USA > Kansas > Wyandotte County > History of Wyandotte County, Kansas, and its people, Vol. I > Part 21
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THE SOUTHERN BOUNDARY LINE OF KANSAS.
The thirty-seventh parallel, was declared the southern boundary, and was surveyed by Lieutenant-Colonel J. E. Johnston, First Cavalry, and finished September 10. 1857. The astronomical determinations were by J. H. Clark and H. Campbell ; the survey by J. E. Weyss. The southern boundary of the Osage Nation formed the northern boundary of the Cherokee Nation. by treaties with the United States of 1828 and 1833. A map of Kansas and Nebraska, indorsed Angust 5, 1854, by George W. Manypenny. commissioner of Indian affairs, shows the thirty- seventh parallel as the boundary line between the Osage and Cherokee reservations, and it is possible that in outlining the bounds of the new territory the line between these two tribes was adopted as least liable to aronse controversy.
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It is an interesting study to follow the organization and develop- ment of these plains. At the time of the creation of the territory there had been no surveying other than for Indian reservations. Instead of distinct lines being given in the creation of counties a stated territory was described as so many miles west, so many miles south, etc., the point of beginning being the main channel of the Kansas or Kaw river at the point where the main channel crosses the Missouri line.
WHEN COLORADO WAS A PART OF KANSAS.
The pro-slavery legislature of 1855 created thirty-five counties in what is now Kansas, and the county of Arapahoe in what is now Colorado. The aet said that when the surveys were completed the nearest township, section or subdividing line should be the boundary. The counties established by the first act extended only to the west line of Marshall, Riley and Geary. In a separate aet the counties of Marion and Washington were established. Marion was a narrow strip extend- ing from about the south line of the present Diekinson county to the south line of the state. Washington extended from about the middle of Sumner to the east line of Las Animas county, Colorado. Arapahoe county covered the Rocky Mountains region, and extended east to the one hundred and third meridian, or a few miles east of the west line of Kit Carson county, Colorado, or to the east line of New Mexico ex- tended northı. This left all the region west of Marshall county and north of the south line of the present Wallace and Logan counties under the vague description "all the territory west of Marshall and east of Arapahoe." The county lines were made regardless of routes of travel, and subsequently development made lots of trouble readjusting counties to suit ambitious eities. The channel of the Kansas river would not answer, so we had Wyandotte taken from Leavenworth and Johnson, Douglas and Shawnee pieced out from Jefferson and Jackson, and Riley had to be shifted greatly to suit Manhattan.
In 1859 the legislature established the counties of Montana, El- Paso, Oro, Broderick and Fremont out of the west end of Arapahoe, leaving this last named county on the great plains. The names Brode- rick and Fremont indicated that a different sentiment was in charge of affairs. Of the counties thus established bnt three remain in the state of Colorado-Fremont, El Paso and Arapahoe.
After the creation of the territory and prior to statehood, Kansas had four constitutional conventions. The Topeka convention of Octo- ber, 1855, the Lecompton convention of September. 1857, and the Leavenworth convention of March, 1858. each accepted the boundaries established in the organic act of May 30, 1854, extending the proposed state westward to the summit of the Rocky Mountains.
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THE WYANDOTTE CONVENTION CUT OFF COLORADO.
1
The Wyandotte convention, the fourth and last before the admis- sion of the state, fixed the present boundary of Kansas at 102 degrees west longitude from Greenwich, or, as stated in our constitution, the twenty-fifth meridian west from Washington. The west boundary runs three miles west of the twenty-fifth meridian, or 102 degrees, which is explained by the fact that after the adoption of the constitution the surveyors in running the eastern line of the Indian reservation in Colo- rado established the west line of Kansas, and made an error of three miles beyond the meridian named as our western boundary, so that it is really 102° 2' west from Greenwich.
