450 - HISTORY OF OHIO the state auditor was instructed to have plans drawn up for enlarging the prison and to advertise for bids to do the construction work ; also appropriation was made for $7,000 to buy materials for the prisoners to work on. In order to speed up the business the keeper of the prison was allowed a two per cent commission on all convict made goods he sold, in addition to his regular salary. But these measures did not solve the problem of the penitentiary. The number of prisoners increased so much more rapidly than had been foreseen that the site upon which it had been established proved in time to be entirely inadequate, and the final solution was removal to a much larger area in Columbus. On the original penitentiary site the state arsenal was built in later years, and it was a place of tremendous activity during the Civil and Spanish wars. The settling of the state officers in the new "apartments" was a task not so easily accomplished as might at first appear. The furniture which had been sufficient at Chillicothe had been sold at auction—the price brought for it being only $68.50—and entirely new equipment had to be purchased. The quarters at Columbus were so much larger than had been those at Chillicothe and Zanesville that greater provision had to be made to take care of them. The new halls of legislation could not be closed up between sessions and left to take care of themselves. The town of Columbus did not afford suitable residences for the officers. Governor Worthington did not live at the capital. He continued to reside in his mansion "Adena" on Prospect Hill at Chillicothe, and he was in Columbus only when his duties absolutely required his presence there. Everything had to be adjusted to the new circumstances, and this required time. It was necessary for the general assembly to adopt various resolutions in this regard, for example : "Resolved, That his excellency the governor be and he is hereby authorized and requested to employ some person to take the necessary care of the state house and its furniture during the recess of the legislature and also to take the necessary care of that part of the public offices not occupied by the officers of state. "Resolved, further, That his excellency the governor be and he is hereby authorized to make such distribution of the rooms in the public offices, for the occupancy of the officers of state, as he shall deem expedient." Another resolution requested his excellency the governor to provide, and cause to be hung, a bell in the state house cupola. Notwithstanding the spacious new buildings, the old methods of lighting and heating them—the only ones known—were not improved. Appropriations were made at this session to pay for candles and firewood, as well as for wafers, quills and "ink powders ;" also "for thirteen brass knobs and one sweeping brush furnished for the state house." The assembly had no assistant clerks, nor assistant door keepers, nor postmasters, nor pages, nor porters—which Ohio legislatures of modern times employ in large numbers ; notwithstanding that at that time the roll of the senators (twenty-eight in number) was three-fourths as long, and of representatives (sixty-two) almost one-half as long, as the rolls of the respective bodies more than a hundred years later. Very definite evidence that there was now a large population of German immigrants among the new settlers is found in an appropriation of $1,300 to defray the expense of translating and printing the state constitution and part of the general laws in the German language. The steady flow of thousands of immigrants into the state continued, and this fact brought on a controversy of peculiar intensity between the newspapers of the West and those of the East, which now began a systematic discouragement of settlement in the West. The editors of Ohio attributed this attitude in the East to a fear that their own sections—particularly in New England—would suffer a material diminution of their population. There were acrimonious discussions in the press as to the productiveness of Ohio soil, the conditions of living, the ANNALS OF OHIO ADMINISTRATIONS - 451 hardships of clearing the forests, and especially manners and morals of the people of Ohio. On all of these points the eastern papers were very persistent in their attacks, and to them the Ohio press made vigorous reply. Editors did not hesitate to charge deliberate misrepresentation upon the part of the traducers of their state and of its people. It is curious to note the kind of charges that were made against the character of Ohio's population. One long article, which was copied all over the eastern country, was in the form of a letter written by a traveler from that section during a short stay at Cincinnati : "And as it respects the habits of the people here, I think a large proportion of them are bad—drinking and fighting are carried on to great perfection. Scarcely a day transpires but I hear the horrid sounds of 'murder' issuing from the lips of some half-murdered wretch. A scene like this occurred yesterday. I flew to the spot from whence the cry issued, and you may judge what my feelings were in beholding a man full six feet tall on the body of a smaller one, chewing his hand with as much deliberation as you would a piece of roast beef. After he had satisfied his savage appetite he stuck his finger in the man's eye and tore it from its socket !" This picture of life in Cincinnati, which then contained about 7,500 people, was bitterly resented by the papers of that city. "We charge this correspondent with wilful and corrupt departure from the truth," cried one editor. And to other animadversions another paper replied : "The Portland (Maine) land jobbers, in speaking of Ohio, talk as flippantly of 'Western Wilds,' the Wilderness of the West,' and the `Vasty West,' as if it were the haunt of savages. If they could leave their herring and codfish long enough to pay us a visit they would see the wilderness 'blossom as a rose.' Instead of savages they would find large towns, enjoying a cultivated society, and a country filled with hardy yeomanry not inferior to their own. Our population is at this time not less than 500,000." Wide publicity was given to a letter written by another eastern traveler—a young man who had his eyes opened as to the refined influences under which young ladies of Ohio towns were reared: "Now, thinks I to myself, rare sport ! The girls in this wooden country knew nothing ; similar to Low Dutch girls of the states of Pennsylvania and New Jersey. There ! Get three or four sleighs, fill them with girls, stow in with them thick as three in a bed and one in the middle, take in a fiddler (no old matron along to keep the girls in order), go to a rowdy Waggoners' Tavern three or four miles from town, get out, set the fiddle to scraping, girls to dancing, boys to drinking—fine times ! "Under these impressions I called, with some of the young men of my acquaintance, on some ladies to whom I had been introduced ; and you will be astonished to learn that I was completely deceived in my calculations and found the back-woods girls not quite as uncivilized as I expected. In short, they would not go with us—they were not accustomed in the wilds of the west