Ohio History Journal

362        Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.     ADDRESS OF ISAAC J. COX. [The subject of Prof. Cox's address was "Ohio and Western Sectionalism." Prof. Cox is professor of American History in the University of Cincinnati.  He is president of the Mississippi Valley Historical Society and was formerly president of the Ohio Valley Historical Society.] It is a truism to state that natural forces determine the es- sential facts of history, but at the same time, we may assert that men of vision show the way in which these forces are to ex- press themselves. In this brief attempt, therefore, to give a per-

spective to some features of Ohio his- tory, I shall naturally emphasize a few of those that have contributed to its growth and around them group those forces that make for local and regional development and in the end for national strength. The sectional forces that were to rule in this region, and which were ultimately to merge it with the Union, have their origin in the most remote phases of history. Long be- fore the coming of the white man, the aborigines pursued lines of in- ternal communication that suggest

the commercial routes of a later day. Even before the aborigines, the buffalo, and before him prehistoric animals that have long since disappeared, suggested lines of travel and congregation that are familiar to us. The chief physiographic features of a pre- historic age and of our own day are based on the fact that to the eastward of this region rose the mountain barrier of the Alle- ghanies; that past its western borders flowed the mighty torrent of the Mississippi; to the north lay the largest group of fresh water lakes on the surface of the globe; while its southern shores were washed by the waters of the Mexican Gulf. Through its interior, dividing it into two equal sections, wound the beautiful Ohio, the destined course of western empire. These were the es-

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Dedicatory Exercises May 30, 1914.        363   sential factors that determined the ultimate development of a western sectionalism which would either weld distant areas into a more perfect Union; or, if perverted, cause them to separate into warring fragments. Whether in the Union or out of it, the trans- Alleghany section must exert an influence second to no other. That this section has been ultimately devoted to nationalism, was largely determined by the position of the Ohio Valley and the fact

that its northern portion was the first important offspring of the American Union. Passing over those influences contributed by the beasts of the wilderness and by primeval man-influences which in themselves are of singular importance and well worth the study of this and similar organizations, we come to the advent of civilization and propose to show how the men of the western waters first de- veloped a stalwart sectionalism, which in turn became an im- portant element in our national existence. We may term this

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the period of approach, and it is fittingly ushered in by the ro-

mantic figure of the French explorer, Robert Cavalier de La-

Salle. The incidents of his presence in the upper portion of the

Ohio Valley and within the present limits of our state, are not

sufficiently well known to require more than the most brief gen-

eralization, but taken in connection with his whole career, we

may suggest that to the pioneer Frenchman there appeared in

this trans-Alleghany region, a triple vision that the succeeding

centuries have abundantly confirmed. In the first place, LaSalle

had a vision of the commercial possibilities of this section. The

fur trade that led so many pioneer Frenchmen into the wilds of

the vast interior or to the frozen regions of the North, pre-

sented its attraction to this intrepid Frenchman. He relied upon

this single form of natural wealth to achieve his far-reaching

plans of national aggrandizement. It proved inadequate as an

expression of the boundless resources of this region, yet the fur

trade that he and his contemporaries initiated served to support

a pioneer existence in which Frenchman, Briton and American

played their parts, and developed lines of expansion that ter-

minated only with the frozen Arctic and the far Pacific. Now

teeming multitudes, alien to the great explorer, gain from our

natural wealth a richness of life of which he was only dimly

aware.

A second vision that was granted to LaSalle was that through

this system of interior waterways, he might open up a way of

approach to Mexico. It was this prospect that led the Grand

Monarque to give him permission to penetrate the vast interior of

North America. It is true that in his later efforts, LaSalle em-

phasized the routes through Illinois rather than those to the

Eastward, but his brief tarrying on the upper courses of the

Ohio, while contemplating a chance of approach to the Spanish

dominions, for all time to come linked this immediate region with

the lure of the far Southwest. Following him as the pioneer

adventurer, came a host of others whose later visions were tan-

talized by the inexhaustible wealth of the Mexican mines. More

than a century later the western boatmen of this section formed

recruiting force for the filibustering expeditions with which Burr

and his contemporaries vainly attempted to reach the same goal

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that beckoned the indomitable Frenchman. Incidentally we may

say it was no policy of watchful waiting or benevolent assimila-

tion that attracted these worthies.

