welcoming the illustrious General Lafayette within its borders. The reception of this great friend of American and national liberty was extended by the Executive of Indiana in true and genuine republican simplicity; and that so many of the pioneers of the State had the honor to greet the presence of this illustrious veteran in the cause of our liberty and country, and to express to him as far as possible, their unutterable. sentiments of gratitude and admiration, will ever be a source of the most greatful recollection.

6

On the important question of asylums, it was urged by the Executive in 1825, that radical changes should be made in the law for the support of the poor, and measures adopted "to provide by law for a general system of education, ascending in a regular gradation from township schools to a State university, wherein tuition shall be gratis, and equally open to all." In 1826, Governor Ray expressed the sentiments of the people of Indiana when, in his message to the legislature he used this exciting language: "All that the most ardent could rationally wish for has fallen within the lap of the State. The history of other nations furnishes us with no parallel for our gigantic growth. A wonder among wonders,' our amazing young State, with each annual revolution of the earth, seems destined, by the force of circumstances and the energies of her people, to outstrip the geographer with all his sagacity; to develop some dormant treasure, and exhibit to public view some facinating projects eminently calculated to attach our citizens to their homes and country, and to enable us to look prospectively to the period when we shall be among the first in power, wealth, and respectability in the grand confederation of North American States." And in the year 1827, in the same official capacity, he added: "When we bring in review before us the successive currents of emigration which annually penetrate the deep recesses of the western forests; when we behold the generous efforts of the enlightened statesman and philanthropist for the establishment of primary and higher schools that education may be equal and universal; when we witness the enterprise and industry of the people, their morality and order, the conclusion follows that all the essentia:

elements are concentrating to prosecute and consummate the great design of the social compact." And again in 1828, Governor Ray reflects the steady flow of prosperity in his usual style: "Peace, plenty, and an increase of moral feeling have blessed our growing community; *** and if a dense population is in any respect essential to the happiness of the people, or the prosperity of the State, the continuous influx of emigration which we are now experiencing without a parallel, augur the most auspicious to both."

It was in this year, 1828, that the disaffection of the Southern States first became a subject for executive or legislative attention in Indiana. In this year Governor Ray, little suspecting the terrible results that would grow out of the subject of his remarks, observed to the legislature: "Since our last separation, while we have witnessed with anxious solicitude the belligerent operations of another hemisphere, the cross contending against the cresent, and the prospect of a general rupture among the legitimates of other quarters of the globe, *** our attention has been arrested by proceedings in our own country truly dangerous to liberty, if seriously premeditated, and disgraceful to its authors if agitated only to tamper with the American people. If such experiments as we see attempted in certain deluded quarters, do not fall with a burst of thunder upon the heads of their seditious projectors, then, indeed, the republic has begun to experience the days of its degeneracy. * * The Union of these States is the people's only sure charter for their liberties and independence. Dissolve it and each State will soon be in a condition as deplorable as Alexandria's conquered countries after they were divided amongst his victorious military captains."

*

It should be borne in mind by the reader that this part of the history, extending from the organization of the State in 1816, to 1875, treating of the administrations of the various governors, is not supposed to include, as it advances, a history of the educational institutions, benevolent institutions, and settlements. These chapters are designed to cover merelv a

political and exceedingly condensed documentary history of the State, and the reader is directed to look elsewhere for a complete history and description of those special features and institutions of the State, as well as of the cities, towns and villages, all of which date their commencement in some one of these administrations, and receive only a passing notice in this connection. It is also desirable to state, in this place, that our political history is necessarily condensed in order that these special features of the State may receive the space which their importance demands.

IN

CHAPTER XXI.

ADMINISTRATION OF GOVERNOR RAY, CONTINUED.

N 1830 the current of emigration was still flowing into the State and spreading itself throughout the limits of the territory, affording the surest indications of a continued growth and prosperity. These assurances were considerably supported by the great increase of agricultural productions, facilities for transportation, and increasing wealth, enterprise, intelligence, temperance and morality; and of the general and rapidly accumulating masses of the people. During these months, the people were daily cheered by witnessing from twenty to fifty wagons, containing families, moving through Indianapolis and other large towns, on their way to the valleys of the White and Wabash rivers. It was estimated that every day, during the year 1826, over thirty families settled in the State of Indiana. It is only from a contemplation of these facts that the reader can form any correct idea of the rapid growth of the State.

At no former period within the history of the State had the people enjoyed a more ample reward for the various agricultural products than in 1830. This market was created from

many causes

time.

principally from the wars existing at that

In the same year the farmer, the mechanic and the merchant of Indiana were excited by the "gigantic purpose of wedding the extremes of our vast country by one of the most approved

methods of conveyance"-a railroad, notably the "National, New York and Mississippi Railroad."

The "National Road," and the "Michigan and Ohio Turnpike" were enterprises in which the people and legislature of

Indiana were deeply interested, in 1830. The latter had already been the cause of much bitter controversy, and its location was then the subject of contention.

*

* *

In his message to the legislature, in 1830, Governor Ray, on the delicate question of excluding a certain class of colored people from the State, remarked: "A non-productive and, in many instances, a superanuated colored population, is pouring in upon us, possessing all the affirmative bad qualities of the uneducated, immoralized bondsman, without affording any of his advantages, living without visible means, or labor, most of whom are paupers on society. While our laws and institutions proclaim the State an asylum for the good, virtuous and useful of all nations and colors, it is due to ourselves and to the rights of posterity that we should not tamely submit to any imposition which is the direct effect of foreign legislation. Though it might savor somewhat of injustice to interfere with any that are already here, it will still become your province, as it is your right, to regulate for the future, by prompt correctives, the emigration into the State, and the continuance of known paupers thrown upon us from any quarter."

In 1830 there were still two tribes of Indians living within the borders of Indiana, but their growing indolence, their intemperate habits, their primitive ignorance, their increasing dependence upon their neighbors for the bread of life, their diminished prospects of living by the chase, their perpetration of murders and other outrages of dangerous precedent, their unrestrained exhibitions of their own savage customs before the children of the settlers, combined to make them subjects for a more rigid government.

One of the features of interest in the history of Governor Ray's last term of office was the part taken by Indiana in the election of a President of the United States, which effected a considerable change in the national policy.

In the same period the task of preparing a civil code of laws for the State was commenced. In 1830 a question of jurisdiction was presented for the consideration of the legislature. The trial and acquittal of William Rothwell, in Perry