William Hutchinson, chairman of the committee on preamble and bill of rights, reported, on July 15th, the present boundaries for Kansas as adopted by the committee. A prolonged discussion was closed the next afternoon by a vote in committee of the whole, plaeing the western boundary at the one hundredth meridian, a line about six miles west of Hill City, in Graham county. On July 28th, the day before the final adjournment, Caleb May, of Atchison, proposed to amend the clause by making the twenty-sixth meridian, or 103 degrees west longitude, the line, which would be a northern extension of the east line of New Mexico, or about the west line of Kit Carson county, Colorado. After some discussion May was prevailed upon to change his motion to the original recommendation of the committee, and our present western boundary was fixed by a unanimous vote. The discussion on this point during the sultry days of July 15 and 16, 1859, are interesting, and a few extracts are made to show in what estimation western Kansas was then held.
THE DEBATE ON THE WESTERN BOUNDARY.
William C. McDowell, of Leavenworth, who seems to have fathered the South Platte annexation, says: "I would inquire whether the boun- daries given here are the same as those in the organic act ?"
Mr. Hutchinson : "They are the same, except the western; after diligent inquiry it was ascertained that the one hundredth meridian west, (Hill City and Fort Dodge) would be in a country which is at present being settled; the one hundredth and first (at Atwood, Colby, Scott, Garden City and Liberal) will probably be settled, but at the one hundredth and second degree, or twenty-five degrees west from the boundary, it was believed was placed upon a natural sandy divide, where no part of the population would be ent off that wanted to be with us."
James Blood objected to an amendment making the twenty-fourth meridian west from Washington, corresponding to the one hundred and first west from Greenwich, the western boundary (the longitude of
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Colby, Scott and Garden City), saying: "I would prefer the twenty- fifth (our present boundary), and if gentlemen will make a caleulation they will find that it is not extending our state unreasonably in that direction-about 400 miles. The country out there will not be settled for a long time, and is not of much particular value. I think the pro- position is a fair one as submitted by the committee."
Solon O. Thacher understood "that a large portion of this western region from the twenty-third ( Hill City) or twenty-fourth (Colby and Garden City) is a miserable, uninhabited region. The only question is whether we shall inelnde within our boundaries a tract of country that is not valuable to us, and confer upon it the benefits of government at our expense. Those of us who have read Horace Greeley's letters from that region, and conversed with gentlemen who have been there, are of the opinion that that portion of the territory is not at all inviting."
TO CUT OFF THE "SHORT GRASS" COUNTRY.
Mr. IIutchinson remarked that "it is simply a question of fact as to how far west this section of country can be inhabited-how far there is timber, water and grass. It is evident that if we place it at the twenty- third (Hill City) or twenty-fourth meridian (three miles west of Colby), that we shall cut off a population that will be greatly diseom- moded at some future day to travel to meet settlements near the Rocky mountains. That should be the governing influence in giving the direction of our vote. We are expected a grant of land from congress. That will call for alternate sections, in all probably; so the further westward our boundary shall go the greater the number of acres of land we shall get. If it is uninhabited entirely it will never be worth a dollar : we have nothing to pay on it-we have neither to pay taxes on it nor build fences around it. There is no loss, and I think there is no gain."
Samuel D. Houston, of Riley county, who favored the summit of the Rocky mountains and also the Platte river, said: "There are argu- ments in favor of extending our boundary westward; and I should be recreant to my duty were I not to present these arguments. I have learned for the first time, and with astonishment, of a move by the people in defining their boundaries (in which) they were benevolent enough to give away one-half their territory. Were we to do it as individuals we would be charged with insanity. If we can get the boundary designated by congress in the Kansas-Nebraska bill, and get a road to the mountains, I ask if it is not a question of some magnitude whether Kansas shall not have the grand Pacific railroad of the eonn- try. You must go to the mountains and get pine with which to fence and build on your beautiful prairies; but if you give away your
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pineries and give those thoroughfares into the control of other people, how are you going to accomplish this? I believe what I propose is for the best interests of the whole territory of Kansas."
OBJECTED TO THE MINING REGIONS.
Mr. MeDowell objected to incorporating the mining regions, "their difference of pursuits presenting a people not homogeneous, whose wants will be different and very little in common with ours."
James G. Blunt proposed again the twenty-third meridian, the Hill City line, and said: "We would then embrace all of the desirable terri- tory upon this side of that large, sterile plain situated on our west, that would add neither wealth nor importance to our state, but over which to extend our laws and protection would be an onerous burden."
