Northwest Territory

“ There were few if any wage-earners, the accommodating method of exchanging work among neighbors being generally in vogue.
Such, in brief, were the daily customs of the early settlers of the middle West, whose children wandered still farther westward in the forties and fifties, carrying with them the habits in which they had been reared to the distant Territory afterwards known as the “Whole of Oregon,” which originally comprised the great Northwest Territory, where now flourish massive blocks of mighty States. ”

“ In going westward, the region we are traversing beyond the Pennsylvania boundary gradually changes 404 from coal and iron to a rich agricultural section. As we move away from the influence of the Allegheny ranges, the hills become gentler, and the rolling surface is more and more subdued, until it is smoothed out into an almost level prairie, heavily timbered where not yet cleared for cultivation. This was the Northwest Territory, first explored by the French, who were led by the Sieur de la Salle in his original discoveries in the seventeenth century. ”

“ The Northwest presents a series of very interesting race problems. The first one, chronologically at least, is the problem that the American Indian presents. It is not so long ago since the Indian was in possession of a very large portion of the region we are now considering. A number of tribes were gradually removed further West, or were assigned to districts in the Indian Territory. But most of them were concentrated in large reservations in Minnesota, Nebraska, North and South Dakota, Montana, and Wyoming. ”

“ When it is borne in mind that large tracts of this territory were reserved for distribution among the Continental soldiers, it is impossible for me to believe that it was ever considered that the result of the cession was to take the Northwest Territory out of the Union, the necessary effect of which would have been to expatriate the very men who by their suffering and valor had secured the liberty of their united country. ”

“ He hoped thus to build up a stronghold and seat of government that would brook no rivalry. The colonists came and settled at Fort Garry, at the forks of the Red River; but matters grew worse instead of better. Each company claimed to be in the right, and was resolved to drive the other out of existence. During the next few years the men of the Northwest Company and of the Hudson Bay Company came to blows more than once, and finally, in October of 1814, the Northwest Company were ordered to remove from the territory within six months—a mandate which they treated with contempt and derision. ”

“ That portion of the Northwest coast which was long known as the "Oregon territory" enjoys the distinction of having been fathered by more men with a greater variety of purposes and ambitions than any other of the family of commonwealths under the United States flag. First, there were the English and the American explorers, Gray and Vancouver, and Lewis and Clark, in the employ of their respective companies or governments, whose acts formed the foundation of opposing claims to the northwest, and particularly the region drained by the Columbia River. These form a class by themselves. ”

“ Instead of other pay, many of these officers and of the continental soldiers now received grants of land in what was then called the Northwest Territory. There they soon settled, working hard, and serving their country just as nobly by being good farmers, good citizens, good husbands, and good fathers as they had done by being good soldiers in the Revolutionary War. ”

“ The younger men in the Northwest Company were fired with ambition and assured of an adequate reward for their services. While for many years their older rivals had slumbered, content with the limits of their territory, the more enterprising Northwest Company, with infinite toil and danger, extended their posts throughout the interior and western parts of Canada, and opened up a new and hitherto undeveloped country. ”

“ The residue of the Northwest was the dwelling-place of Algonquins alone. In reality, therefore, "the territory northwest of the river Ohio" has no veritable history ante-dating the period of its first discovery by civilized man. Portions of the country had been heard of, it is true, but only through vague reports of savages. There were no accounts at all, besides these, of the extensive region of the upper lakes or of the valley of the Upper Mississippi ”

“ When one views the great and growing cities of the northwest it seems hardly credible that any living man should have witnessed the entire development of this section of the country. Yet personal knowledge of the wonderful progress of the northwest enables R. C. McCaw to speak with authority concerning the events which have shaped its history. He was born in Linn county, Oregon, on the 11th of February, 1856, at which time Washington was still a part of the territory of Oregon and all of this vast region was practically undeveloped. ”

“ We have a great Northwest, still in large degree a wilderness, to cover with farms and homes and the other appurtenances of civilization. We have yet large sections of our East to dot with the towns and the industries which this territory will bountifully support.
“It is only within a very few years that we have begun to take hold of this work with the zeal and determination that brings success. With this twentieth century there has been born in Canada a new spirit of enterprise. Even here in the University its effects have been strongly felt. ”

“ Popularly it signified the old Northwestern Territory—including Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, and Wisconsin—until about the time of the Civil War. In the decade following the war, Illinois and Iowa were largely in the minds of men who spoke of the Northwest. From 1870 to 1880, Iowa, Kansas, northern Missouri, and Nebraska constituted the most stirring and favored region—the Northwest par excellence. But the past decade has witnessed a remarkable development in the Dakotas ”

“ The first territories added to the Union were Rupert's Land and the North-Western Territory, (subsequently designated the Northwest Territories) , which were admitted pursuant to section 146 of the Constitution Act, 1867 and the Rupert's Land Act, 1868, by the Rupert's Land and North-Western Territory Order of June 23, 1870, effective July 15, 1870. ”

“ And yet in important historical ideals—in the process of expansion, in the persistence of agricultural interests, in impulsiveness, in imperialistic ways of looking at the American destiny, in hero-worship, in the newness of its present social structure—the Old Northwest has much in common with the South and the Far West.
Behind her is the old pioneer past of simple democratic conditions, and freedom of opportunity for all men. Before her is a superb industrial development, the brilliancy of success as evinced in a vast population, aggregate wealth, and sectional power. ”

