will be like opening the flood-gates to a mill! Wealth will flow in upon us; improvements will adorn our lands; agriculture will flourish; our rivers emptying into the Ohio will convey, by way of the Mississippi, our surplus crops to thousands suffering from want of food. Manufactories will spring up in this wilderness; arrangements and facilities for education will be perfected; an Athens and other centers of learning will show steeples above our towering oaks, and soon send our youth into the world, ornaments to humanity. Our plains will be covered with herds; our farms, laden from the horn of plenty, will gladden our farmers' hearts; and our government, like a tree of liberty, will extend its shelter over all our citizens and cause all men to contemplate our rising greatness with amazement, and our people to cry out with the venerable Franklin, 'Here dwells Liberty! Here is my Country!""

In the absence of the full text of the foregoing, I here insert the summary of the contention of the State party as given by Judge Burnet in his Notes:

"It was alleged " (by the State party) "that the existing government was anti-republican; that the inhabitants of the Territory did not enjoy the political rights which belonged to freemen; that

neither the governor, the judges of the General Court, nor the Legislative Council were in any form amenable to the people; that the power of appointing to office, exercised by Congress, was a dangerous one and had been abused; that the governor controlled the will of the representatives of the people, and that there was no remedy for these evils save by a radical change of government."

2

CHAPTER VI

Jefferson's Seeming Reluctance to remove St. Clair-Formal Charges preferred against St. Clair-Tiffin's Part in them-Charges ignored by the President-St. Clair's Proposition to re-divide the Territory precipitates Debate in Congress-Is Rejected-The Enabling Act proposed-Michigan excluded from the Proposed State― Requirement as to Population evaded and Enabling Act passed-The Debates upon It.

JEFFERSON had now occupied the presidential chair for some months, while the efforts of the State party had been pressed unremittingly, not only for the creation of the State, but also for the removal of St. Clair.

Worthington had remained, most of the time, at the seat of national government, where he had brought all possible influences to bear to accomplish both these purposes. He made very evident progress in the matter of securing statehood, but in dislodging St. Clair from his position (scarcely less desired by him and his circle of immediate friends) his progress was not obvious. He had secured the very active and zealous support of William B. Giles, an able, influential and exceedingly energetic member of Congress from Virginia, and to a

great extent the favor and support of the Republican Democrats in both Senate and House (and that party was in the ascendant in Congress then) to the proposition to form a State from the eastern part of the Northwest Territory. And no doubt-indeed it is certain-the President quietly and privately assumed the guidance of the State project through his friend and partisan, Giles; for, would it not most probably strengthen his party, and secure to himself three more electoral votes ? (he had attained the presidency only by choice of the House of Representatives, after a tie in the electoral college) as well as three more zealous friends on the floors of Congress? But in the matter of removing General St. Clair the President seemed, at least, loath to act. Let us hope that he thought of St. Clair's services as a soldier in the War for Independence, and his patriotic devotion and zeal as a member of the old Congress in the formative days of the United States Government, and therefore hesitated to inflict the blow, notwithstanding St. Clair's Federalism.

66

Formal charges of the maladministration of his office, and personal misconduct which amounted to high crimes and misdemeanors," had been drawn up by Massie against Governor St. Clair upon the urgency of Worthington and Tiffin, and with the assistance of Tiffin, and were by Worthington filed with the President on the 30th of February, 1802,

accompanied by a very strong and bitter personal letter reciting the proofs which, Worthington thought, fully sustained the charges. That Tiffin took a willing and an eager part in getting up these charges against Governor St. Clair, sufficiently appears in the following extracts from letters. written by him to Worthington.

Under date of February 1, 1802, he says:

"I have used every exertion to get Colonel Massie to draw up and forward his charges. We have appointed three different times to meet on that business, and I have always attended but could never get him there. He has now left town, and when I shall see him again, I know not."

And again, under date of February 8th, he wrote:

"We have this day been busy in drawing up charges to forward to the Secretary of State against Governor St. Clair. Colonel Massie, Mr. Creighton and myself meet again at my house on Wednesday. We will send them on by the next mail thereafter, most certainly."

And on the 20th he wrote:

"I expect ere this you have received the charges against the Governor; I had much trouble to get Colonel Massie to finish them."