The government of the people of the state of Illinois

Front matter

JK

OF

ilinois

Chapter I. Historical Sketch Of Illinois

I. The French Period. 1. Near the close of the seventeenth century a few bold cavaliers zealous for the glory of France, and a few devout priests zealous for the conversion of souls, began the exploration of that vast region, intersected by innumerable water-ways, which is now called the Mississippi Valley. Of that occupation, illustrated again and again by deeds of heroism and piety perhaps unparalleled in American history, Francis Parkman has told the story. 1 A part of that story is the story of the people of the State of Illinois. It is a story of the days from La Salle to Lincoln, from the days of despotism to those of freedom. In the long struggle for the rights of man, Illinois and her people, in the providence of God, have borne no inconspicuous part. Her citizens, her soldiers, and her statesmen rank with the citizens, the soldiers, and the statesmen of her sister States with whom she has co-operated in the cause of humanity and human rights.

2. The first settlement of white people within the limits of the present State of Illinois was made by French colonists from Canada in 1679, under the direction of the Sieur De La Salle, a friend of Frontenac, the French governor of Canada. La Salle discovered and named the Illinois River from an Indian tribe called Illini who lived on its banks. In 1682 he again visited Illinois with another colony of Canadians, made settlements at Kaskaskia, Fort Chartres, and elsewhere, and made a voyage down the Mississippi River to its mouth ; in the same year he established a depot for the purchase of furs from the Indians at St. Louis of the Rock about eight miles from the present city of Ottawa. This place is a natural fortress, being elevated one hundred and thirty-five feet above the river. Its northern side is on the Illinois River; it has a level top including three-fourths of an acre, and the only available approach is by a steep path on its eastern slope, which is easily fortified.

3. At this place, which was afterward known as Starved Rock, and in its vicinity, not less than twenty thousand Indians belonging to different tribes were gathered, the

1 Parkman's " Discovery of the Great West," " Pontiac and the Indian * Wars," etc.

women employed in raising corn and vegetables for sustenance, the men mainly engaged in the collection of furs which they bartered with the French for commodities. It is no wonder that the French became wealthy by exchanging knives, scissors, pocket looking-glasses, and other inexpensive trinkets for furs which were worth in Paris a thousandfold more.

4. Meanwhile a new French governor, envying the profits that La Salle was enjoying from the fur-trade, took the place of Frontenac at Quebec. He issued orders unfriendly to the business, and in 1702 he discontinued the fort at Starved Rock.

5. The first permanent settlement of Europeans in Illinois was made at Tamaroa, now called Cahokia, in St. Clair county, near the Mississippi River, a few miles below St. Louis. The precise time of its settlement is uncertain, but an Indian village and Catholic missionaries were there in the year 1700. Some of these missionaries were secular priests, a larger number belonged to the Recollet order, and at a later period a still greater number came who were Jesuits. The benevolence which these priests practised toward their fellow-men, and their fervent piety, gave them a deserved influence over the Indians as well as over their own countrymen. Their teachings were the laws of the people, their decisions were as authoritative as the decisions of courts, and both justice and mercy reigned in harmony. It was a golden age for the colonists.

The discoveries and settlements of the French colonists and of the French Jesuit missionaries gave to France the ownership of the great Mississippi Valley by right of discovery and first occupation.

6. In 1712, Crozat, a French merchant, received a grant from the king of France, authorizing him to search for wealth in the king's dominions from the Wabash River to the Mexican Gulf, on condition that one-fifth of the revenues that he received should be paid to the French king.

THE CIVIL GOVERNMENT OF ILLINOIS.

7. In pursuing his schemes Crozat endeavored to open commerce with the Spaniards on the Gulf of Mexico, but they insisted that they were the owners of the Mississippi Valley, and that he was a trespasser on their territory. He then proposed to exchange the products of Illinois with the Spaniards of Santa Fe for their gold and silver, but his offers were rejected.

Map showing the Territory claimed by France and by Spain. (About 1750 a. d.)

