Messages and Letters of William Henry Harrison/Petition of a Convention at Vincennes Favoring slavery
Petition of the Vincennes Convention
That nine-tenths of your memorialists being of opinion, that the sixth article of Compact contained in the ordinance for the Government of the Territory has been extremely prejudicial to their Interest and welfare, requested the Governor by petitions from each of the several counties to call a general convention of the Territory for the purpose of taking the sense of the whole People by their Representatives on a subject to them so interesting and of afterwards taking such measures as to them might seem meet by petition to your honorable Bodies not only for obtaining the repeal or suspension of the said article of Compact but also for that of representing and Petitioning for the passage of such other Laws as would in the opinion of the Convention be conducive to the general welfare, population and happiness of this distant and unrepresented portion of the United States.
This convention is now sitting at Vincennes and have agreed to make the following representations to the Congress of the United States, not in the least doubting but that everything they can desire (not prejudicial to the Constitution or to the Interest of the General Government) will readily be granted them.
The Sixth article of Compact between the United States and the people of the Territory which declares that there shall be neither slavery nor involuntary servitude in it has prevented the Country from populating and been the reason of driving many valuable Citizens possessing Slaves to the Spanish side of the Mississippi, most of whom but for the prohibition contained in the ordinance would have settled in this Territory, and the consequences of keeping that prohibition in force will be that of obliging the numerous Class of Citizens disposed to emigrate, to seek an Asylum in that country where they can be permitted to enjoy their property.
Your memorialists however and the people they represent do not wish for a repeal of the article entirely, but that it may be suspended for the Term of Ten Years and then to be again in force, but that the slaves brought into the Territory during the Continuance of this Suspension and their progeny, may be considered and continued in the same state of Servitude, as if they had remained in those parts of the United States where Slavery is permitted and from whence they may have been removed.
Your memoralists beg leave further to represent, That the quantity of lands in the Territory open for Settlement is by no means sufficiently large to admit of a population adequate to the purposes of Civil Government. They therefore pray that the Indian titles to the land lying between the settled part of the Illinois country and the Ohio, between the general Indian boundary line running from the mouth of the river Kentucky [Greenville Treaty Line] and the tract commonly called Clark's Grant [Clark County, Indiana] and between and below the said Clark's Grant and the Ohio and Wabash Rivers, may be extinguished; and as an incouragement for a speedy population of the Country; that those lands and all other public lands in the Territory may be sold in Smaller Tracts and at a lower price than is now allowed by the existing Laws. A purchase of most of the Country above men- tioned but more especially of that part lying between the Illinois and the Ohio it is conceived may be easily obtained from the Indians and on very moderate and advantageous Terms.
Several persons (as your memoralists are informed) having settled on the public lands in this Territory with the intention of purchasing the same when offered for sale by the United States are fearful that advantages may be taken of their Improvements to enhance the Price. Your Petitioners therefore pray, That a law may be passed for their relief, giving the right of Pre-emption to all those who may have so settled on the public lands, and also as one of the more sure means of populating the Country as of enhancing the value of the United States lands remaining undisposed of in the Territory. They further pray, that provision may be made in the said Law for securing a certain part of every Section of Such public land to those who will actually settle and cultivate the same.
The United States having pledged themselves in the Ordinance that Schools and the means of Education should be forever encouraged, and having in all the Sales of land heretofore made, reserved considerable portions thereof for that purpose.
Your memorialists, therefore, humbly pray that a law may be passed making a grant of lands for the support of the Schools and Seminaries of learning to the several Settlements in the Illinois, the Settlement of Vincennes, and that of Clark's Grant, near the Rapids of the Ohio.
The means of communication as well between the several Settled parts of the Territory as between the Territory and the State of Kentucky, being extremely difficult and inconvenient, as well for want of good Roads as for want of houses of Entertainment, and as neither of those objects can be obtained otherwise than by application to the United States who own or may own the lands through which the said Roads must pass.