to go on sleighing parties, to assemblies or to other places of amusement unless married ladies of their acquaintance were of the party. I left the ladies with impressions of respect and esteem very different from those I entertained on my arrival." The efforts of the eastern papers to retard the stream of emigration were unavailing, but, notwithstanding the vigor of the Ohio editors in defending the reputation of their state, there are many evidences in their own columns that all was not sunshine and happiness among the people. The law passed at the session of 1815-16 providing for the erection of county poor-houses was now, in 1817, receiving considera- tion in numerous localities. The counties were not required—they were only authorized—to provide the poor-houses, and so far none had actually been built. The township overseers of the poor were still in charge of the destitute, and the dark picture drawn in a letter to the 452 - HISTORY OF OHIO Supporter of July 1st, of the conditions in Ross County, was but a duplicate picture of those which might have been drawn in all parts of the state : "If the person applying to the township overseers is thought by them to be an object of charity, advertisements are scattered throughout the township notifying the inhabitants that on such a day a poor or infirm person will be let out to him that will keep him for the least money. This kind of notice generally collects a set of the most needy and dirty livers in the neighborhood to bid down the unfortunate poor—the lowest bidder is the buyer. The person whose situation requires the most tender, humane and delicate attention is carried off by some unfeeling, indolent, half starved wretch who hopes to support himself and family with the money he received for (hastening to his grave by neglect and filth) a poor person." The state of imprisoned debtors was also receiving consideration, and the papers were leaning toward a campaign to have that evil system abolished. A revolting condition in the jail at Cincinnati, which undoubtedly existed in many other jails of the state, was revealed by the Western Spy of March 31st : "A humane police would provide in every prison separate apartments for the sexes, and distinguish by like means the debtor from the criminal. Is it so in Cincinnati ? No !—all are promiscuously confined in a single apartment, and without even the comfort of a bench to sit upon. Here is to be seen the disgusting—the heart rending—spectacle of men and women, whites and blacks, murderers and debtors—all in one undistinguished group." The editorial was accompanied by a leading article based upon the fact that imprisonment for debt had just been abolished in New York. It had been accomplished by spreading the startling facts before the New York Legislature—that in New York City alone, during the year 1816, 1,984 different persons had been confined for debt, of whom 729 were imprisoned for claims of less than twenty-five dollars, and that nearly all of them must have starved but for individual charity ; that the keepers of the 'debtors' prisons had been compelled to beg fuel to keep them from freezing to death ; that one man had been in prison for three years because of inability to pay a debt of less than fifty dollars ; that another had been confined for six years and subsisted entirely on charity ; and that thirty debtors then in one prison had wives and a total of seventy-three children. The explosion on the river of the boiler of the steamboat Constitution, in the spring of 1817, produced a profound sensation throughout the state and set people to wondering whether steamboats were a blessing after all. Eleven of the passengers were killed—"all of the most respectable passengers on board," one paper described them. This was the sixth terrible disaster of the kind to occur within twelve months, one of them on the Thames River in England, in which "the boiler was blown to atoms and fourteen out of twenty-two passengers killed or wounded." The Liberty Hall and Cincinnati Gazette commented : "The idea of being scalded to death is so dreadful to the imagination. and in reality, that we apprehend a few more instances of the boilers of steamboats bursting will go far to destroy this highly useful mode of navigating our rivers." But the building of steamboats went on rapidly nevertheless, always of greater size and magnificence of appointments, and scarcely a week passed without the recording of the arrival and departure of new boats in the river notes of the Cincinnati papers. A big news item of May 11, 1817, was the announcement that a line of stage coaches would be established immediately, between Louisville and Wheeling. It does not appear that such a line had previously been operating in Ohio, but those from Louisville traversed the southern part of this state and the people of Ohio were highly interested in it. The stages carried mail and passengers, sixty miles a day, ran three ANNALS OF OHIO ADMINISTRATIONS - 453 times a week, and at Wheeling connected with the stages to and from Philadelphia and Washington. The announcement stated that "in case any accident happens to a stage, arrangements are made to carry passengers by horseback until the next stage can take them." Another important announcement was that made, April 21st of this year, that the merchants of Philadelphia were "exerting themselves to form a company for the transportation of goods to Pittsburg, in wagons to travel day and night, and at a uniform rate through the year, considerably lower than at present." This enterprise was attributed to the importation of large volumes of foreign goods to Ohio through New Orleans, where vessels made port from all parts of the world. The eastern merchants determined to secure the great and growing trade for such goods in the western country. In line with this there appeared another commercial news item which a century later appears extraordinary in view of the fact that the Scioto River is never used as a navigable stream except for the very smallest boats, and no freight traffic from Columbus has been carried on it within the memory of any now living. The Monitor, of Columbus, on April 3, 1817, printed this : "The Scioto exhibits an aspect of commerce unknown to former times. Seven Orleans boats have been built in this neighborhood within a few weeks and have taken part freight at this place, but are principally freighted at Circleville and Chillicothe. They are all freighted with flour, at 350 barrels each, destined for New Orleans." As flour was selling at more than ten dollars per barrel at New Orleans, this shipment alone would bring back to Ohio more than $25,000. It was in this year of 1817 that the last obstacle was removed from the settlement of the great territory at the northwestern corner of the state. A treaty between the United States Commissioners (Governor Cass, of the Territory of Michigan, and Gen. Duncan McArthur, of Ohio) and the Indians who had possession of those lands, was concluded at Fort Meigs early in October. The papers of Ohio gave the incident much attention. The Watchman, published at Dayton, contained the first news of it in its issue of October 8 : "The treaty. of Ft. Meigs has been brought to a close. The cessions made by the Indians on this occasion nearly extinguish their title in this state. The two great objects are gained : the security of the northwestern frontier and opportunity for an immediate settlement of the country, which latter will soon compel the few remaining Indians to adopt the habits of civilization or to migrate to situations more congenial to savage life." This was an event of immense importance in the history of the state. It had long been intensely desired, and the great tracts of rich land were henceforth to be a real factor in the increase of population and wealth of Ohio. Toledo, then unknown to the map of Ohio, became the metropolis of that district within a few years, and, later, one of the great cities of the state. Many published incidents of more minor import throw a flood of light on conditions in Ohio during this year. "The extreme badness of the roads" prevented the Miami Intelligencer from procuring paper from the mill, which caused the appearance of only half sheets or none at all.