Abbildungen der Seite
PDF
EPUB

Bacon, "take heed how their nobility and gentlemen do multiply too fast; for that maketh the common subject to be a peasant and base swain, driven out of heart, and, in effect, but a gentleman's laborer." He who seeks for the true cause of the greatness and thrift of our northwestern states will find it not less in the influence of just laws and the education of all classes of men, than in the exist ence of productive fields and in the means of physical wealth.

"What constitutes a state?

Not high raised battlement, or labored mound,
Thick wall, or moated gate;

Not cities proud, with spires and turrets crowned;
Not bays and broad armed ports,

Where, laughing at the storm, proud navies ride;
But men, high minded men.

PART II.

TERRITORY OF DACOTAH.

"POPULOUS CITIES AND STATES ARE SPRINGING UP, AS IF LY ENCHANTMENT, FROM THE BOSOM OF OUR WESTERN WILDS."—The President's Annual Message for 1856.

15 *

(173)

THE PROPOSED NEW TERRITORY OF

DACOTAH.

Organization of Minnesota as a state-Suggestions as to its division— Views of Captain Pope-Character and resources of the new territory to be left adjoining-Its occupation by the Dacotah Indians-Its organization and name.

THE territory of Minnesota according to its present boundaries embraces an area of 141,839 square miles exclusive of water;- -a domain four times as large as the State of Ohio, and twelve times as large as Holland, when her commerce was unrivalled and her fleets ruled the sea. Its limits take in three of the largest rivers of North America; the Mississippi, the Missouri, and the Red River of the North. Though remote from the sea board, ships can go out from its harbors to the ocean in two if not three different channels. Its delightful scenery of lakes and water-falls, of prairie and woodland, are not more alluring to the tourist, than are its invigorating climate and its verdant fields attractive to the husbandman. It has been organized seven years; and its resources have become so much developed, and its population so large, there is a general disposition among the people to have a state organiza

tion, and be admitted into the Confederacy of the Union.1 A measure of this kind is not now premature: on the contrary, it is not for the interest of the general government any longer to defray the expenses of the territory; and the adoption of a state organization, throwing the taxes upon the people, would give rise to a spirit of rivalry and emulation, a watchfulness as to the system of public expenditures, and a more jealous regard for the proper development of the physical resources of the state. The legislature which meets in January (1857), will without doubt take the subject into consideration, and provide for a convention to frame a constitution."

This being the condition of things, the manner in which the territory shall be divided-for no one can expect the new state will embrace the whole extent of the present territory—becomes a very interesting question. Some maintain, I believe, that the territory should be divided by a line running east and west. That would include in its limits the country bordering, for some distance, on the Missouri River; possibly the head of navigation of the Red River of the North. But it is hardly probable that a line of this description would give Minnesota any part of Lake Superior. Others maintain that the territory should be divided by a line running north and south; say, for instance, along the valley

1 On the 9th of December Mr. Rice, the delegate in congress from Minnesota, gave notice to the house that he would in a few days in troduce a bill authorizing the people of the territory to hold a con vention for the purpose of forming a state constitution.

« ZurückWeiter »