B. Wrigley, of Doniphan county, said: "You put the western boundary upon the twenty-third meridian (IIill City and Fort Dodge) and you have on the west an expanse of territory of equal width and of equal extent, barren, sterile and unfit for agricultural purposes."
A PATHWAY TO THE MOUNTAINS.
Mr. Houston : "Why gentlemen, we want a connection of this sort that we might get the highest possible price for our products. One would suppose from what gentlemen say of the country that it was a God-forsaken desert; that the lightnings of heaven had poured their streams of death upon it for centuries. But what are the facts? Al- most everyone that goes out there tells us that it is covered with im- mense herds of buffalo as far as the eye can reach, over a vast extent- north, south, east and west. I believe I have as much respect for the buffaloes' opinion as I have for the gentlemen's here in regard to that country. Who ever heard of wild animals seeking a home that is per- fectly barren ? Why, the grass must be extremely nutritious there. } believe that cotton ean be raised on these plains that will supply the demand of the whole country. When we get a railroad out there, can't you tax these herds ? When you run a railroad out there, let men make a business of herding. You know very little about that country. One gentleman remarked to me a short time since that he had written hundreds of letters to the east, telling them to come on here; that we wanted to make a pathway to the Rocky mountains over this very country we are now proposing to give away. I would keep it till we found out all about it. Who ever heard of a man cutting off part of his farm before he had examined it? Now, gentlemen, this territory may be too large for certain schemes of partisanship, but it is not too large to make a grand and a glorions state for the people, and for the interests of the people."
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PART OF NEBRASKA WANTED TO BE IN KANSAS.
There is an incident relating to the north boundary line of the state of Kansas scarcely known in her history, but in the history of the twin state of Nebraska it constitutes a very important chapter. On January 17, 1856, J. Sterling Morton introduced into the lower house of the territorial legislature of Nebraska a resolution memorializing con- gress to annex to Kansas all that portion of Nebraska sonth of the Platte river, because it would be "to the interests of this territory and to the general good of the entire Union." It was stated that the Platte river was a natural boundary mark-that it was impossible to either ford, ferry or bridge it; it was further thought that such a move would effectually prevent the establishment of slavery in either of the terri- tories. This was postponed by a vote of twenty to five. The project slumbered until 1858. There was great bitterness between north and south Nebraska at the time, and the annexation sentiment seemed to grow.
NEBRASKA'S MANY CAPITALS.
In those days Nebraska had other troubles than the unreliability of the Platte river. Kansas was torn in pieces by a great national issue, and our Republican-Populist war of 1893 had a precedent for ridicu- lousness in the controversy which divided the pioneers of Nebraska from 1855 to 1858. Florence, Omaha, Plattsmouth, Bellevue and Nebraska City were contestants for the territorial capital. The story reads like a southwest Kansas county-seat fight. The legislature was called at towns, who made threats that the session should not be held. In Jan-
Omaha, January 16, 1855. Omaha was full of people interested in rival mary, 1857, the antagonism to Omaha assumed an aggressive character. A bill passed both houses of the legislature, moving the session to a place called Douglas, in Lancaster county. This bill was vetoed by the governor. In 1858 a portion of the legislature seceded in a small riot but no bloodshed, and attempted to do business at a town called Florence. On September 21, 1858, the fifth session met in peace at Omaha, and be- gan to talk about bridging the Platte.
Restlessness was common then, for the Kansas territorial legislature was also hard to please. The Pro-Slavery people left Pawnee to sit in Shawnee Mission, and the Free Soilers would not remain at Lecompton, but in 1859. 1860 and 1861 moved to Lawrenee.
WOULD MAKE THE PLATTE THE BOUNDARY.