—"The extreme coldness of the weather, which prevailed during the last week, was the cause of our paper (The Philanthropist) not appearing on the 17th," of January.—"The eastern mail due on Thursday did not arrive, in consequence of which our paper appears rather barren of news," says another editor.—Valentine Labolt, of Marietta, an old offender, was sentenced to seven years at hard labor in the penitentiary. "It is but a few years since he received a public whipping for the same offense," which was that of stealing cloth.—Several mail robberies occurred in Eastern Ohio ; one of the men arrested hanged himself by a handkerchief in the jail.—Very many warnings against counterfeiters and spurious money swindlers.—"Our 454 - HISTORY OF OHIO paper for some time past, owing to bad ink we were compelled to use, appeared rather under the weather, there being no ink to be obtained short of Pittsburg." Its sickly appearance was just as noticeable to the reader of a century later as to those who read it in 1817.—The Ohio River was frozen so hard in February that sleighs, wagons and horses traveled over its surface—for the first time known to any one. This was a disaster because it stopped for some weeks receipts of goods from New Orleans.—People in Ohio approved a change just made in the American flag by which the thirteen stripes were permanently adopted by Congress, with a new star for each state admitted into the Union.—Great interest in a small sailing schooner which arrived in the Ohio River from Rome, in the central part of New York State, via Wood Creek, Oneida Lake, Oswego River, Lake Ontario, Buffalo and Lake Erie, Cataraugas Creek and the Allegheny River. Portages, on wheels, of only eleven miles around Niagara Falls and eight from Cataraugas Creek to the headwaters of the Alleghany.—Lake Erie fleets of both American and British war ships dismantled except two small revenue cutters for each. "This saves great expense and is, besides, an evidence of confidence and good will on the part of both."—Meeting of delegates from eight townships in Hamilton County to endorse candidates for state senator, representatives, and a county commissioner. Report of the meeting signed by Othniel Looker, chairman, and William Henry Harrison, secretary. Think of the latter great name signed to a report of such small consequence !—The estate of the famous Nathaniel Massie, who had died in 1813, insolvent, and, according to published legal notice, not yet settled up in 1817.—Notices of the death of Samuel Huntington ex-governor, and conspicuous name in Ohio history, June 7th, 1817. Probably the greatest event of the year, not only in Ohio but in several other states as well, was the tour through them of President James Monroe and his suite. To the people of this state, perhaps not one in ten thousand of whom had ever seen a chief magistrate of the nation, it was an occasion of enormous public interest. The itinerary, which began at Washington on June 2nd, extended successively into the states of Maryland, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New York, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New Hampshire, Maine (then a district of Massachusetts), Vermont, thence to Detroit and into Ohio. On Saturday, August 23d, the President reached Delaware, and passed the Sabbath of the 24th there. On Monday he arrived in Columbus, and was officially greeted there by Governor Worthington, who had hurried from his home at Chillicothe for the purpose. On Tuesday he proceeded to the line between Franklin and Pickaway counties, was met there by a deputation from Circleville, and escorted to "Mr. Holmes' Tavern," where he remained over night. The next morning he was escorted by a troop of horse to Circleville, whence he proceeded to the boundary line of Ross County and was met by a large number of gentlemen from Chillicothe on horse-back. These escorted him to Governor Worthington's mansion, "Adena," overlooking Chillicothe from Prospect Hill, where he spent that night. On Thursday the president was taken to Chillicothe, thence to Lancaster and Zanesville, which was his last stopping place in the state. The newspapers chronicled all these moves, together with the elaborate addresses made to him and his "elegant and impressive" responses. Great throngs of people gathered at every stop and along the road. There were decorations, artillery salutes, formal dinners, and every possible attention. A detailed history of this whole tour was published the next year in a 300 page book by S. Putnam Waldo, and the various events, together with addresses of town officials everywhere, and responses by the President, were included. Many comments were made by the author, and Ohio people and towns received highly complimentary attention at his hands. The "Era of Good Feeling" which characterized the times of the ANNALS OF OHIO ADMINISTRATIONS - 455 administration of President Monroe may be said to date from this tour. Gradually and rapidly political rancor disappeared, and all papers, whether federalist or democratic in politics, spoke in the warmest terms of him. He had been elected as a democrat, but party lines were now obliterated, not only in Ohio but also throughout the country. The Supporter, of Chillicothe, which was the chief federalist paper in the state, in the course of a long editorial, said : "There is reason to believe that Mr. Monroe will be the president of the United States, and not president of a party ; and if so, he will command the support and esteem of the wise and virtuous of all parties and retire from office amidst the benedictions of a grateful and happy people." That this was a true prophecy, was evidenced by the fact that three years later he was reelected President with but one dissenting electoral vote. SIXTEENTH LEGISLATIVE SESSION December 1, 1817, to January 30, 1818 The Senate again elected Abraham Shepherd its speaker ; and Gen. Duncan McArthur was made speaker of the House of Representatives. Governor Worthington's message to the assembly had for its keynotes the advance of the material welfare of the state by increased building of roads and encouragement of business industries, and the mental development of the rising generation by improvements in facilities