A third vision that stirred the ambitious Frenchman was the

hope that the river along which he was passing, leading into still

other and mightier streams, in due time might find its way into

the distant Vermilion Sea. Thus it appeared to him that he

was on a commercial highway to the Pacific and to the far East,

a possible route that had attracted explorers since the days of

Columbus. Again LaSalle was a prophet far in advance of his

time, for it is only in our own day, with means and with measures

that he could not have dreamed of, that we are about to open

this highway between the cloven continents. Through a system of

improvements that give us access to the Gulf and the Caribbean;

through this wonderful channel that actually bridges a continent,

we now behold a chain of communication from the foothills of

the Alleghanies to the uttermost parts of the former Spanish

Main and to the distant Indies themselves. Yet in the proud

day of achievement, let us not forget that upon some portion of

this very soil, LaSalle first conceived this wonderful triple vis-

ion which has materialized into the political unity of the inte-

rior of the American continent, the commercial unity of both

Americas and the essential solidarity of all nations bordering on

the Pacific.

With the vision of marvelous growth came the portent of

mighty conflict. English explorers were approaching this western

region even in the time of LaSalle, but some forty years passed

ere their early representatives began to affect their governmental

policy. The figure that can best be compared with LaSalle is the

Virginia executive, Alexander Spottswood. With his interest

early aroused in this western country he was led to predict that

it would become the scene of conflict between the French and

English of North America, a full half century before this ac-

tually broke out. He led in a notable attempt to explore this

western country, and although he reached only the crest of the

Blue Ridge, he imagined that through the haze of that summer

day in 1716, he beheld the distant waters of Lake Erie. While his

exaggerated report represents a vision of faith rather than of

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reality, we may well believe that had he been given an insight

into the future comparable to the reality of his supposed vision,

he would have been doubly insistent on securing this mighty em-

pire that had beckoned him westward. As a result of his sur-

vey, we know that he emphasized the importance of aggressive

action in seizing this territory ere the enemies of England should

occupy it and roll the tide of war through the mountain passes

and over the colonies to the Eastward. He would divide French

settlements to the North and to the South by a series of pro-

jected English posts leading to the waters of Lake Erie and even

into the wilds beyond. But like the great LaSalle, his prophecy

and his importunity alike remained unheeded until threatening

peril a half century later aroused the English to a sense if immi-

nent danger.

The prospect of international conflict grew with each decade

of the eighteenth century. Gradually the French approached the

upper portion of the Ohio Valley. As a sort of final effort in

their insidious advance, occurred the expedition of Celeron de

Bienville, who in 1748 attempted to mark Bourbon dominion in

this region by placing leaden plates at the mouths of certain

rivers. This inconclusive method of planting lead promised to

be succeeded by other chances when, two years later, Christopher

Gist crossed the Alleghanies, prospecting for that "good level

land" that has tempted the English-speaking people to the utter-

most parts of the earth. The work of Gist and of Boone, fit

representatives of a long line of hunters, surveyors, prospectors

and settlers, promised a conflict not merely with the French

but also with the Indians, who claimed this western territory by

immemorial right. The details of this long-drawn out and ever-

doubtful struggle, form a page without rival in the history of

human expansion. Here Gaul and Briton contended for over-

lapping claims. Here civilization and savagery carried on their

never-ending conflict that leads to only one result. And in the

midst of this warfare of primeval and international forces a new

nation likewise came into being to receive its baptism on Ohio

soil in the following imperishable words: "Love of liberty and

attachment to the real interests and just rights of America out-

weigh every other consideration, we resolve that we will exert

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Dedicatory Exercises May 30, 1914.        367   every power that is within us for the defense of American liberty and for the support of her just rights and privileges; not in any precipitate, riotous, or tumultuous manner but when regularly called for by the unanimous voice of our countrymen." In this prophetic manner was national liberty and union prefigured on the soil of our state November 5, 1774, by western pioneers, called out by a British governor in pursuit of the savage. From the midst of this frontier conflict there emerged the hope of na-

tionality; in the later expression of a multitude of such resolu- tions, nationality itself. Of the great figures who played their titanic parts in this double contest with natives and with national rivals, we can only make the barest mention, but in passing we must briefly note one who occupies an unapproachable position in our national his- tory, but who incidentally drew from this western country many of the qualities that rendered him first in the hearts of his coun- trymen and foremost among the men of modern times. George

