at the
time were probably more nearly represented by Grayson, who wrote to
James Monroe, three weeks after the ordinance was passed: "The clause
respecting slavery was agreed to by the southern members for the purpose
of preventing tobacco and indigo from being made on the northwest side
of the Ohio, as well as for several other political reasons."

It is over one hundred and forty years since the Ordinance of 1787 was
adopted, during which period more than thirty territories of the United
States have been organized, and there has never been a time when one or
more territories were not under Congressional supervision, so that the
process of legislative control has been continuous. Changes have been
made from time to time in order to adapt the territorial government to
changed conditions, but for fifty years the Ordinance of 1787 actually
remained in operation, and even twenty years later it was specifically
referred to by statute. The principles of territorial government today
are identical with those of 1787, and those principles comprise the
largest measure of local self-government compatible with national
control, a gradual extension of self-government to the people of a
territory, and finally complete statehood and admission into the Union
on a footing of equality with the other States.

In 1825, when the military occupation of Oregon was suggested in
Congress, Senator Dickerson of New Jersey objected, saying, "We have not
adopted a system of colonization and it is to be hoped we never shall."
Yet that is just what America has always had. Not only were the first
settlers on the Atlantic coast colonists from Europe; but the men who
went to the frontier were also colonists from the Atlantic seaboard. And
the men who settled the States in the West were colonists from the older
communities. The Americans had so recently asserted their independence
that they regarded the name of colony as not merely indicating
dependence but as implying something of inferiority and even of
reproach. And when the American colonial system was being formulated in
1783-87 the word "Colony" was not used. The country under consideration
was the region west of the Alleghany Mountains and in particular the
territory north and west of the Ohio River and, being so referred to in
the documents, the word "Territory" became the term applied to all the
colonies.

The Northwest Territory increased so rapidly in population that in 1800
it was divided