most egregious of all, for the cost of shipping their children off to Indian boarding schools.

For more than a century, and without much fanfare, litigation like this has supplemented the payments for Indian land originally paid as part of treaties, agreements, statutes, and executive orders. Indian claims cases for broken or unconscionably iniquitous treaties have been in the courts continuously since the s.

Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy was stunned to find lawyers tabulating debts for land acquired in the 19 th century when he toured the Department of Justice in Because these awards were arrived at after long delays, and typically excluded interest or any consideration of value not dictated by markets, they ultimately served more to quiet claims than deliver justice. While the court admitted that the agreement had been coerced with threats of starvation and that it violated an earlier treaty from , its decision left no room for what the Sioux actually wanted.

Most awards from the 20 th century heyday of Indian claims litigation—in the Court of Claims through the s and later the Indian Claims Commission from to —were far smaller than the sum the Sioux rejected. In the past 25 years, cases have generally involved smaller amounts of land and a limited range of mineral or water rights disputes, which have made larger settlements politically possible. These settlements have generally been resolved by congressional acts ending costly and time-consuming litigation.

This belated turn toward equity illuminates just how little compensation was issued for land and resources previously. Settlement acts passed since the s represent nearly a quarter of the total expenditures mapped here while covering only about 1 percent of the land cessions.

But although the Americans never asked for it, Napoleon dangled the entire territory in front of them on April 11, Even that low price was too steep for the United States. Napoleon wanted the money immediately in order to prepare for war with Great Britain. But despite landing Louisiana for less than three cents an acre, the price was more than the United States could afford. As a result, it was forced to borrow from two European banks at 6 percent interest.

The Louisiana negotiations helped put James Monroe in the proverbial poor house. After spending three years as governor of Virginia, Monroe purportedly hoped to retire from politics and make some money opening a law practice and developing his landholdings. Barely a month went by, however, before Jefferson nominated him as a special envoy to help Livingston with the Louisiana Purchase negotiations.

Tanesse; courtesy the Library of Congress. Boundaries of the Louisiana Purchase. Courtesy of the Library of Congress. The Louisiana Purchase Treaty. February Napoleon decides against sending more troops to Saint Domingue and instead orders forces to sail to New Orleans. March Napoleon cancels military expedition to Louisiana.

May 18 Britain declares war on France. July 4 Purchase is officially announced in United States. October 20 U. Senate ratifies purchase treaty. November 30 Spain formally transfers Louisiana to France. December 20 France formally transfers Louisiana to United States. Further Sources Bond, Bradley G. French Colonial Louisiana and the Atlantic World. Cunningham, Noble, Jr. Jefferson and Monroe: Constant Friendship and Respect. Charlottesville: Thomas Jefferson Foundation, Personal Finance.

Your Practice. Popular Courses. Key Takeaways While modern-day multi-million or multi-billion real estate deals can seem staggering, they lose some luster when compared to historic land sales.

Russia's sale of Alaska to the U. The Louisiana Purchase from France proved to be transformational for the United States, as it gave the young country access to 13 states and million additional acres. The Treaty of Tordesillas split the lands outside Europe between Spain and Portugal, then the world's biggest superpowers.

Spain got the better deal, gaining control of much of modern-day Latin America. Article Sources. Investopedia requires writers to use primary sources to support their work. These include white papers, government data, original reporting, and interviews with industry experts.

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