for their education. He dwelt upon the inadequacy of the schools and the teachers, and urged upon the assembly the necessity of improvement in these regards, if a high position was to be taken by the state. Governor Worthington fully realized the great importance of the mental training of the young. In his message he not only urged the Legislature to provide every possible opportunity for this, but strongly appealed to the teachers themselves to advance their professional attainments by forming teachers' associations for mutual self-improvement. The equipment of teachers for their work was inadequate, and the conditions under which they taught were so discouraging as to offer no inducements to efficient and well educated men to enter the profession. The governor requested the general assembly to increase their compensation over the "subscriptions" of parents of school children, and to provide means for the training of teachers to enable them to do a higher grade of work. But none of these suggestions were adopted by the assembly. The session of this year was not productive of much legislation of a general character. Perry, Brown, Clark, Morgan, Logan, Hocking and Medina counties were established, which brought the total number up to fifty-one.—Six new banks were incorporated, located at Steubenville, Portsmouth, Canton, Hamilton, Gallipolis and Circleville. With these there were now twenty-seven incorporated state banks.—The annual salary of the secretary of state was made $1,000, an increase of $200 over that fixed two years before, to make it conform with the salaries of the treasurer and auditor.—An act was passed providing that convicted persons were not to be sent to the penitentiary unless the money or goods stolen, or property damaged, was of a value of ten dollars or more.—Another act permitted doctors to practice medicine in the state without examination by the medical board of censors if they had received the degree of Doctor of Medicine from any university or other medical institution in the United States.—Adam Betz, who had become an institution as door keeper of the House of Representatives by holding that position for fifteen successive years, was now defeated for reappointment.—For the first time since the founding of the state county sheriffs, recorders and auditors were now permitted to have deputies and clerks under certain conditions ; this had become 456 - HISTORY OF OHIO a necessity by reason of the large increase in the business of some of the counties.—The Supreme Court was removed to Columbus from Chillicothe, and the senators and representatives in Congress were by resolution asked to secure, if possible, transfer of the United States District Court also to the capital.—An act authorized a lottery to raise $20,000 "to defray the expense of completing the college edifice lately erected at Athens and to purchase a library and suitable mathematical and philosophical apparatus for the Ohio University."—The governor, under authority of the previous assembly to borrow more money to meet direct taxes of the general government, had found it necessary to make a loan of only $34,000, and an appropriation was made to repay this.—Provision was made to secure for the State of Ohio copies of the laws passed in the other states of the Union, presumably for study of the methods by which state problems had been met elsewhere. Action was taken authorizing the extension of the penitentiary which subject had occupied so much time at the previous session. The work was left in the hands of the state secretary, treasurer and auditor, who, pursuant to instructions, had had plans drawn and estimates of costs made, and $15,000 was appropriated to meet the bills for it. The convicts were to be used in the labor of construction, and an agent, or superintendent, was to be appointed at an annual salary of not more than $800. An appropriation of $10,000 was also made to cover cost of buying material for the convicts to work upon in their manufacturing operations, and to defray the expense of sheriffs in conveying convicts to the big state prison. The ever present subject of slavery came into the assembly in a new form by agitation of Ohio anti-slavery advocates, and a preamble and resolution were adopted as follows: "Whereas, a number of the good people of this state have by a memorial expressed their most ardent wishes for the emancipation and colonization of the people of colour of the United States ; Therefore— "Resolved by the general assembly of the state of Ohio, That our senators in congress be instructed, and our representatives be requested, to use their best endeavors to procure the passage of a law which will effect the purpose aforesaid." Prior to this period there had been no definite provision by which a man condemned to death in the state could be reprieved. A celebrated murder case occupied much of this assembly's time and led to an important change in that regard. One Jacob Lewis, of Zanesville, had been convicted of murder in the first degree and sentenced by the court to he hanged. But he had influential friends who carried the case to the State Legislature, asking for a reprieve. The existence of the penitentiary brought in a new element. It was thought that the man ought to be taken there if reprieved, but there was no legal means of confining him there. Much discussion of the constitutional aspects of the case was held from time to time throughout the whole session. Finally a law was passed placing with the governor the right in such cases to commute death sentences to "perpetual imprisonment," and to place such reprieved murderers at hard labor in the penitentiary. Under this law Lewis was conveyed to the prison, and, presumably, spent the rest of his life there. In the governor has rested decisions in all such cases ever since that time. State Treasurer Curry reported that after expending $25,178.66 from the three per cent fund for building roads during the previous year (1816), there remained a balance of $26,723.40 available for the same purpose. Also that he had during the year paid bills from the state treasury amounting to $202,310.26, and that there was a deficit of $1,522.57. The state auditor made a report of taxed land which is interesting as showing the strides so far made in taking up the public lands. Under the tax system all lands were still classified in three grades as to value. ANNALS OF OHIO ADMINISTRATIONS - 457 The commissioners of the forty-four counties existing in 1816 had made to the state auditor detailed returns of all the taxed lands of the three grades in their respective counties, and the totals compiled by him were : First grade, 154,049 acres ; second grade, 3,490,394 acres ; third grade, 2,877,595 acres; total, 6,522,038. The amount of taxes assessed against these acres for state purposes was $130,999.23. It is curious to read the list of the ten counties which contributed the largest amount to this total. They were : Ross, $8,727.27 ; Hamilton, $6,531.91 ; Columbiana, $6,385.20 ; Trumbull, $6,138.13 ; Fairfield, $5,875.32 ; Clermont, $5,213.02 ; Portage, $4,956.23 ; Franklin, $4,449.29 ; Warren, $4,354.11 ; Washington, $4,330.78. Since that day all but two of these counties—Hamilton and Franklin—have