About the beginning of the year 1859 several mass meetings were held. and congress was memorialized to incorporate the South Platte country in the proposed state of Kansas. There was some dissent, of
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course, but the annexationists seem to have been quite lively. On the 2nd of May, a mass meeting was held at Nebraska City, which invited the people to participate in the formation of a constitution at Wyandotte July 5th, reciting "that the pestiferous Platte should be the northern boundary of a great agricultural and commercial state." They or- dained that an election should be held in the several South Platte conn- ties on June 7th. There are no results of the election given, but Morton's "History of Nebraska," (Vol. I, Page 401), says, that in the rounty of Otoe, of 1,078 ballots cast at a previous election, 900 electors signed a petition for annexation, and that this sentiment was repre- sentative of the whole South Platte district. Governor Medary's son and private seeretary, on the 16th of May, 1859, had written a letter to the Nebraska people, urging them to elect delegates to the Wyandotte convention, and to proceed quickly, "as it would only create an un- necessary issue in southern Kansas at the time, were it freely talked of."
NEBRASKA'S DELEGATES TO WYANDOTTE.
On the 12th day of July, 1859, the following Nebraska men were admitted to seats on the floor of the Wyandotte constitutional conven- tion then in session, as honorary members, with the privilege of partici- pating in the discussion of the northern boundary of the state of Kansas, but not to vote : Stephen F. Muckolls, Mills S. Reeves, Robert W. Furnas, Obadiah B. Hewett, Wm. W. Keeling, Samuel A. Chambers, Wm. H. Taylor, Stephen B. Miles, (George H. Nixon), John II. Croxton, John H. Cheever, John B. Bennet, Jacob Dawson and William P. Loan. In the archives of the State Historical Society we find the original application of the Nebraska people signed by Mills S. Reeves, John B. Bennet, William HI. Taylor, Samuel A. Chambers and Stephen B. Miles. On the 15th the Nebraska delegates were heard, and on the 16th, during the consideration of the west boundary line of the state of Kansas, William C. MeDowell, of Leavenworth, a Democratie member, moved the following amendment :
"Provided, however, that if the people of southern Nebraska, embraced he- tween Platte river and the northern boundary of Kansas as established by congress, agree to the same, a vote is to be taken by them, both upon the question of boun- dary and upon this constitution, at the time this constitution is submitted to the people of Kansas, and provided congress agree to the same the boundaries of the state of Kansas shall be as follows: 'Beginning at a point on the western boundary of the state of Missouri where the thirty-seventh parallel of north latitude crosses the same; thence west with said parallel to the twenty-fourth meridian of longitude west from Washington; thence north with said meridian to the middle of the south fork of the Platte river; thence following the main channel of said river to the middle of the Missouri river; thence with the middle of the Missouri river to the mouth of the Kansas river; thence south on the western boundary line of the state of Missouri to the place of beginning.' "
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THE DEFEAT OF THE PLAN.
After a short parliamentary wrangle about separating the north and west lines, Mr. McDowell withdrew the amendment, and the conven- tion voted that the northern boundary remain unchanged.
The Nebraska City News, the organ of the South Platte sentiment, was furious over the result. We quote: "The curious may wish to know why this rich boon was refused by the Black Republican constitu- tional convention of Kansas. It was for this reason: Its acquisition, it was believed by those worthies, would operate against their party. They said Sonth Platte, Nebraska, was Democratic, and that, being added to northern Kansas, which is largely Democratic, would make Kansas a Democratic state: would deprive the Black Republican party of two United States senators, a congressman and other offices. They were dragooned into this position, too, by the Republican party outside of Kansas. Kansas, they are determined at all hazards, shall be an abolition state."
It was a great deal, amid the sentiment and passion of that hour, to ask the Free Soilers in the Wyandotte convention, following the strng- gles of the border as far sonth as Fort Scott from 1855 to 1860, to go back on the people south of the Kaw for an unknown quantity in south- ern Nebraska. The delegates from Nebraska offered great things in a material way, but politics cropped out everywhere, principally from ont- side of Kansas. There was no polities then but the slavery issue. Solon O. Thacher said: "Chief among their arguments was one meeting an objection which they supposed would be raised in consequence of the political character of the country proposed to be annexed ; and we have been invoked by all the powers of logic and rhetoric to ignore the politi- val aspect of this case-to lay aside whatever feelings might arise poli- tically, and look at the question dispassionately. Now, sir. I say they urge an impossibility. lad these gentlemen from southern Nebraska seen the sky lurid with the flames of their burning homes, the soil of these beantiful prairies crimson with the blood of their brothers and fathers, or their wives and children flying over the land for a place of refuge from crime and outrage, they would not think of making such an appeal to us. Gentlemen must remember that this is the first time in the history of Kansas that southern Kansas has been represented in any deliberate body. Think you, sir, that the people who have just escaped from a prison-honse that has kept them so long can desire to reenter the clammy dungeon ?"
