The United States are proprietors of large tracts within the municipal and legislative jurisdiction of States, not held directly by virtue of any original prerogative or eminent domain, by any right of conquest, occupancy, or discovery, but under acts of cession from the old States, in which the lands were situated, and from foreign countries, recognized and confirmed in the statutes by which the different States have been constituted. Words determining this relation are found in the Ordinance of 1787, as follows: "The Legislatures of those districts or new States shall never interfere with _the primary disposal of the soil_ by the United States in Congress assembled, nor with any regulations Congress may find necessary for securing the title in such soil to the _bona fide_ purchasers." This provision is incorporated, as an article of compact, in subsequent statutes under which the new States took their place in the Union. It is "the primary disposal of the soil," without any incident of _sovereignty_, which is here secured. Regarding the United States, then, as simple proprietors, under the jurisdiction of the States, would they not be liable, in the discretion of the States, to the burdens of other proprietors, unless specially exempted? This exemption is conceded. In the Ordinance of 1787 it is expressly declared that "no tax shall be imposed on lands the property of the United States"; and this provision, like that already mentioned, was embodied in succeeding Acts of Congress by which new States were constituted. The fact that it was formally conceded and has been thus embodied seems to denote that such concession was regarded as necessary to secure the desired immunity. Indeed, from familiar principles of our jurisprudence, recognized by the Supreme Court, it is reasonable to infer, that, without such express exemption, this whole extent of territory would be within the field of local taxation, liable, like the lands of other proprietors, to all customary burdens and incidents. Thus, in an early case of Pennsylvania, it is decided that the purchase of land by the United States would not alone be sufficient to vest them with the jurisdiction, or to oust the jurisdiction of the State, without being accompanied or followed by the consent of the Legislature of the State.[75] And it is judicially declared by the late Mr. Justice Woodbury, in a well-considered case:-- "Where the United States own land situated within the limits of particular States, and over which they have no cession of jurisdiction, for objects either special or general, little doubt exists _that the rights and remedies in relation to it are usually such as apply to other land-owners within the State_."[76] [75] See Commonwealth of Pennsylvania _v._ Young. 1 Kent's Com., 431. [76] United States _v._ Ames, 1 Woodbury and Minot, 80. After setting forth certain rights of the United States, the learned judge proceeds:--