sunk far below the relative positions which they then occupied in their contributions to the support of the state, and other counties which were then quite insignificant or not in existence at all have risen to immense importance in land values, general wealth, and population. Among the appropriations made January 28, 1817, was the following : "Sec. 5. Be it further enacted that a sum not exceeding three hundred thousand five hundred dollars be and the same is hereby appropriated as a contingent fund subject to the order of the governor for the year one thousand eight hundred and seventeen, who shall make a report of the disbursements thereof to the next session of the general assembly." And on the same day this resolution was adopted : "Resolved, That the governor be, and he is hereby, requested to procure a bell of such size and dimensions as he may think proper, and cause the same to be hung in a proper manner in the cupola of the state house, for the use of the legislature ; and also to procure a sufficient quantity of carpeting for the floors of the senate chamber and representatives hall ; and in procuring same he shall give preference to the manufacturers of this state when the expense thereof is not materially different." All in the regular routine of the day's work ! But out of these legislative acts came an unexpected result ; for they laid the foundation of one of the great institutions of Ohio—the State Library. In his annual message to the assembly of this year (1817), Governor Worthington included this paragraph : "The fund made subject to my control by the last general assembly, besides the ordinary demands made upon it and for articles mentioned in the resolution of the legislature of the 28th of January, 1817, has enabled me to purchase a small but valuable collection of books which are intended as the commencement of a library for this state. In the performance of this act I was guided by what I conceived the best interests of the state by placing within reach of the representatives of the people such information as will aid them in the discharge of the important duties they are delegated to perform." The amount he invested in the books was $2,002. Contributions had also been made of the works of .the celebrated English philosopher, Jeremy Bentham, in thirty-seven volumes. John Quincy Adams, then minister of the United States to the Court of St. James, had sent these books, a gift from Bentham himself. One hundred years later Daniel J. Ryan, one of the trustees of the Ohio State Archaeological and Historical Society of Ohio, in the course of an address delivered at the Ohio State Library Centennial celebration, said : "Subsequently Governor Worthington presented a catalogue of the books purchased, being 509 volumes. They embraced a wide range of literature of the most substantial character, and it is noticed that in the entire list there is but one work of poetry, that being Milton's 'Paradise Lost.' In this list we observe the works of authors representing the best literature in ancient and modern times. The foundation thus laid by 458 - HISTORY OF OHIO Governor Worthington has increased year by year until there has been formed one of the most comprehensive and valuable collections of books possessed by any state in the union. The man who did this work has erected for himself a monument more lasting than brass and has rendered the generations that followed him his grateful debtors. "His memorial is this library. Other governors have contributed their part in developing the material greatness of the state and some have added glory to its name by valor in war, but the man who has furnished means of happiness and elevation of spirit to the thousands that have gone before, and through whose instrumentality thousands to come will be benefited, has left a monument that time cannot destroy and men cannot forget." During the session in which Governor Worthington informed the assembly of the beginning of the state library a committee was appointed to adopt a plan to care for it and to establish rules for its government. The books were kept in one of the rooms of the public office building, open during the legislative session only, from 8 o'clock a. m. to 1 p. m. and from 4 to 8 p. m. daily. A librarian was employed, to serve during the session only, and it was his duty to label, number and catalogue the books, and keep accurate accounts of all issues and returns of them. During the recess of the assembly the governor himself had charge. Only the state officers, members of the Legislature and their clerks could use the books. Folios taken out might be retained three weeks, quartos two weeks, and octavos and duodecimos one week. If one was kept longer the borrower had to pay a fine of 25 cents a day for a folio, or 12Y2 cents per day for a smaller book. These fines could be remitted for good cause by the speakers of the Senate and House, but right to use the books was denied to persons who had violated the rules. If a book was damaged when returned the borrower could not have another until the damage was made good. If books were not returned within two days before the adjournment of the assembly the librarian notified the speakers, and they would retain twice the cost of the books from the salaries of those holding them. And any book lost which belonged to a set was charged at double the value of the complete set. A hundred years later a great change has taken place in the management of the library. Books are issued to the public under proper safeguards, and thousands of them are sent on tours through the state for the use of people at their homes. It is probable that nobody except Governor Worthington himself had the least conception of the great thing he had done in establishing the state library. The records bear no words indicating that the assembly had a vision of its future, and, so far as a careful search discloses, there was not one word in any newspaper concerning it beyond the bare fact that the books had been purchased. With the exception of the act concerning reprieves for condemned murderers, this Legislature did not pass a single general law ; as the newspapers were not slow to announce and to comment upon in a way derogatory to the body, both before and after its adjournment. "The legislature of the state," said the Supporter of February 3, "adjourned on Friday morning last after a session of two months, which appears to have been spent to very little purpose. They have chartered seven new banks and erected seven new counties ; and have wasted so much time in windy warfare that they have passed but one single act of a general nature." The newspapers were greatly interested in the act concerning the reprieve of murderers, and revealed an interesting fact in connection with it : "A few days since," reported the Chillicothe Supporter at the time, "a bill passed the senate to amend the law for the punishment of crimes. In this bill was introduced a provision that no person should be punished with death for the commission of any crime. Instead of death it was proposed to punish with perpetual imprisonment in the ANNALS OF OHIO ADMINISTRATIONS - 459 penitentiary. On this question the senate was divided fourteen to fourteen, and so the question