8. Crozat then attempted to enrich himself by trading for furs with Indians to the east and south-east, but the superior energy and enterprise of the English settlers of Virginia and the Carolinas, who had penetrated the forests of Kentucky and Tennessee, secured the trade of the Indian tribes east of the Mississippi. Crozat failed, as so many others have failed, to perceive that the wealth of Illinois and of the Mississippi Valley lies in the inexhaustible fertility of its soil. After five years of labors and failures, in which he exhausted all his capital, he received permission from the king to give up his charter. The control of the commerce of the valley passed again into the hands of the king of France,

9. In 1717, John Law brought forward his famous " Mississippi scheme." This financial illusion is one of the most remarkable episodes in history. Many millions of dollars were lost, and thousands of persons were made paupers, by purchasing stock in a speculative company that possessed no wealth nor a prospect of any. It was a delusive scheme which proposed to pledge all the land of North America east of the Mississippi River as security for the shares of its stock. A company called the " Western Company " was formed in France to mine for silver and gold in the Mississippi Valley. To this company the king gave the control and government of the French territory in the Mississippi Valley. The present counties of Jackson, Monroe, Randolph, and St. Clair, and other parts of Illinois, were searched for silver, and a Frenchman named Renault brought from France two hundred laborers, and from St. Domingo five hundred negro slaves, to work in the mines. The enterprise was as fruitless as the search for gold at Jamestown in 1607. The financial collapse of the Western Company was delayed, but not avoided, by the change of its name to "The Company of the Indies." In 1732 the company gave up its charter, and the territory was again ceded to the king of France. For the next thirty years the government of the French dominions in the Mississippi Valley was vested in governors appointed by the king. Under the royal governors Bienville, De Vaudreuil, La Buissonier, and Macarty, the people were contented and happy. " The governor, aided by the friendly advice of the commandant and priests, either prevented the existence of controversies, or settled them, when they arose, without litigation." Lawsuits and courts were unknown. This period has been called by historians "the halcyon days of Illinois."

10. For reasons which are now clearly understood, the settlement of Illinois and the Mississippi Valley had been a failure, The French, up to the time of the surrender of

Quebec to the English in 1759, had been in undisturbed possession of the country for eighty years, yet from Lake Michigan to the Gulf of Mexico there were only four thousand white inhabitants. The reasons for this failure are stated by Judge Moses in his work on Illinois : 1. The French offered no inducements to settlers to become owners of the soil. 2. Transfers and sales of land were burdened with restrictions and heavy fines. 3. Energy was paralyzed by the grasp of commercial monopolies, thus stamping out all competition. 4. The French preferred ignorance to knowledge. During their domination in Canada there was not a printing-press in the province.

11. The defeat of the French at Quebec in September, 1759, and the surrender of Mackinaw, Detroit, and other posts to the English in the following year, ended French supremacy in the Mississippi Valley. In 1763, by the treaty of Paris, France relinquished all claim to territory in North America, but it was not until the 10th of October, 1765, that the lilies of France gave place to the cross of St. George over Fort Chartres, the last stronghold of the French in Illinois.

II. The English Period.

12. The most dramatic event of this period — extending from 1765 to 1778 — is the conspiracy of Pontiac, a conspiracy whose dark deeds are told by one of our most illustrious historians. 1 In the story of the American Indians, Pontiac is no less famed than Philip or Tecumseh.

13. It had always been the policy of the French to ingratiate themselves with the natives. In this they were remarkably successful. By providing the Indians with guns, ammunition, and clothing, by purchasing their furs and supplying them with spirits, and by free and equal social intercourse with them, the French not only made

1 Francis Parkman.

themselves agreeable to the natives, but also essential to their welfare.

14. The English, on the contrary, made little effort to acquire the good will of the natives, and had it not been for the prudent firmness of Major Rogers in his negotiations with Pontiac, a great part of the advantage arising from the surrender of Canada might have been lost. Pontiac aroused and combined all the tribes of the West against the English. From the Susquehanna to the Mississippi no white person was to be spared. Every stronghold west of Pittsburg, except Detroit, fell into the hands of the Indians.

