CHAPTER IX

THE NORTHWEST TERRITORY

In our study of the northwest, we have thus far considered only the scattered communities formed by the different land companies, without considering their government. The land companies were able to get people to go into the wilderness, because of the certainty of a good government under the Ordinance of 1787. According to this ordinance, the temporary administration rested in the hands of the governor and judges. In October, 1787, Congress appointed Arthur St. Clair governor of the territory, and Samuel H. Parsons, John Armstrong, and James W. Varnum judges, and Winthrop Sargent secretary. Armstrong declined to serve, and John C. Symmes was appointed in his place. Dr. Cutler's choice for governor had been, as we have seen, his Connecticut friend and associate, Samuel H. Parsons. But while negotiating with Congress, he found that St. Clair, its president, wished to be governor, and that the bill for the land purchase would go through much more easily if he favored the appointment of St. Clair. This he did, requesting that Sargeant might be made secretary and Parsons first judge. These requests were granted.

Arthur St. Clair, first governor of the Northwest Territory, was a Scotchman by birth, and had received a university training in his own land. Through the influence of relatives, he obtained a commission in the British army. He served as an officer under Wolfe at the capture of Quebec. After the treaty of 1763, he resigned his

commission as lieutenant and settled in Pennsylvania, where he became a farmer and a surveyor. He was prominent in civil life in his colony; and his military training was so highly regarded that at the outbreak of the Revolution he was appointed colonel in the Continental army, and, because of his skill and bravery, was later advanced to the position of brigadier and major general. He was courtmartialled for abandoning Ticonderoga, but acquitted from the charge of cowardice. In 1785, he was sent as a delegate from Pennsylvania to the Continental Congress and in 1787 was chosen president of that body.

In July, 1788, the governor came to the Territory, and was received at Marietta with appropriate ceremonies. General Harmer, commander of the fort, with the officers and citizens, welcomed him as he stepped from the twelveoared barge to the shore. Fourteen guns were discharged at the fort, in honor of the event.

July 15th was the day of the official beginning of the government in the Northwest. St. Clair, accompanied by Secretary Sargent and Judges Parsons and Varnum, made a public entry into the city, where he was welcomed by the citizens. He addressed them in a short speech, in which he showed himself sensible of the honor conferred upon him by the gubernatorial appointment, and a consciousness of the importance of the work upon which he was entering. He referred to the temporary nature of the government and stated that it was to continue only while infancy lasted. He promised to select with the greatest care, and with the assistance of his associates, laws from the codes of the established States. The difficulties before the people were conceded to be very great, but he pictured to his auditors the joy of seeing the vast forests give way to cultivated fields, and cities rising in the former habitations of wild beasts. He reminded the pioneers of the dangers from the Indians, and recommended that cordial relations be cultivated with them, and that they be treated with kindness and justice, in order that the reproach might not be

brought against the settlers that they professed a holy and benevolent religion but did not practise it. The response of the people was cordial. It was voiced by Rufus Putnam in a rather inflated style. The welcome is in sad contrast to St. Clair's departure. The stormy, disappointing career of St. Clair in the northwest little realized the closing wish of Putnam's address: "May heaven grant to you both in your public character and private life all the felicity that can meet your expectations. May the cold hand of death never arrest you, until you shall have accomplished all the objects which a good and great man can embrace; . and then when nature shall begin to sink beneath the weight of mortality may you rise triumphant on cherub's wings, to enjoy your God in realms of endless felicity." It is to be hoped that this last wish has been more completely fulfilled than the earlier ones.

The situation was one which called for all the skill of St. Clair and the able men who were associated with him in the government of the Territory. There was sure to be trouble with the Indians, and the foundation had already been laid for that perennial problem, the conflicting land claims. St. Clair and his judges formed, according to the Ordinance, the legislative body, but their power was restricted to the enactment of laws which were already in force in the older States. They were engaged in this legislative duty from August to December. Some of the older laws they adopted, but they were confronted by conditions which were peculiar to the Territory and so they were compelled, or at least they seemed to be compelled, to exceed the authority given them in the Ordinance and to make new laws themselves. This is the first of many instances which we shall find where the people of the Northwest did not strictly hold to the letter of the Ordinance, but modified it in such a way as to suit their wishes or conditions. The laws passed in this way were, as a rule necessary for the welfare of the people. They were opposed by Congress on the ground above given, that St. Clair and his associates

were not authorized to enact new laws.

All, however, but two continued in force until the second grade of government was established in 1798. Then the governor and council enacted a code of laws which were recognized as having legal force. In this exercise of power which was not granted them by the Ordinance, Judges Parsons and Varnum believed that the prohibition was not to be taken literally; that if the clause were given a strict and literal construction, it would defeat in general the purpose of the Ordinance. There were two possible interpretations of the wording of the Ordinance in the lines dealing with legislation: one was that the laws of the older States must be adopted literally and verbally; the other, that parts of particular laws might be adopted, and if the latter is true, then it follows that a law might be adopted composed of such different parts of laws of two or more States as were best suited to the district, provided that such composite laws were not repugnant, but as comfortable as may be, to those of the original States.

St. Clair held the conservative view that the legislators were not allowed such a degree of liberty, and his interpretation was upheld by Congress. His reply is a convincing one, showing that it was not the design of Congress to make them legislators, but only judges.

In the course of the year 1788 laws of the Territory were issued in writing, because there was no printing press within its limits. These laws were very strict. The first was "an act to establish and regulate the militia;" a very important subject in a country where Indian outbreaks were certain to take place. Others were for the organization and procedure of the courts. The death penalty was prescribed for the crimes of murder, arson, and burglary. Drunkenness was punished by a fine of fifty cents for the first offence and one dollar for every subsequent one. Debts and petty offences were harshly treated. No attempt was made in the first two years to enforce the laws outside of Washington County, which was organized July 27, 1788,

and included all of the Northwest Territory east of the Scioto.

The judiciary department was inaugurated September 2, 1788. On the 9th the Judge of Quarter Sessions was installed.

The most important work before the new governor was the solution of the Indian problem. The natives did not like the intrusion of the white men into the region north of Ohio River. St. Clair had been instructed by Congress to use all means to extinguish the Indian titles to the lands north of the Ohio and east of the Mississippi. The earlier treaties with the Indians were disregarded. In 1789, St. Clair concluded the treaty of Fort Harmar with some of the tribes, but most of those interested refused to make a treaty. A long war followed in which the Indians tried to drive the white invaders out of the country north of the Ohio. There were three campaigns in this Indian war. The first was under the command of General Harmar who began the war in the fall of 1790. This quickly resulted in the defeat of the whites, and the Indians, made bold by their success, became more aggressive.

The second campaign was undertaken under the leadership of St. Clair with a large but poorly drilled and equipped body of soldiers. In November, 1791, this army was surprised and put to rout by the Indians, six hundred of the soldiers being killed. This defeat spread terror through the Northwest, and it seemed for a time as if all the country north of the Ohio would fall into the hands of the Indians.

The third campaign was conducted by General Wayne, who led his army from Cincinnati in the fall of 1793, and in August, 1794, met the Indians on Maumee River where he administered to them a crushing defeat, breaking the Indian reign of terror north of the Ohio. In August, 1795, Wayne and the Indian chiefs met and held a long council at Greeneville, where a permanent peace between the United States and the Northern Indians was made.