was lost." Thus early, in the state's history, only a few years after repeal of satutes which prescribed the death penalty for five different crimes, was introduced the subject of abolishing capital punishment, which has been a matter of almost continuous argument in Ohio through all the intervening years. One of the notable questions considered by the general assembly at this session arose partly out of consideration of the tenure of office of State Treasurer Curry. When elected to his office by the assembly at the preceding session it was to fill a vacancy occasioned by the resignation of William McFarland, whose term would have expired in the following March. Proposals were now made to elect a successor by those members who regarded that Curry's term had ended. Others opposed this on the ground that the treasurer's term under the constitution was for three years, and they contended that Curry should continue in office for a full term. This precipitated a controversy in which the exact meaning of the language of the constitution was called in question. The newspapers were quick to take up this subject, and discussion of it filled much space. But there was a general admission that, as expressed by the Chillicothe Supporter, "our constitution is so badly worded that in many instances it is difficult to tell what the framers had in view." There was objection also to other provisions of the fundamental law, chiefly those relating to the judiciary. The presiding judges of the courts were compelled to travel so far and so often to meet their engagements in the several counties that it was a great hardship upon them and they were often unable to reach towns where their presence was necessary for the holding of court. There had been a growing desire to revise the constitution, and, as a result of the feeling which culminated at this time, a bill was introduced in the assembly to call a convention for the purpose. But it failed of passage. Another measure before the Legislature arose to major importance in the press of the state and produced intense animosity among the members of the assembly itself. This was the proposal, now boldly stated, in a bill to tax the Ohio branches of the United States Bank. It would. place an annual tax of four per cent upon the amounts received by those branches for all discounts and interest on loans. The bill was at first expected to pass by a large majority, and, indeed, the votes on preliminary motions gave every reason for that expectation. But the branch banks had powerful influences at work. Gen. Duncan McArthur, speaker of the House of Representatives, who was himself a director of the United States branch bank at Chillicothe, bore the brunt of the battle for them. Delays in taking the final vote were secured, and the enemies of the bill were able to prevent present action on it. Its consideration was postponed until the following session. Discussion of the question was continued in the newspapers during the whole of the ensuing year. Some of the correspondents for and against the measure were so violent in their language that the editors frequently warned them that they must moderate their expressions. Editorial notes often appeared announcing that communications received upon the subject would not be printed because of their highly objectionable contents. The position of the opponents of the branch banks was that they were endeavoring to monopolize the banking business of the state and thus destroy the state banks. These were, of course, owned by citizens of Ohio, and their friends claimed that they ought to have every encouragement on the part of the State's Legislature. Those favorable to the national institution pointed out that under the state banking system the value of notes issued by the local banks was generally in doubt, and that very often it was below par. In this contention they were certainly borne out by the facts published in almost every issue of the papers. Reports were very numerous that the money issues of 460 - HISTORY OF OHIO this or that bank were worthless because of suspension of payments. There were published lists of banks of Ohio and other states whose notes were quoted at less than their face value. The conditions as to circulating mediums were, in fact, intolerable, as was made plain by articles published in all the papers. Quotation from one of these will suffice. The State Legislature of Kentucky, in January (1818), incorporated thirty-three new state banks, with a total authorized capital of $6,570,000, most of which was merely on paper, but it made possible the issue of a new great flood of bank notes. The Western Spy of January 31, taking this action as the basis for a long editorial, thus described the general financial situation, so far as it affected the public: "Are we not already sufficiently inundated with the vile trash issued, in lieu of money, by Banking Institutions ? Is not the credit of the West, at this time, sufficiently low in the Atlantic states ? But these considerations are the smallest part of the evil. Countenance this measure of the Kentucky legislature, and no person is secure in the possession of his property. Countenance it, and, we venture to assert, you shall, ere long, be unable to purchase a six penny loaf of bread with a dollar note. Where is the bank ? What is the security for the payment of its notes ? says the shop keeper to the labourer who presents his representative of money to buy goods for his necessitous family. `I would not give you the value of the paper it is printed on for it.' "The evil, however, will not rest on the poor alone, for we are decidedly of the opinion that all confidence in all monied transactions will be lost. Commerce will cease, for the exchange will not be possible to be made ; no man, however good his circumstances may be, will be found capable of supporting the excessive discounts he will have to pay before his money can be made useful." One of the very interesting features of the early papers of Ohio is the continued story, year after year, of the troubles and delays in deliveries of the United States mails. It was a never ending subject of news and of complaints. The people in general were greatly interested, of course, but to the newspapers it was of the most vital concern. They depended entirely upon the mails to bring them the eastern papers from which all their information was extracted as to the happenings in the world outside of their own immediate territory. Mails were affected by high water, by bad roads, by failure and neglect on the part of post riders and stage coach drivers, and sometimes by mail robberies. A Cincinnati paper of January of this year bewailed the fact that it had received no mail for a week, but had, instead, a letter from the postmaster at Chillicothe explaining that one stage driver had forgotten the mail somewhere east of Zanesville and that the one who followed two days later had been unable to take it up because his bags were too small to hold the Cincinnati mail and so he had left it behind. The editor, having exhausted himself in unavailing violent language, now changed his style to one of a sort of mild sarcasm : "We respectfully submit to the post master general whether these things are