15. But with the defeat of the natives in Ohio, the relief of Detroit, the recapture of Mackinaw and other forts that had been seized by the Indians ; when the French commander at St. Louis assured the Indians that the French dominion in Canada had been ceded to England, and the trans-Mississippi territory to Spain ; when Boquet had compelled a surrender of the whites who had been adopted into the families of their captors ; and, finally, when Captain Stirling, at the head of the 42d Highlanders, raised the flag of England over Fort Chartres, — Pontiac realized that his power had departed, and he sullenly bowed to his fate. His inglorious assassination near St. Louis soon afterward gave peace and encouragement to the English. From the older settlements in the East and the South-east, stimulated by the hope of a gainful traffic with the natives or the prospect of abundant returns from the soil, immigrants began settlements in the river-bottoms of Illinois.

16. On the 10th of October, 1765, Fort Chartres was surrendered- by the French to the English. The first official act of the English officer in charge was to publish a proclamation issued by General Gage, commander-inchief of the British forces in North America, offering to the French inhabitants religious freedom, with the rights and privileges of British'subjects, if they would take the oath of allegiance to England. If they chose France to England, they were offered a safe removal, with all their goods. About one-third of the French settlers sold their lands to British subjects, preferring to leave the country.

17. On June 2, 1774, the English Parliament passed an act by which the North- West Territory, 1 of which Illinois was a part, was included in the Province of Canada. This act was denounced by the settlers, most of whom, having come from the eastern colonies, retained sentiments of friendship for their old homes. In the Declaration of Independence this act is cited as one of the illegal acts of the English Government.

III. The Territorial Period.

18. In 1777, the year following the Declaration of Independence, Colonel George Rogers Clark, recognizing the wisdom of including the North-West Territory within the

limits of- the United States, / proposed to Patrick Henry,

jL fa. then governor of Virginia, a

m ly *m/ plan for capturing the Eng-

^1 k^ lish posts in Illinois and In-

diana, which was approved.

Clark was furnished with ^^_ $6000 by Virginia, and was

authorized to raise a body of troops. Arriving at Kaskaskia July 5, 1778, he captured the garrison and the

Colonel George Rogers Clark. English governor without

firing a gun. He soon afterward captured Port Vincennes, and took possession of Ca-

1 The North- West Territory comprised all the land westward from Pennsylvania and Virginia to the Mississippi Eiver, and from the Ohio River to the Canadian line. It embraced all the land now occupied by the States of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, and Wisconsin.

i hokia and the other settlements in Illinois. The account of Clark's campaign reads like a tale from Froissart. Fort Vincennes was afterward retaken by the British, and again recaptured by Clark. From this time it was held by the Americans. The United States, mainly through the foresight and energy of Clark, " the Hannibal of the West," was able, in the treaty between the United States and England in 1783, to secure the Great Lakes, and not the Ohio River, as the northern boundary of our continent.

19. It was partly on account of Clark's conquests, and partly because of the charter of 1606 to the old London Company which conveyed " the land from sea to sea," that the State of Virginia laid claim to the territory northwest of the Ohio River. Massachusetts, Connecticut, and New York also claimed portions of the territory under the terms of their charters. These claims infringed upon that of Virginia, but all these claims, as well as similar claims made by North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia, were voluntarily relinquished in cessions made by the legislatures of those States to the General Government. The only condition insisted on was one by Virginia, which declared that the expenses incurred by the State of Virginia in maintaining forts and garrisons and in subduing British posts should be repaid this State by the United States ; that the French settlers who had become citizens of Virginia should be protected in their rights and possessions ; and that one hundred and fifty thousand acres of land which had been promised to George Rogers Clark and his men should be laid off in one tract and divided among them. This condition was agreed to by Congress, and on March 1, 1784, the deed of cession was given by Virginia to the United States.