Your memorialists, therefore, further pray that a law may be enacted granting to such persons as the Governor of the Territory may recommend, Four hundred acres of land to each in such places as the said Governor may designate, not exceeding the distance of Twenty miles from each other, on the road leading from Clark county to Knox county, and from Vincennes in the said County to the Bank of the Ohio opposite to the town of Henderson, in Kentucky: also from Vincennes to Kaskaskia, in Randolph county, and from thence to Lusk's Ferry on the Ohio [15 miles above the mouth of Cumberland river], who will open good waggon roads and Establish houses of Entertainment thereon for Five Years, under such restrictions as to your Wisdom may Seem Necessary. And your Memorialists further beg leave to represent that one of the mostindispensable articles of life (Salt) is very Scarse and difficult to be obtained, That for the want of a sufficient number of Salt Springs in their Country, that difficulty must increase with the population, and if effectual methods are not taken to secure the Timber in the neighbourhood of the Salt Springs [near Shawneetown] from being willfully or carelessly wasted and destroyed, they will in a very few years indeed be utterly destitute of that very valuable article; that there is but one Salt Spring known in the Country of any value, and that is situate below the mouth of the Wabash River, Commonly called the Saline, and is very advantageously placed for the accommodation of most of the Inhabitants of the Territory, and has, moreover, been lately ceded by the Indians to the general Government.
Your memoralists, therefore, humbly pray the Congress of the United States to extend their Bounty to this Territory as they have lately done to that Northwest of the Ohio, and vest the said Salt Spring in the Legislature of the Territory, as soon as it is formed in trust, for the use of the Territory, and untill the Legislature be formed, that the management of said spring be committed to the Governor of the Territory, or to such other person as the President of the United States may think proper to appoint.
By a Resolve of Congress of the 29th August, 1788, confirmed by an Act of the United States of the 3d March, 1791, a donation of Four hundred acres of land is given to each of those persons who were heads of Families in the Illinois Country on or before the year 1783, which the Governor of the Territory was directed to cause to be laid off to the several claimants in a form of a Parallelogram adjoining the several Villages therein mentioned.
The whole of the lands adjoining those Villages were before the passage of the above Resolve the private property of Individuals who claimed the same by Virtue of old grants made to them and their ancestors during the time of the French government so that the Governor could not cause the said donation to be laid off in the form and manner designated by the said Resolve.
This has been very detrimental to the several Grantees, and in a great measure prevented the further population of the Country, your memorialists however beg leave to observe. that if the said donation lands are directed to be laid off in distinct Bodies for each Village, by far the greatest part of them must from the very large and extensive Prairies with which the whole of that country abounds be wholly and absolutely useless through the entire want of Timber.
Your memoralists therefore pray you to take the situation of the antient Inhabitants of the Illinois Country into Consideration and as the humane Intention of Congress was to give such lands as would be useful, that you will permit the said Grantees, their Heirs and assigns especially after a period of Fourteen years, to locate their said donation of Four hundred acres of land in separate Tracts, in such parts of the Illinois Country to which the Indian titles may have been extinguished, and that the Governor of the Territory may be authorized to issue Patents therefor. This permission to locate the lands in separate Tracts, will not it is conceived be prejudicial to the United States, as the value of the lands in the neighbourhood of each Settled Tract will thereby be considerably augmented.
Your memorialists further shew that they view that part of the ordinance for the Government of the Territory which requires a freehold qualification in fifty acres of land as Electors for members to the general assembly as subversive of the liberties of the Citizens and tending to throw too great a weight in the Scale of wealth. They therefore pray that the right of Suffrage (in voting for representatives to the general assembly) may be extended to the free male Inhabitants of the Territory of the age of Twenty one years and upwards, but under such Regulations and Restrictions as to you in your Wisdom may seem proper.
Since the Erection of the Territory into a separate Government, the Attorney General [John Rice Jones] therof has prosecuted not only for offenses committed against the Municipal Laws of the Territory but also against the Laws of the United States, and has been obliged at three different Times to travel one hundred and sixty miles, from his home to the seat of the Territorial Government to prosecute offenders against those Laws, and yet he has received no Compensation for his Services either from the United States or the Territory, nor is it probable that the Territory can afford to allow him any Salary for his future services.
Your memorialists, therefore, pray that a Law may be passed allowing a Salary to the Attorney-General of the Territory adequate to the important services which are rendered by that officer to the United States as well as to the Territory.
Your memorialists are well aware that the consideration of the numerous objects contemplated by this memorial will require more time than can well be spared from the important and general concenis of the Union, but when they reflect upon their neglected and orphan-like Situation they are emboldened to hope that their wants and wishes will meet with all the indulgence and attention necessary to secure to them the relief which is so essential to their welfare and happiness.
Done at Vincennes in the Indiana Territory the twenty-eighth day of December in the Year of our Lord One Thousand Eight Hundred and Two, and of the Independence of the United States the Twenty-Seventh.
By order of the Convention.
Teste: John Rice Jones,
- Secretary