not worthy of his attention. Stage drivers may certainly be found who will not forget the principal part of their business, nor is leather so scarce in the western country but what sufficient may be obtained for mail bags." As a last resort the editors took the matter up with Congressman William Henry Harrison, and in March he wrote them a king letter on the subject. He said he had made frequent calls on the postmaster general (Return Jonathan Meigs, Jr., still held that office) and "I am perfectly persuaded that it is his wish to do everything in his power to place the mails upon a footing the most beneficial and acceptable to the people. But his distance from the scenes of these abuses, and the numerous sources of them, render it really out of his power to prevent them from occurring, or, as speedily as might be wished, to correct them when they do occur'!" So, they had to continue to endure them. ANNALS OF OHIO ADMINISTRATIONS - 461 Those strong passages of Governor Worthington in his annual message to the general assembly which dwelt upon the almost utter lack of provisions for the education of the rising generation met with no response from that body. But that they were timely, and that they ought to have received generous support, appears very evident from a perusal of the newspapers of the year 1818. Although many of the citizens were people of high education and culture, it is plain in many articles published that a great number of them were practically without education and many were illiterate. The newspapers often urged that measures be taken to improve these -conditions, but the necessary public appropriations were not forthcoming and the parents of children were not disposed—or not able—to provide them with proper schools. "It is a melancholy truth," one of the editors stated, "that a large proportion of the sons and daughters of the citizens are growing up in sloth and ignorance, without the means of education, and calculated hereafter to become a reproach instead of an honor to their country. Is there a single other state in the Union in which the condition of literature is so languishing ? in which schools are so neglected and the funds appropriated for their support so badly managed ? in which there are so few academies and such a want of patronage, zeal and liberality for their encouragement? in which teachers are so badly qualified or so injudiciously selected ?" But at last means were being provided to educate men in a systematic way for the medical profession. No medical college for Ohio was as yet. thought of, but in the fall and winter of this year 1818, there was held at Cincinnati the first of an annual series of medical lectures of recognized authority, "on surgery and surgical anatomy, by Doctor Rogers ; on materia medica and the practice of physic, by Doctor Drake ; on chemistry and pharmacy, by Mr. Slack." The charge for the full series was thirty dollars ; to "those who wished to be furnished with books and private instruction" the charge was forty dollars. So far as known, this was the first formal and established course of study for physicians and surgeons in the West. In the course of an article upon the natural resources of the State of Ohio, prepared for The Western Emigrant Society which had now been formed, a list of the quadrupeds and birds (not domesticated) was published at this time. Most of them are still very common, but some of them are no longer seen in Ohio and some have since made their appearance which were not known then. The list was as follows : "Quadrupeds—Bear, wolf (gray and black), elk, deer, beaver, otter, musk-rat, fisher, raccoon, panther (or painter), wild cat, fox (red, gray and silver gray), mink, skunk (or polecat), wood chuck (or ground hog). rabbit, weasel, squirrel (black, gray, red and striped), ground mole. "Fowls and small birds—Turkeys, swans, geese, brants, ducks (great variety of), eagles (variety), gulls (variety), turkey buzzards, loon (black and white), ravens, cranes (variety), owls (variety), hen hawks, pheasants, partridges, fish hawks, pigeons, whipperwills, king-fishers, wood cocks, wood peckers, quails, black birds, blue jays, plovers, snipes, thrushes. larks, robins, gold finches, swallows." In March (1818) it was possible to publish something official about the weather of the previous December, and it is interesting now because it was the first reference made to thermometrical readings in this state. Josiah Meigs, who signed the report, was commissioner of the general land office- at Washington, and the information on which he compiled his statement was sent to him under instructions by his registers of land offices at Detroit, Wooster, Zanesville and Cincinnati. The mean temperatures for December, as given in this belated report, were : In Detroit. 26 degrees above zero ; Wooster, 29 ; Zanesville, 35 ; Cincinnati, 36. The lowest temperatures at these points in the month were all on the 21st, and were : At Detroit, 10 degrees below zero ; Wooster, 8 below ; Zanesville, 4 below ; Cincinnati, 6 above. 462 - HISTORY OF OHIO These figures were prominently displayed in the papers, as important news, under the heading "Meteorological." That the facts were two months old apparently did not render them any the less interesting to the citizens of Ohio. Many small items of news found their way into the columns of those old papers, and some of them are quite as interesting now as they were then because of their contributions to our knowledge of conditions in the still primitive times : In March a great thaw and heavy rain raised the waters in the streams of Central Ohio so high as to produce enormous damage to property along their banks, which was early evidence of the fallacy of the theory advanced ninety-five years later (1913), when the same cause in the same streams wrought great havoc, that the clearing away of the forests was responsible for the great and sudden floods in modern times.—A note that in Belmont County 170 marriage licenses had been issued during the year 1817, but "as the Friends and Seceders marry without licenses the number of marriages must have been considerably greater."—Many descriptions of Indian atrocities, but all of them were a long way west and south of Ohio ; and the United States established a military post on the Yellowstone River, 1,800 miles west of St. Louis.—Ross County bought a 200-acre farm on which to erect a poor house, the first one mentioned under the new law.—The Ohio militia now consisted of a total of 61,988 men, as compared with 49,483 the preceding year.—Report of death of Daniel Boone, famous in Ohio, then living in the West, denied. "So far from his being dead, Colonel Boone has intimated his intention of moving higher up the Missouri, and out of the precincts of the settlements which are so thickly forming around him."—Ticket 3,673 held by Ohio gentlemen, drew the $100,000 prize in the lottery for a surgical institute in the East.—The Cincinnati town council established a night watch consisting of a captain and six subordinates, part of whose duties was to trim and light the street lamps.—Gen. Arthur St. Clair, the old first governor of the Northwestern Territory, died August 28 at his home in Greensburg, Pennsylvania.