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Washington, the young surveyor, was an early western prospec-

tor, a diplomatic messenger between the contending factions of

England and of France, a frontier commander in the most cruel

days of the struggle for the upper Ohio Valley, and a shrewd

speculator in western lands both before and after the contest with

the mother country. A man of vision, who saw in this western

country one of the strongest ties to bind together the original

states that formed the American Union, he felt that the essential

problem of the West was one of communication. Once this were

solved, the central government need fear neither the natural dis-

ruptive spirit of the pioneer nor the temptations of British or

Spanish hirelings. In his closing days he exerted the power re-

posed in him by the new nation to defend the outlying com-

munities that it had created. Thus in his public career of nearly

half a century, he contributed to every significant movement

that affected this western land and in the end saw its destiny

safely united to the nation which was at once its creator and its

beneficiary.

It was not to be expected that the idea of separation cher-

ished by the physical features of the country, the pioneer spirit

of its earlier inhabitants, and the vicious intrigues of British and

Spanish agents, would easily disappear. When LaSalle and

Spottswood marked this region as the scene of conflict for su-

premacy between their respective nations, they stirred up forces

that would long survive them. Even when the population of the

Ohio valley was politically united with that of the states of the

eastward, with many ties of kindred origin to make this union

permanent, these personal and physical forces still tended to

sectionalism and even to a movement for independence. The

worst of these forces center around the career of General James

Wilkinson. Willing to employ the commercial opportunities of

the region to his advantage, he turned the commendable demand

of the western people for an outlet to the Gulf into a means for

commercial bargaining with the Spaniard. His visit to New

Orleans in 1787 ushers in the most corrupt intrigue in our po-

litical annals. Fortunately in that same year there was inaugu-

rated a national movement that was destined not only to coun-

teract his intrigues but to prevent their more far-reaching effects.

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Dedicatory Exercises May 30, 1914.         369

 

The Congress under the Confederation-the same body that had

proposed to limit the sale of western lands and close the Mis-

sissippi for a period of years-more than atoned for its remis-

ness in these respects by the famous Ordinance creating the

territory northwest of the Ohio. This wise measure of state

policy has proved to be the best gift which the East ever be-

stowed on the West, and our own state of Ohio, the first fruit of

this policy, has been the one to profit most by it. Through its

provisions the new territory was to secure freedom in religion,

freedom and encouragement in education, freedom in the dis-

tribution of property, and last and by no means the least, freedom

from the worst effects of the institution of slavery.

The best results of this policy were not immediately ap-

parent. Under national auspices new western communities were

founded, whose outlying settlements must be protected from the

murderous savage. After mortifying failures, Washington, the

firm and far-sighted friend of the West, selected his former sub-

ordinate Wayne to accomplish this necessary task. It is inter-

esting to note that in the campaign of 1793-94, the campaign

which redeemed the greater part of Ohio from the Indian peril,

Wayne, the representative of stalwart nationalism, and Wilkin-

son, the agent of perfidious intrigue, were closely but not in-

timately associated. Wilkinson hampered Wayne in his funda-

mental purpose, and by so doing, misled rather than represented

the Kentucky contingent. Fortunately he was unable to over-

throw the other's plans and ultimately the victory at Fallen

Timbers gave a new impulse to nationalism in the West, and

partially broke the Spanish spell over the wavering Wilkinson.

When another phase of sectionalism showed itself in the

famous Kentucky resolution of 1798-99, it awoke an answering

response north of the Ohio River. Here the forces of Federal-

ism and those of particularism were engaged in a contest over

the division of the territory and the admission of a portion into

the Union as a state. Fortunately this new sectional develop-

ment was merged into a national movement by the election of

Jefferson in 1800. This peaceful democratic revolution was

shortly followed by the admission of Ohio as the seventeenth state

Vol. XXIII- 24.

