fix the Standard of Weights and Measures". In his first annual message to Congress (what later came to be called "State of the Union Addresses") on January 8, 1790 (a few months before Jefferson's report to the House of Representatives), George Washington stated, "Uniformity in the currency, weights, and measures of the United States is an object of great importance, and will, I am pers­ed, be duly attended to." Washington repeated similar calls for action in his second and third annual messages (after Jefferson's report). Jefferson's decimal proposal had the support of Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, James Monroe, and George Washington. Robert Morris was a powerful opponent of the proposal. In late 1791 the Senate appointed a committee to report on the subject and make recommendations. The committee reported in April 1792, unanimously endorsing Jefferson's decimal system. The Senate was slow to act on the matter and while they delayed events in France complicated the issue. Although French scientists working on a decimal system had originally supported using the seconds pendulum as a scientific basis, and Jefferson had deliberately matched his seconds pendulum proposal to the French one, based on a measurement at the latitude of Paris, the French decided to use the length of a meridian of the Earth instead of a seconds pendulum. This and other developments changed what had promised to be an internationally developed system into a strictly French project. Jefferson wrote, "The element of measure adopted by the National Assembly excludes, ipso facto, every nation on earth from a communion of measurement with them." The Senate continued to consider Jefferson's two proposals, along with a number of new proposals, for several years. In 1795 a bill titled "An Act directing certain experiments to be made to ascertain uniform standards of weights and measures for the United States" was passed by the House and was approved by committee in the Senate, but on the last day of the session the Senate said it would consider the bill during the next session. The bill was never taken up again. In 1795 the Northwest Indian War, which for years had prevented the surveying and sale of land in the Northwest Territory came to an end. A land rush of settlers, surveyors, squatters, and others rapidly pushed into the region and the federal government had a sudden and intense need to establish a method for surveying and selling land.