20. The ordinance of 1787, which was passed by the Congress of the Confederation before the Constitution of the United States was adopted, fixed the basis of future government in six unalterable articles in the form of an agreement between the people of the original States and the people of the North-West Territory. Of this ordinance Chief- Justice Chase has said : " Never, probably, in the history of the world did a measure of legislation so accurately fulfil and yet so mightily exceed the anticipations of the legislators. The ordinance has been well described as a pillar of cloud by day and of fire by night in the settlement of the North-western States. When the settlers went into the wilderness they found the law already there."

21. In 1788, President Washington appointed General Arthur St. Clair as the first governor of the North-West Territory. In 1791, General St. Clair was defeated in a battle with the Indians. General Anthony Wayne then took command of the troops, and, having defeated the Indians, made a treaty with them in 1794, and made permanent the safety of the settlers who from that time came freely into the territory. •

22. In 1800, Congress created Indiana Territory out of the North-West Territory, including in it most of the territory now occupied by the States of Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, and Wisconsin. General William H. Harrison was appointed governor of the territory, with the seat of government at Vincennes. During his term of office he made so many treaties with different Indian tribes that he was known as " the great treaty-maker." Not less than thirteen treaties with the Indians are signed with his name.

23. After the purchase of Louisiana from the French, that country was annexed to Indiana Territory. The. connection continued, however, but one year, ending in March, 1805.

24. In 1809, Illinois Territory was created by Congress out of that part of Indiana Territory lying west of the Wabash River. Its capital was located at Kaskaskia. Ninian Edwards was appointed governor by President Madison. At this time the white population of Illinois

Territory was about nine thousand, and the Indian population about eighteen thousand.

25. During the war of 1812-15 with England, the principal engagement in the Territory of Illinois was what is known as the " Massacre at Fort Dearborn," which stood upon ground now occupied by part of the city of Chicago.

IV. Illinois as a State.

26. In January, 1818, the legislature of the Territory of Illinois petitioned the National Congress for admission into the Union as a State. On April 18, 1818, Congress passed an enabling act beginning as follows : " Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America, in Congress assembled: That the inhabitants of the Territory of Illinois be and they are hereby authorized to form for themselves a constitution and state government, and to assume such name as they deem proper, and the said State when formed shall be admitted to the Union upon the same footing as the original States in all respects whatever."

27. In May, 1818, a convention was held, composed of thirty-three delegates from the fifteen counties which composed the Territory, 1 and formed the first constitution of the State. In accordance with the provisions of the constitution, an election for state officers and members of the state legislature was held in September. In October the Legislature met at Kaskaskia and organized the state government. 2 The provisions of the enabling act having been

1 These fifteen counties were : Bond, Crawford, Edwards, Franklin, Gallatin, Jackson, Johnson, Madison, Monroe, Pope, Kandolph, St. Clair, Union, Washington, and White.

2 The first state officers were : Governor, Shadrach Bond ; lieutenant-governor, Pierre Menard ; secretary of state, Elias Kent Kane ; state auditor, Elijah C. Berry ; state treasurer, John Thomas ; attorney-general, Daniel P.Cook; adjutant-general, William M. Alexander. The legislature elected Ninian Edwards and Jesse B. Thomas United States senators.

complied with, Illinois, the twenty-first State, was admitted into the Union by Congress, December 3, 1818. 1

28. The act providing for the admission of the State made the line of 41° 39' north latitude the northern boundary. Judge Pope, the delegate in Congress from the Territory of Illinois, declared that the territorial boundary of 41° 39' would give the State no interest in Lake Michigan, while the line of 42° 30' would give her a lake port and would bind her in business relations to the Northern as well as to the Southern States. With prophetic foresight he said : " If her commerce is to be confined to that great artery of communication, the Mississippi, which washes her entire western border, and to its chief tributary on the south, the Ohio, there is a possibility that her commercial relations with the South may become so closely connected that in the event of an attempted dismemberment of the Union, Illinois will cast her lot with the Southern States. On the other hand, to fix the northern boundary of Illinois upon such a parallel of latitude as would give to the State territorial jurisdiction over the south-western shores of Lake Michigan