KANSAS PAPERS INDIFFERENT.
"I have carefully looked through the files of several of the Kansas newspapers of that period, and I find a singular indifference to the ques-
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tion of annexation," says Secretary Martin, of the Kansas Historical Society. The Topeka Tribunc and the Leavenworth Herald very freely supported it. The Lawrence Republican, T. Dwight Thacher's paper, was strongly opposed to it. There was little else considered then aside from slavery. The Lecompton Democrat favored the dismemberment of both Kansas and Nebraska and the formation of a new state lying be- tween Kansas and the Platte rivers. The Republican of July 21, 1859, said this scheme was hatched in Washington and nursed in the Blue Lodges of Missouri. Annexation would make southern Kansas a mere appendage to the northern part of the state and completely at its mercy. The editor of the Republican made a visit to southeastern Kansas, and in his issue of July 14th reported unanimous opposition to the movement; that the people there neither cared to be annexed nor knew the politics of the Nebraska men. A portion of the Nebraska movement was to make another state south of Kansas river to be called Neosho. In a
speech before the convention, on July 22nd, Solon O. Thaeher said that three-fifths of the population of Kansas was south of the Kansas river. The Platte gave no river frontage, and would need an appropriation every year to make it navigable by catfish and pollywogs, and a move- ment would give Kansas three additional Missouri river counties north of the Kansas river, which would not be desirable. A singular feature is that the Free Soil legislature of 1859 petitioned for annexation, while Free Soilers in the constitution bitterly opposed it. The Lawrence Republican is the only paper that handled the subject with vigor, as is evident from the following quotation, taken from its issue of June 16, 1859: "The proposed measure, if accomplished, would destroy the community of interests which now exists between the various portions of Kansas. Our people are bound together as the people of no other new state ever were. Together they have gone through one of the dark- est and bloodiest struggles for freedom that any people ever encount- ered ; together they have achieved the most significant and far-reaching victory since the Revolution; together they have suffered-together triumphed ! At this late day, after the battle has been fought and won, and we are about to enter upon the enjoyment of the fruits of our peri- lous labors. we do not care to have introduced into our household a set of strangers who have had no community of interests with us in the past, who have hardly granted us the poor boon of their sympathy, and who even now speak of the thrice-honored and loved name of Kansas as a 'name which is but the synonym of crime and blood !' (extract from a Nebraska City paper.)"
On the 23rd of July, MeDowell renewed the subject in the Wvan- dotte convention by the following resolution : "Resolved, that eongress be memorialized to include within the limits of the state of Kansas that part of southern Nebraska lying between the northern boundary of the territory of Kansas and the Platte river." This was defeated, on the Vol. I-12
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same day, by a vote of nineteen for and twenty-nine against. The Democrats refused to sign the constitution, and of those who did sign, four-S. D. Honston, J. A. Middleton, L. R. Palmer and R. J. Porter-voted to annex the South Platte country.
A MISSOURI OPINION OF KANSAS.
Senator Green, of Missouri, in opposing the admission of Kansas under the Wyandotte constitution, said that not over three-eighths of Kansas could be cultivated; that "without this addition (South Ne- braska) Kansas must be weak, puerile, sickly, in debt. and at no time capable of sustaining herself." In the United States senate on Janu- ary 18, 1861. he moved to strike out the proposed boundaries of Kansas and insert the following: "Beginning in the main channel of the North fork of the Platte river, at a point where the twenty-fifth meridian of longitude west from Washington crosses the same; thence down and along said channel to its junction with the main stream of the Platte. thenee down and along the main channel of the Platte to the Missouri river ; thence south along said river and the western boundary of the state of Missouri to the northern boundary of the Cherokee neutral land : thence west along said northern boundary, the northern boundary of the Osage lands and the prolongation of the same, to the twenty-fifth meridian of longitude west from Washington: thence north on said meridian to the place of beginning."
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