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of the American Union. Thus, in the course of two decades, the

national movement which was ushered in by the cession of

western territory to the general government, developed to full

fruition in the admission of the first of the states from the

ceded territory. Ohio, as the child of the national government,

never forgot its filial devotion to its creator.

It was hardly likely that the states of this western region,

though adopted or created by the national government, should

immediately abandon all strictly sectional feeling. Their leaders

emphasized this when they forced the War of 1812 upon the hes-

itant Madison. Ohio, like its sister state of Kentucky, opposed

the national policy represented by the Second United States bank,

and quoted from the Kentucky and other similar resolutions to

justify its attitude. Our state likewise asserted a particularistic

policy to justify its claims to the Toledo district, even though

this policy brought into question the Ordinance of 1788, under

which it was created. But at length those measures for which

it had most strenuously fought, either alone or in company with

its sister states, became cardinal principles of national policy.

On the other side of the picture it is comforting to note that

Ohio and her sister states of the Northwest played a conspicuous

part in combatting some of the expressions of western section-

alism during the early 19th century. It assisted to arouse public

opinion and force the problem of the open Mississippi upon Jef-

ferson's administration. This led to the acquisition of ouisiana,

the most significant national event after the Declaration of In-

dependence and the adoption of the Constitution. In company

with Kentucky, but even more instrumental than that state, Ohio

gave the deathblow to the Burr conspiracy, whatever that move-

ment represented. Burr himself is reported to have said that he

felt confident of all the western people except those of Ohio.

He told Tupper, of Marietta, "You should make yourself of con-

sequence." Her sons abundantly followed this injunction. Side

by side Kentusky and Ohio fought the British in the War of

1812, with Perry's victory and the Thames river to mark their

final success in expelling the invader, if not in pushing their

conquests into Canada. In this same struggle the last significant

Indian confederacy under Tecumseh was dissolved and the Indian

peril removed from the Northwest. In these events Kentucky

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Dedicatory Exercises May 30, 1914.        371   played the part of elder sister, for which it was to receive its reward a half-century later. During this warfare, two conspicuous figures received the stamp of Ohio. William Henry Harrison, a representative of Virginia, who settled between the Miamis, did yeoman service against the savages that threatened Indiana and Illinois, while Lewis Cass took up the task of the nerveless Hull and was the

most tireless opponent of British intrigue in the Northwest. It was fitting that these two men should later play a conspicuous national part, the one as a brief occupant of the presidential chair and the other as a prominent candidate for the same po- sition. Through the irony of fate, the Virginian, Harrison, rep- resented the nationalistic tendencies of a later generation while the New Englander, Cass, was an active supporter of the latter particularistic doctrine of popular sovereignty. Thus far we have considered the part played by Ohio in

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early western sectionalism. Time fails, although the day and

occasion demand some attention to that bitter discussion which

emphasized a later sectional movement in our country. In the

beginning the line of sectionalism followed the course of the

Alleghany mountains, and a possible cleavage threatened to divide

the country into an East and a West. This was suggested by La-

Salle and repeated by a later Frenchman, Laussat, on the eve

of the Louisiana transfer. Many intervening measures of popular

policy emphasized this tendency, but all real danger of such a

sectionalism disappeared with the overthrow of Burr's abortive

attempt. The more threatening slavery discussion produced a

sectionalism, from which emerged a North and South. Many of

the events in Ohio's history suggest a wavering upon this ques-

tion. During the critical days of the Nullification Controversy,

William Henry Harrison, Junior, voiced the Union sentiment

which the older generation of his section cherished as well as his

own, in these stirring phrases: "Born and raised a freeman,

and my ancestors having contributed freely, and risked much to

gain, maintain, and support our happy government, I feel an

indignation I cannot express against those who are for raising the

standard of Nullification, which I consider a decent term for re-

bellion and treason." Then in characteristic Ohio fashion he

commends himself to the President as commander of a regiment

of volunteers, and promises within a month after marching to

"ride through the streets of Charleston."