—The people of Cincinnati urged the town council to provide fire-hooks and ladders, as they were quite as important as the fire engine.—All Chillicothe citizens were requested to have buckets ready to be immediately available at all times for use in extinguishing fires in the town.—"A well has been sunk on the farm of Mr. Demming, in Medina County, which affords from five to ten quarts of Seneca oil per day."—Soda water was announced, in a large advertisement, to be had at a fountain set up in Cincinnati, with a doctor's certificate that it was harmless, and in some cases beneficial to health. Political activities for the gubernatorial election in October began early in the year, and even in January Judge Ethan Allen Brown, who had been defeated the last time by Governor Worthington, began to be regarded as certain of election. It is probable that he could have been elected in 1816 against any man other than Worthington, and it now became evident that he would have but little opposition. Gen. Duncan McArthur's name was put forward by some, but he promptly disclaimed a wish to be a candidate, and, in his letter to the public, stressed that the office ought to be given to a man from the western part of the state inasmuch as all previous governors had been residents of the southern, eastern and northern sections. As Judge Brown lived in Cincinnati, this helped his chances. The only other avowed candidate was Col. James Dunlap, of Chillicothe. Gen. William Henry Harrison addressed his constituents declining to be a candidate for reelection to Congress, but three other congressmen were reelected with little opposition. As usual, in the utter lack of organized news gathering, and with the slow methods of travel, the newspapers received the returns only after great delay. Almost four weeks after election day the vote was ANNALS OF OHIO ADMINISTRATIONS - 463 in from only fifteen counties. By November 4 it was known that in twenty-five counties reporting Brown had a majority of 15,124. Even when the official vote of the state was canvassed by the general assembly in December, returns from six counties were missing, but without them Brown's majority over Dunlap was more than 22,000. ADMINISTRATION OF ETHAN ALLEN BROWN SEVENTEENTH LEGISLATIVE SESSION It was known that this was to be a highly important session. The decisions as to taxing the United States branch banks and as to the proposed convention to revise the state constitution were to be made, and not only the members of the assembly but the people at large were on a high tension with regard to both questions. The two months of the sitting were, indeed, among the most momentous in the early history of the state. Robert Lucas, of Pike County, was elected speaker of the Senate, and Joseph Richardson, of Columbiana County, speaker of the House. Both were comparatively new names, neither having attained any previous prominence. Richardson's career was inconspicuous. Lucas had been a brigadier-general in 1813, but his part in the war had attracted no particular attention to him. Afterwards, in 1832-36, he was governor of Ohio. He was territorial governor of Iowa from 1838 to 1841, and remained there after the state's admission, until the time of his death in 1858. Now, for the first time, the title sergeant-at-arms was substituted for doorkeeper. Edward Sherlock, who had held that place in the constitutional convention of 1802, and in the Senate every year since, was retired in this year 1818, and his successor bore the name of John Martin. Governor Worthington's fourth and final message to the general assembly again devoted much attention to the subject of the education of the people and to the energetic building of roads, especially dwelling upon the importance of the proposed National Road, which some years later became the chief artery of travel from east to west. He was greatly concerned over the banking situation in the state, and offered as a solution the organization of a state bank in which all the chartered banks should become united after surrendering the respective charters under which they were functioning. He advocated the utmost possible encouragement of domestic manufactures ; and asked that legal restraints be placed upon the production, sale and use of intoxicating liquors, the evil effects of which were growing more and more menacing. Governor-elect Ethan Allen Brown took the oath of office and delivered his inaugural address. It dwelt largely upon the inequalities of taxation and methods of assessments. He also urged heavy taxation of United States, branch banks. The canvass of votes in the six congressional districts officially disclosed that Thomas R. Ross, John W. Campbell, Henry Brush, Samuel Herrick, Philemon Beecher and John Sloane had been chosen to the national Legislature. Some of these were present incumbents of the office, as has been noted before in these annals. Ross was a practicing lawyer at Lebanon. He served three successive terms in Congress, but held no other positions of importance, and died on his' farm in Warren County in 1869, at the age of eighty-one years. Brush was a lawyer at Chillicothe and later at London. After a single term in Congress he became one of the supreme judges of the state, and lived a quiet life until 1855, when he died on his Madison County farm, aged seventy-seven. Sloan served five terms in Congress, retiring in 1829 ; was later secretary of state, and United States treasurer. His home was in Wooster, where he died in 1856. ANNALS OF OHIO ADMINISTRATIONS - 465 Peter Hitchcock, who had just finished a term in Congress, was appointed judge of the Supreme Court, to fill the vacancy caused by the resignation of Judge Brown to become governor. Jeremiah Morrow's term as United States senator had expired and the contest to fill his place was a very spirited one. Thomas Worth-ington was a candidate against three others, but was defeated on the fourth ballot (39 to 46) by William A. Trimble of Highland County, a young man of thirty-two. The letter of a Columbus correspondent of the Western Spy told the story of the election in sporting terms and in a manner which showed no respect for the name of Worthington, revered in history. His reference to Worthington's "weight," as ex-plained in a foot note, were his vote against declaration of the late war and his favorable interest in the Bank of the United States. "Yesterday," he wrote on January 31 (1819) "at three o'clock P. M., the great purse was run for by the old Baldfaced Sorrel and the Highland Colt. The old Sorrel led off from the first at nearly his full speed. The Highland Colt (being his first race) was held back until the last heat, when he took the track, kept it, and came out seven lengths ahead, to the great surprise and mortification of the friends of the old horse, who had formerly been one of the surest nags to bet on that could be started—for he had been so often run there was no driving him from the track. Owing to his age he had necessarily to carry some weight. The colt, owing to his youth, and an unfortunate wound received in the late war, was unincumbered. It was thought by all who witnessed the sport that at the outcome he made a greater leap than any other colt has ever made before in the western country."