Whenever the political laws of the United States are to be discussed, it is with the doctrine of the sovereignty of the people that we must begin.
— from Democracy in America — Volume 1 by Alexis de Tocqueville

In 1785, Congress passed a law which has become general in its application to all public lands of the United States.
— from Boy Scouts Handbook The First Edition, 1911 by Boy Scouts of America

Rough and savage though they were, they were the true pioneers of that extraordinary tide of civilisation which has poured its resistless current through tracts large [Pg 68] enough for kings to govern, over a country now teeming with cultivation, where, a few short years ago, countless herds of buffalo roamed unmolested, where the bear and deer abounded, and the savage Indian skulked through the woods and prairies, lord of the unappreciated soil that now yields its prolific treasures to the spade and plough of civilised man.
— from Life in the Far West by George Frederick Augustus Ruxton

The question was then taken to concur with the Committee of the whole House in their disagreement to the resolution recommended by the select committee, which is as follows: Resolved , That provision should be made for securing to the officers and soldiers of the Revolutionary army of Virginia, on State establishment, in the land or sea service of the said State, the bounty lands which were promised to them, either by a law or [Pg 711] resolution of the said Commonwealth, out of the lands not otherwise appropriated, and lying on the northwest side of the river Ohio, within the Virginia cession, to be of good quality, according to the true intent and meaning of the promises made on the part of Virginia, and that, if a sufficiency of good land within the meaning of the aforesaid engagement cannot there be found, that their bounties shall be satisfied out of any other public land of the United States, not heretofore otherwise appropriated: And was determined in the affirmative—yeas 66, nays 41.
— from Abridgment of the Debates of Congress, from 1789 to 1856, Vol. 4 (of 16) by United States. Congress

For, if the constitution meant the practical limits of the United States, the extent of country which we then possessed —our recent acquisitions, on the side of Canada and the Natchez, could not be defended.
— from Abridgment of the Debates of Congress, from 1789 to 1856, Vol. 3 (of 16) by United States. Congress

R121805, 7Dec53, Haldeman-Julius Publications (PWH) Lives of the U. S. presidents.
— from U.S. Copyright Renewals, 1953 July - December by Library of Congress. Copyright Office

The public opinion of Charleston is stronger than the public law of the United States on [Pg 195] that point, stronger than the Constitution, and nobody dares execute the laws of the United States in that matter.
— from Speeches, Addresses, and Occasional Sermons, Volume 3 (of 3) by Theodore Parker

Mr. Berrien concluded from these postulates of international and constitutional law that, if Congress did nothing in the premises, the President would continue to administer, by means of his military officials, the private law of Mexico, and the public law of the United States, in the territory acquired from Mexico, and that this would allow slaveholders to take their slaves into this territory, and hold them in slavery; but that if Congress, by a positive enactment, should adopt the Mexican laws, en bloc, for this territory, slavery would be thereby excluded from it.
— from The Middle Period, 1817-1858 by John William Burgess

I acted on the theory that the President could at any time in his discretion withdraw from entry any of the public lands of the United States and reserve the same for forestry, for water-power sites, for irrigation, and other public purposes.
— from Theodore Roosevelt: An Autobiography by Theodore Roosevelt

It is an unusual coincidence that during the war between the States, Fredericksburg should have had within its gates, President Lincoln of the United States and President Jefferson Davis of the Confederate States, and that each made a public address from places three blocks apart.
— from Historic Fredericksburg: The Story of an Old Town by John T. (John Tackett) Goolrick