1 At the present time the enabling act usually defines the territory to be admitted by fixing its boundaries; provides for calling a convention of the electors of the Territory to form a constitution, and for submitting the constitution so formed to popular vote; it stipulates that a republican form of government shall be established, and that the constitution adopted shall not in any manner conflict with the Constitution of the United States nor with the principles of the Declaration of Independence ; that ordinances shall be enacted providing for the perfect toleration of religious sentiment and freedom of worship ; that provision shall be made for establishing and maintaining a system of public schools, and for the payment of the territorial debts ; it determines the number of representatives to Congress to which the State is entitled at the time of admission ; it appropriates certain lands belonging to the United States, situated within the Territory, for the benefit of state and educational institutions ; and it contains such other provisions as Congress may deem necessary.

would be to unite the incipient commonwealth to the States of Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and New York in a bond of common interest wellnigh indissoluble. By the adoption of such a line Illinois may become at some future time the keystone to the perpetuity of the Union. A water-way connecting the Lake with the Mississippi would bind together the East and the West by a community of interest." The result of Judge Pope's argument was to change the northern boundary of the State from 41° 39' to 42° 30' north latitude, and thus to include Illinois, ever after, among the Northern rather than the Southern States. This change in boundaries gave Illinois lake-ports and lead-mines.

29. Shadrach Bond was the first governor of the State of Illinois. During his administration a state bank with three branch banks, chartered by the legislature, furnished $300,000 in currency, which was made receivable for state and county taxes and for salaries. This paper money gradually fell in value until the notes were worth but thirty per cent, of their face. A law delaying the collection of debts was also unfortunately enacted by this legislature. The firmness of Governor Bond in executing a duellist who had shot his opponent put an end to duelling in Illinois.

30. In 1822, Edward Coles was elected governor as successor to Governor Bond. The limitation of slavery in Illinois was the most important question that arose during his term. Slavery was growing in the State, the number of slaves having increased from 168 in 1810 to 917 in 1820. One of the United States Senators, the lieutenant-governor, and both houses of the legislature were in favor of slavery. Governor Coles was opposed to it. A special committee of the legislature to which had been referred the question of slavery recommended that at the next election the electors should vote for or against a convention to amend the constitution so as to legalize slavery. After a long and severe contest for a year and a half the proposition was defeated by the people. The vote stood: "for," 4972; "against," 6640 — a majority of 1678 against legalizing slavery in the State.

31. In 1825, during the administration of Governor Coles, General La Fayette visited the State. Governor Coles was quite unpopular during his lifetime, but to him, sa} r s Judge Moses, "the people of Illinois are more indebted than to any other person for saving the State, then and for ever, from the black curse of African slavery."

32. Ninian Edwards was governor of Illinois from 1826 to 1830. He was more popular with the people than either of his predecessors had been.

33. The event which was of most interest during the administration of Governor John Reynolds, who succeeded Governor Edwards, was the so-called Black Hawk war. " This," says Judge Moses, " has been most unduly magnified. It is the story of calling out eight thousand volunteers to co-operate with fifteen hundred troops of the regular army in expelling from the State a band of about four hundred Indian warriors, with their one thousand women and children, at an expenditure of millions of money and three years of time, besides the loss of over a thousand lives. It was brought on by the interference of the state authorities, together with those of the United States, upon the false pretences and clamorous demands of a few interloping squatters who were themselves in the wrong." Governor Reynolds himself gives an account very different from the above.

34. The fifth governor of Illinois was Joseph Duncan, elected in 1834. He advocated a public-school system, the Illinois and Michigan canal, and a homestead exemption bill. A bill authorizing the removal of the capital from Vandalia to Springfield was passed during his administration. The removal of deposits from the United States Bank by President Jackson and their deposit in

TEE CIVIL GOVERNMENT OF ILLINOIS. 19

state banks was followed by a period of wild speculation, resulting in financial stringency and many business failures. As a measure of relief, the governor called the legislature together in extra session and recommended the repeal of the internal improvement system. This the legislature refused to do, with the result, deprecated by Governor Duncan, of raising the state debt from $217,276 to $6,668,784. The Alton riots and the death of E. P. Lovejoy, which has been called the beginning of the end of slavery in the United States, were important incidents of Governor Duncan's administration.

