The Southwestern Territory.

“The Territory of the United States of America South of the River Ohio” was the official title of the tract of land which had been ceded by North Carolina to the United States, and which a few years later became the State of Tennessee.  William Blount, the newly appointed Governor, took charge late in 1790.  He made a tour of the various counties, as laid out under authority of the State of North Carolina, rechristening them as counties of the Territory, and summoning before him the persons in each county holding commissions from North Carolina, at the respective court-houses, where he formally notified them of the change.  He read to them the act of Congress accepting the cessions of the claims of North Carolina; then he read his own commission from President Washington; and informed them of the provision by North Carolina that Congress should assume and execute the government of the new Territory “in a manner similar to that which they support northwest of the River Ohio.”  Following this he formally read the ordinance for the government of the Northwestern Territory.  He commented upon and explained this proclamation, stating that under it the President had appointed the Governor, the Judges, and the Secretary of the new Territory, and that he himself, as Governor, would now appoint the necessary county officers.

  Blount Inaugurated as Governor. 
  Slavery in the New Territory.

The remarkable feature of this address was that he read to the assembled officers in each county, as part of the law apparently binding upon them, Article 6 of the Ordinance of 1787, which provided that there should be neither slavery nor involuntary servitude in the Northwestern Territory. [Footnote:  Blount MSS., Journal of Proceedings of William Blount, Esq., Governor in and over the Territory of the United States of America South of the River Ohio, in his executive department, October 23, 1790.] It had been expressly stipulated that this particular provision as regards slavery should not apply to the Southwestern Territory, and of course Blount’s omission to mention this fact did not in any way alter the case; but it is a singular thing that he should without comment have read, and his listeners without comment have heard, a recital that slavery was abolished in their territory.  It emphasizes the fact that at this time there was throughout the West no very strong feeling on the subject of slavery, and what feeling there was, was if anything hostile.  The adventurous backwoods farmers who composed the great mass of the population in Tennessee, as elsewhere among and west of the Alleghanies, were not a slave-owning people, in the sense that the planters of the seaboard were.  They were preeminently folk who did their work with their own hands.  Master and man chopped and ploughed and reaped and builded side by side, and even the leaders of the community, the militia generals, the legislators, and the judges,