SELECTIONS FROM THE MINERAL POINT STATE GOVERNMENT13 No. 1 [October 8, 1845] MR. BRITT: The time has arrived when Wisconsin may with propriety assume the dignified station to which she is entitled amongst her sisters of our republican confederacy. With more than the number of inhabitants required by the Ordinance of 1787 to authorize Wisconsin to knock at the doors of Congress and demand admission into the Union, her immense resources as an agricultural, commercial, manufacturing, and mineral producing country are daily and hourly being developed to such an extent as to justify the belief that she will rank among the first of the western, and, as regards those advantages, superior to many of the eastern states. At various times within a few years the executive of the territory has recommended that a vote of the people should be taken on the question of state government; laws have been passed on the subject; votes have been received for and against the question; but the people themselves have never hitherto asked for the measure; and this consideration, together with the fact that the votes were taken at a general election when the minds of the people were more directed to the selection of territorial and county officers than to the abstract question of state government, which never had proceeded from themselves, may well account for the result; "These articles on state government, published in the Mineral Point Democrat, were doubtless written by Moses M. Strong. The Democrat, established in April, 1845, was published at Mineral Point only until the close of the year; it was then removed to Madison where it reappeared as the Wisconsin Democrat, under the editorship of Beriah Brown. A complete file of the Democrat is preserved in the Wisconsin Historical Library. not one-fourth of the citizens of the territory have ever voted on the subject. Petitions are now in circulation in all the election precincts of Iowa County calling on the legislature to pass a law, at as early a day as possible, to authorize the people of the territory to vote for or against state government, at a special election to be held as soon as practicable. And if the majority should be in favor of the measure, then that such further legislative action be had as to authorize an election to be immediately held to choose delegates to a convention, in order to frame a constitution for the state of Wisconsin. These petitions, so far as we can learn, are signed universally by reflecting men of all parties. If the measure meets with the approbation of the people, Wisconsin may hold her state convention, form her constitution, and apply to Congress for admission into the Union before the adjournment of the next Congress. It will suffice at present to state a few of the reasons which to my mind are imperative on the people of Wisconsin, immediately to adopt state government. 1. We have 100,000 inhabitants without a voice in either house of Congress. 2. We can now come into the Union with the prospect of obtaining such advantages as we may rightfully ask for: as Florida and Texas (slave-holding states) are now part of the confederacy, and the balance of state power in the Senate can only be preserved by the simultaneous admission of the free states of Iowa and Wisconsin. Hereafter, Wisconsin may be obliged to come into the Union alone. 3. The advantages above alluded to are, in part, "a relinquishment of the assumed right of general government to exercise a landlord's privilege over the mineral lands—a cession of public lands for internal improvements and state purposes-remuneration for unrightful abstraction of territory from Wisconsin by Congress, in establishing the state line of Illinois, and in compromising the Michigan and Ohio controversy at the expense of Wisconsin. 4. We acquire the responsibility of all officers to the people-our executive, our judiciary in all its branches; and the regulation by law of the tenure, salary, and accountability of all officers whatsoever, civil or military, in the state. 5. We acquire the right that our legislature may sit as long as they have business before them; and that they shall not be restricted to the number of days for which Congress may condescend to appropriate pay for them. 6. We receive our due weight in the Union by the voices of our senators and representatives in Congress. 7. State government will put an end to sectional differences as to delegate to Congress from the east or from the west. District representation will produce harmony of political feeling, and eventuate in the general political welfare of the state. Many more reasons might be urged for the desired step of adopting state government as soon as possible: On each of the above enumerated causes for asking the voice of the people upon the measure, I will hereafter give you a communication, should you think proper to open your columns on the subject. STATE GOVERNMENT-No. 2 [October 15, 1845] S. MR. BRITT: In my first communication I stated some of the principal reasons why the people of Wisconsin should be desirous of adopting a constitution and assuming state government; let us review them in their order. "We have 100,000 inhabiants in the territory, and we have no voice in either branch of our national legislature." If such a state of political affairs existed in any community claiming to be governed by free institutions, and no remedy against compulsory power was presented, short of revolution, the desirable end to be attained would justify the means by which it could be reached. The enactment of laws |