35. Thomas Carlin was governor of Illinois from 1838 to 1842. On July 4, 1839, the capital was removed to Springfield. Further internal improvements were authorized by the Legislature, and in 1839 the indebtedness of the State amounted to $13,230,550. This alarmed the legislature. It completed the railwa} r from Springfield to the Illinois River at a cost of nearly one million dollars, leased it at a loss for a few years, and it was finally sold at auction for $21,100.

36. The administration of Thomas Ford was noted for the outbreak of the citizens of Illinois sometimes called the Mormon War. This war was not one of which the State can be proud ; its causes and results must be studied elsewhere. It was an illustration of the efficacy of persecution in building up an utterly absurd religious community. There was a marked improvement in the public credit of the State during Governor Ford's administration.

37. Augustus C. French was the last governor of Illinois under the constitution of 1818. A convention for revising the constitution of the State met at Springfield in June, 1847. The revised constitution was adopted by the people by a vote of 60,000 against 15,000. Governor French was re-elected in 1848, and served till 1852. It was during his administration that the law was enacted, which has since proved so popular, authorizing township organization of counties. A homestead exemption law, a prohibitory liquor law, and a free banking law were also passed. Each of these laws has been instrumental in developing industry, morality, and wealth in Illinois. During his second term the Illinois Central Railroad received its charter.

38. In 1852, Joel Mattison was elected governor. The most noted law enacted during his term was one prohibiting the immigration of free negroes into Illinois. The state debt, which had increased to $16,000,000, was reduced to $12,000,000.

39. The campaign of 1856 introduced into our politics the question of slavery extension. Senator Douglas and Abraham Lincoln were the exponents of these opposing policies. At the election William H. Bissel was chosen governor. During his administration the state debt was reduced to $9,000,000. The governor died during his official term, and Lieutenant-Governor Wood acted as governor.

40. The election of Richard Yates as governor followed in 1860. By his energy and patriotism he earned the name of " the great war governor." His adjournment of the legislature in 1863, against its will, because he deemed its continuance a menace to the public welfare, was an illustration of his courage. In this act the people sustained him, and at the next election they sent to Springfield a legislature favorable to the prosecution of the war.

The removal of 30,000 muskets, with cannon, small arms, and ammunition, from the United States arsenal at St. Louis to Springfield, 111., under direction of Governor Yates, at the beginning of the Rebellion, admirably illustrates the firmness of his purpose and the fertility of his resources.

41. Richard Oglesby was the next governor. During his administration the Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution was sent to the States by Congress, and Illinois was the first State to ratify it, thus having the signal honor of leading the line of American commonwealths in abolishing slavery.

42. During the administration of Governor John M. Palmer, from 1869 to 1873, occurred the Chicago fire, which destroyed more wealth than any similar calamity in this country ; the third constitution of the State, that of 1870, was adopted; the Fifteenth Amendment to the national Constitution was adopted, and the state debt was diminished about four million dollars.

43. In 1872, Richard Oglesby and John L. Beveridge were elected governor and lieutenant-governor of Illinois. Governor Oglesby being elected almost immediately thereafter to the United States Senate, Lieut.-Governor Beveridge acted as governor during nearly the whole term.

44. Shelby M. Cullom was chosen governor in the centennial year of the Republic, 1876, and was re-elected in 1880. About the middle of his second term he was . elected to the United States Senate, and Lieut.-Governor Hamilton acted as governor for the remainder of the term.

45. In 1884, General Oglesby became governor for the third time. He was succeeded in 1888 by Joseph W. Fifer, during whose administration the State debt was paid. In 1892, Fifer was succeeded by Governor John P. Altgeld. The prominent events of this administration were the great work, begun in 1892, of connecting by a navigable stream the Mississippi River with Lake Michigan, the organization and administration of the World's Columbian Exposition in 1893, and the great strikes of 1894.