“ Two decades hence no man will question the quality of Northwestern civilization. If the East is losing something of its distinctive Americanism through the influx of foreign elements and the decay of its old-time farming communities, the growth of the Northwest, largely upon the basis of New England blood and New England ideas, will make full compensation. ”

“ The changes since the war are of more social importance, in many respects, than those in the years commonly referred to as the formative period. As a result, the Northwest finds herself again between contending forces, sharing the interests of East and West, as once before those of North and South, and forced to give her voice on issues of equal significance for the destiny of the republic. ”

“ The uncontrolled initiative of the individual, which was the chief force in the settlement of the Southwest, was given comparatively little play in the settlement of the Northwest. The Northwest owed its existence to the action of the nation as a whole. ”

“ It was the glory of the Northwest to offer a competence to the needy, the baffled, the discouraged, the tormented of the eastern States and 188 of Europe. The bulk of its fast-growing population consisted, it is true, of ordinary folk who could have lived on in fair comfort in the older sections, yet who were ambitious to own more land, to make more money, and to secure larger advantages for their children. ”

“ That Lewis and Clark Centennial will be the most appropriate, which is the means of the largest, highest, and, therefore, most permanent good. It should be planned so that its central aim appeals to the deepest patriotism of the people of the Pacific Northwest. The Pacific Northwest is unique in its natural wonders. Their charm for the people of the East should be most effectively utilized. Our industries and commerce should receive from the fair, and congresses held in conjunction with it, the best impetus that science can give. ”

“ The most potent single element of population in the Northwest is of New England origin, although more than half of it has found its way into Iowa, Minnesota, the Dakotas, Nebraska, and Kansas, by filtration through the intermediate States of New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Illinois. ”

“ The great Northwest—that wonderful frontier that called to itself a world's hardiest spirits—is rapidly becoming a settled country; and before the light of civilizing influences, the blanket-Indian has trailed the buffalo over the divide that time has set between the pioneer and the crowd. ”

“ Looking at the Northwest as a whole, one sees, in the character of its industries and in the elements of its population, it is identified on the east with the zone of States including the middle region and New England. Cotton culture and the negro make a clear line of division between the Old Northwest and the South. ”

“ The three agencies, agriculture, banking, and the carrier, are most important in our part of the country. Upon the wisdom and energy with which they are conducted, upon their coöperation each with the other, and upon the wise and fair treatment accorded them by the public through the forces of Government, depend their success and the continued growth and success of our great Northwestern country.
The American Northwest is a great empire, very young but very strong and full of opportunity for the best kind of human endeavor. ”

“ But in 1783, at the close of the Revolutionary War, the Northwest Company was organized, with headquarters at Montreal. The British still held possession of our Northwest long after the treaty with the United States was signed. ”

“ Only the Northwest Fur Company ever held its own with the Hudson’s Bay, and the two combined when the Northwest established itself. The others, lone traders, partnerships, the Company fought and intimidated till they withdrew. Technically, it is a free country, has been since ’69, but north of the Saskatchewan the Company still holds forth in the ancient manner, making its own law, recognizing no higher authority than itself. It is a big country, the North, and the Canadian government has its hands full in the east and south. A white man takes his own risks north of latitude 54. ”

“ If the Northwest be plain like a picture in your mind’s eye, you can recall how in the far North the Cascades and Rockies are intermingled, and how, as we come down through British Columbia to our own soil, they gradually separate, slope apart, so that by the time they reach the latitude of Portland, Oregon, a wide, flat domain lies between them. ”

“ In the democracy of the Southwest, industrial development and city life were only minor factors, but to the democracy of the Northwest they were its very life. To widen the area of the clearing, to contend with one another for the mastery of the industrial resources of the rich provinces, to struggle for a place in the ascending movement of society, to transmit to one's offspring the chance for education, for industrial betterment, for the rise in life which the hardships of the pioneer existence denied to the pioneer himself, these were some of the ideals of the region to which Lincoln came. ”

“ There is nothing to connect "the dark backward and abysm" of mound-building times with those of the red race of the Northwest; and all that is known of the latter dating earlier than their first discovery, is exceedingly dim and shadowy. Upon the extended area bounded by Lake Superior on the north, Lake Michigan on the east, wide-spreading prairies on the south, and the Mississippi river on the west, there met and mingled two distinct Indian families—Algonquins [viii] and Dakotas. Concerning the various tribes of these families, nothing of importance could be gleaned by the earliest explorers ”

“ Yet this gaunt shadow of a man had no thought of giving up his long cherished idea of awakening his countrymen to the great advantages, national and individual, which must inevitably follow the settlement of the Northwest Coast under the patronage and protection of the American government. ”

“ This committee will further all they can an intelligent understanding of the subject to the end that the works affecting the Northwest may be speedily completed, and it confidently relies upon the support of the entire Northwestern country in its efforts to bring about a condition which will result in such enormous and continuing benefits to all the people. ”

“ The memory of some of us goes back to the time when, all over the great free Northwest, the people seemed to have forgotten to what they owed their own prosperity. The Northwest had been the gift of Freedom to the Republic on her birthday. In each of her million homes dwells Liberty, a perpetual guest. But yet that people in Illinois and Michigan and Indiana and Ohio seemed for a time to have forgotten their own history, and to be unworthy of their fair and mighty heritage. ”