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To the Honorable, the Council and House of Representatives
of the Territory of Wisconsin,

The Memorial of the Milwaukee and Rock River Canal
Company respectfully represents, That an act to incorporate
said Company was passed by the Honorable Legislature and approved
on the fifth day of January, AD 1838 in the first section of which act
it is enacted, among other rights and powers conferred, that said company
"may purchase hold and convey, real personal or mixed estate" without
restricting or restraining them from the purchase of any particular property
either of a real or personal character; and in the sixth section it is enacted
"that said corporation shall have the right to construct, maintain and
continue a navigable canal or slack water navigation from the town
of Milwaukee to Rock river on such routes and of such dimensions
and to terminate at such point as shall be determined on by said
corporation", without in any manner restricting them in relation to the
persons whom they might employ to execute said work.

That an act was passed by Congress approved on the 18th of June
1838, in the ninth section of which it is enacted, "that the assent of
Congress is hereby given to the act of the Territorial Legislature of Wisconsin
entitled 'an act to incorporate the Milwaukee and Rock River Canal
Company', subject to the preceding modifications and the following provisions",
none of which modifications or provisions however had any reference to
the rights of the Company in the purchase and sale of property or in the
selection of contractors or other agents whom they might employ.

That any subsequent act of the Legislature for the purpose
of repealing, withdrawing or in any manner modifying the rights and
privileges thus granted and thus confirmed, would be repugnant
to the rights of the stockholders, clearly illegal, and consequently
null and void.

Your memorialists would further respectfully represent,
that an act was passed by your Honorable body entitled "an