Less than a decade later Ohio is interested in the projected

construction of railroads to the seaboard. One of the favorite

proposals was to connect Cincinnati with Charleston. Robert

Y. Hayne was the president of the company that urged the proj-

ect and one wonders how history might have been changed had

it been realized at that time rather than in our own day. In-

fluences were then at work to break this desired connection with

the Southeast. The names of Levi Coffin, Harriet Beecher

Stowe, Thomas Morris, Joshua Giddings and Salmon P. Chase,

to mention no others, indicate a personal influence that in time

turned Ohio into an anti-slavery state. When as a result of their

efforts the slavery question became a national issue, and when in

eleven of the commonwealths the die was cast in favor of seces-

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sion, it was the positive attitude of Ohio that largely restrained

western Virginia and Kentucky from taking the same step. In

this way did our state repay the debt incurred by her during the

long period of struggle against the Indians and British.

In this mournful sectional conflict we must pass over the

long list of names that constitute Ohio's honorable muster-roll.

Suffice it to indicate in the career of two of the names of this

period and the contrasting influences that affected her people.

At the outbreak of this struggle, William Tecumseh Sherman was

the popular president of the institution which has since become

the University of Louisiana. Pressed to espouse the side of

secession, he refused to lift his hand against the Union. Later

uttering his opinion that 200,000 men were necessary to hold the

Mississippi Valley, he was regarded as a fit subject for a mad-

house. But Ohio herself furnished more than half as many

again before the men of the western waters accomplished the

task of reopening the Mississippi and of sweeping around the

Alleghanies, through Georgia, to the seaboard.

Contrast with his position this expression from a speech

of Clement L. Vallandigham: "The war of the Union is in your

hands, a most bloody and costly failure." It was indeed most

bloody, for it was sanctified with the best blood of the nation,

North and South. It was most costly; after a lapse of a half

century we are still paying for it. But was it a failure? Let

Santiago and Vera Cruz, distant Manila and Pekin reassure the

halting few that survive the mighty test. Ohio thus nobly re-

fused to put its stamp of approval on Vallandigham's dictum.

In this hurried sketch of an earlier sectional movement that

influenced the later life of our State, one may discern the mighty

impulses that have quickened the life of commonwealth, section,

and nation. The interplay of these forces afford the most sig-

nificant problems of our national government. To ascertain how

they act and with what ultimate result, is a task that engages

the best efforts of historical training. That these efforts may be

aided and rendered effective, is the aim of The Ohio Archaeo-

logical and Historical Society, and of every similar organization

of our land. In its museums, its libraries, its manuscript col-

lections are to be found materials for exploiting the workings

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374      Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.   of these forces. The efforts of those in charge are directed to the best utilization of this material and they should be sustained and supported in their endeavors to make it still more useful. With this in mind, may we not anticipate a development in which this Society as a parent organization shall create others, repre- senting each county of our State, all engaged in collecting the vast resources of historical scholarship and in rendering them available to specialists? These in turn must by their labors show the general public the importance of our local and sectional his- tory, and the necessity for preserving its data. In this way we may render still further honor to those who have made the his- tory of our state famous and incite others to make its present and future development equally significant and equally valuable in the life of our common country. *  *  * *   * Following the address of Prof. Cox, addresses of greeting and congratulation to the Society were made by Mrs. Ella May Smith, of Columbus, representing the New England Historic Genealogical Society, located at Boston, Mass; Mr. Charles F. Brush, of Cleveland, Ohio, representing the American Philo- sophical Society, of Philadelphia, Pa.

In the absence of Dr. W. O. Thompson, president of the Ohio State University, who was unable to be present, Julius F. Stone, member of the board of trustees of the versity, spoke in behalf of the latter institution. He dwelt upon the fact that, although the Society now com- ing into possession of this building was entirely independent in its or- ganization and work, yet there was a mutual interest between it and the University. The trustees of the Uni- versity had been very glad to grant to the Society ground upon which its

building might be erected.  Indeed, they had accorded it the choicest site upon the entire campus, and in this policy they had

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