Thus we see the State is still the guardian of the fundamental civil rights of the citizen, as well as the determiner in the largest extent of the citizen's political privileges. In the American system the State is an ancient and honorable body politic, and its legitimate rights and privileges will continue to be jealously and carefully guarded by all parties in the State. CHAPTER VIII THE TERRITORIES AND THEIR GOVERNMENT HE Territories of the United States may be grouped as follows: THE The Organized Territories have a form of government provided for them by Congress. Congress has extended to them the provisions and guarantees of the Constitution. Therefore the fundamental law for their government may be said to consist of (a) the United States Constitution and (b) the Organizing Act of Congress. The act of Congress by which a Territory is organized bears to the people of a Territory the relation that a State constitution bears to the people of a State. This fundamental law, however, was not ordained or adopted by the inhabitants of a Territory, nor is it within their control. It was created The Organiz- 1 Guam, three Samoan Islands, and the Danish West Indies are other island possessions. The treaty for the Danish islands is still pending in Denmark. by Congress, and it may be amended or repealed by Congress. Its importance consists in that it defines the limits of the Territory and prescribes the forms, rules, and principles for the conduct of its government. It therefore partakes of the nature of a constitution. The famous Ordinance of 1787 was the forerunner of all these organizing acts. That Ordinance was a great The Ordinance and worthy constitution for the Territories for of 1787. which it was made, and to originate its provisions required legal ability and constitutional statesmanship of a high order. This great Organizing Act became famous for several reasons: 1. It gave a form of government to the Northwest Territory that became a precedent for time to come. 2. It guaranteed to the Territory free soil. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except in punishment of crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall ever exist in said territory." 3. It guaranteed free religion. "No person demeaning himself in an orderly manner shall ever be disturbed or molested on account of his mode of worship or religious belief." 4. It guaranteed free schools. "Religion, morality, and knowledge being essential to good government and the happiness of mankind, schools and the means of education shall be forever encouraged." 5. It guaranteed civil liberty. The rights guaranteed in the Virginia Constitutional Bill of Rights of 1776 and in the Massachusetts Constitution of 1780, coming from the old "English Bill of Rights" of 1688, were incorporated in this great Territorial Act. Free speech, a free press, free assembly, free petition, free trial by a jury of his peers, the habeas corpus, -to all these common rights of the freemen every inhabitant of the Northwest Territory was to be guaranteed. These wise and beneficent provisions of the Ordinance of 1787 have been, in the main, transplanted to our new Territories as these have been from time to time organized for civil government by the Congress of the United States. While these great guarantees were not secured in law by the Ordinance of 1787 except as they were afterwards incorporated in the constitutions and laws of the States subsequently erected in this territory, the Ordinance did much to determine the character of the people who settled in the Northwest, and was an effectual influence in committing those States to freedom and free institutions. The later organizing acts have, as a rule, attracted very little attention in our history, though they are of the utmost importance both from the point of view of their subject-matter and from the interests of the people for whom they provided their first and original civil government. In organizing the Territories, Congress has always had in view the admission of the Territories as States of the Union. This was the original purpose in the The Territory Looks Forward first acquisition of territory, even before the to Statehood. adoption of the Constitution. In the Treaty of 1782, by which our independence was recognized, in addition to the original thirteen States the territory west of the Alleghany Mountains, east of the Mississippi, south of the Great Lakes, and north of the thirty-first degree of north latitude, was recognized as belonging to the Confederated States. But this territory belonged to certain States, not to the United States. Maryland refused to ratify the old Articles of Confederation until guarantees were given that this territory would be ceded to the General Government. In the famous Resolution of 1780, by which the old Continental Congress sought to induce the claimant States (Massachusetts, Virginia, New York, Connecticut), to cede to the General Government the territory which they claimed in the West, Congress said: "The lands which may be ceded to the United States by any particular State shall be disposed of for the common benefit of the United States and be settled and formed into distinct republican States, which shall become members of the Federal Union and have the same rights of sovereignty, freedom, and independence as the other States." In all the territory since acquired by treaty, save that of Alaska and the islands lately acquired from Spain, it was agreed that the territory so acquired should be incorporated into the Union as soon as possible, and that in the meantime the civil rights of the inhabitants should be guaranteed. This was the case with Louisiana in 1803, with Florida in 1819, and with the Mexican cessions in 1848, and the Alaskan Treaty guaranteed the rights of citizenship to the inhabitants of the transferred territory. The Government of an organized Territory Territorial has usually provided for three departments': Government. 1. Executive; 2. Legislative; 3. Judicial. I. The executive consists of a Governor and other officers appointed for four years by the President of the United States, confirmed by the Senate. The The Executive. Governor performs the ordinary executive duties, to see that the laws of the United States and of the Territory are faithfully executed. He generally has a veto on legislative acts, which may be overridden by a two-thirds vote of each House. The other executive officers of the Territory, the Secretary, Treasurer, Auditor, and Superintendent of Public 1 This description applies to the customary governments in the organized Territories in the western part of the United States. The Governments for Porto Rico and the Philippines are separately described. See pp. 374, 376. |