stopped, but were at last obliged to apply for assistance to the Legislature, in order to pay the interest due in January, 1841. As there was but little time left, until the interest was to be paid, the exigency of the case was such, that the Legislature resorted to the desperate expedient of making a new issue of bonds, to be hypothecated for whatever they would bring, which measure, had it been permanently adopted, would have involved the State in utter bankruptcy. As there were many, who objected to paying interest at all, and especially upon bonds, which had been sold for less than their full value, as expressed on their face, whilst others argued, that if the bonds had passed from the hands of the original into the hands of bona fide holders, who had purchased them at their full price, the State was bound to pay interest to the latter upon the amount of money, which each bond on its face purported to be issued for. Mr. Cavarly, with a view of making a decision on the disputed point unnecessary, introduced a bill empowering the fund commissioner to mortgage 300,000 dollars' worth of internal improvement bonds, making it incumbent upon him to apply the proceeds to the payment of all interest legally due on the debt, and leaving it for him to decide, which would be more legal, to pay interest upon the full amount of the value of the bonds, as shown on their face, or to pay no interest, except on the money, which these bonds had been sold for. Besides providing, that these interest bonds should be sold for their mere market value, the Legislature levied an additional tax of ten cents on every hundred dollars' worth of property to be pledged for the payment of the interest of these bonds, by which devices the difficulty, which the commissioners had experienced in paying the interest, was finally over

come.

In the year 1840, a large majority of the people were democrats, those formerly the so-called Jackson men; whilst their opponent political party, which, before the year 1834, had flourished under the name of “anti-Jackson," and to which many office-holders, and especially most of the Supreme Court Judges, belonged, now adopted the name of "Whigs," attempting to base the same, as did the "Whigs" of the Revolution, upon opposition to the executive power. Two important questions were submitted to the Supreme Court, the first of which was, whether Governor Carlin had a right, as he claimed to

have, of appointing a new Secretary of State to supersede the old one. The Supreme Court gave as their opinion, that the Governor had no such right, producing, by their decision, a general dissatisfaction throughout the country, since the democrats, who constituted a majority of the people, very plausibly contended, that the unpopular doctrine of life-officers had been sanctioned by it. The second question was, whether an alien had a right to vote. At that time, the alien vote was about 10,000 strong, full nine-tenths of which belonged to the democratic party. The constitution of the State provided, that all free white inhabitants over the age of twenty-one years, who had resided in the State for six months, were entitled to vote at general, as well as at special elections. The whigs pretended, that the word "inhabitants" did not apply to any but citizens, whilst hitherto aliens, who had been in the State for six months, as well as citizens, had been allowed to vote. This question having already been made the subject of much discussion throughout the State, two whigs undertook to settle it, by agreeing on a fictitious cause, which they brought before the Circuit Court, the judge of which, being himself a whig, of course decided, that the aliens had no right to vote. When this decision became known, the democrats, well aware, that its reversion would be of vital importance to their party, since it would secure them the further support of nearly 10,000 votes, forming the balance of power in the State, carried the case before the Supreme Court, continuing it until December, 1840, after the Presidential election. The defeat, which the democratic party throughout the United States had sustained in the Presidential campaign of 1840, by the election of Gen. Harrison, having added fresh fuel to the irritation of the democrats against the whigs, the former, whilst their case remained suspended, lost no time in introducing a measure, by which the Circuit Courts, created in 1835, were to be abolished, and five additional Judges of the Supreme Court were created, all of whom were required to hold Circuit Courts in place of the Circuit Judges, who had been dismissed from office, which arrangement would have given them a majority of two to one in the Supreme Court. Although the success of the measure was for a long time extremely doubtful, it finally passed in both houses of the Legislature. The result of this democratic victory was, that the appointment of the Secretary of State by the Governor was

confirmed, and the democratic party continued to enjoy the support of the alien vote; for nothing could be further from the intention of the new judges, than to concur in the opinion of their whig colleagues on a subject like this.

In July, 1841, payment of the interest on the public debt was stopped. Illinois, for the second time, drew upon herself the censure of the world; people abroad, who had formerly considered Illinois to be a country affording good chances to the industrious settler, no longer entertained the design of emigrating to it, whilst the people at home, could they have found purchasers of their property, would not have hesitated to leave the State, in order to escape the evils of high taxation.

The general distress of the State was rendered complete by the utter failure of the State Bank, which happened in February, 1842; the bank at Shawneetown, after holding out for four months longer, "following in the footsteps of its illustrious predecessor." The banks had first suspended specie payments in the spring of 1837. To save the internal improvement system, this suspension was then legalized, and continued to be made lawful until 1841. This legalized suspension of the banks met with violent opposition from the democrats, which was of itself sufficient to enlist the whigs in their favor, and proved of immense advantage to them, since the business men and capitalists of the State were principally whigs, which party, at the time of Gen. Jackson, in opposition to his policy, had claimed an undue influence in the body politic, whilst the democratic party, in support of Gen. Jackson's administration, had been opposed to the same. In the meantime, the State Bank having been made the depository of the State revenues, which the collectors were required to pay into it as into the public treasury, by the influence it thus acquired over the Legislature, the members of which had to look to the bank for their pay, succeeded in not only obtaining a further privilege of suspension, at the session of the Legislature in 1841, but also a privilege not previously granted, of issuing one, two, and three dollar notes, which must, no doubt, have caused severe disappointment to the democrats. The very triumph of the banks, however, accelerated their ruin, because the issue of these small notes, with which they flooded the country, by banishing from circulation the silver dollar,

which formed the specie basis of the country, rendered it impossible for them to increase, or even, perhaps, to keep their stock of specie. The continual refusal of the United States to take the money of the State and Shawneetown banks in payment for the public lands, except at a discount, which regularly advanced every year, and the boundless liberality, with which the banks distributed their paper money and advanced loans, to attach the members of the Legislature and administration to their interests, led to their inevitable downfall in 1842, which spread ruin throughout the country, and even some of the neighboring States: leaving the people of Illinois almost wholly without any other circulating medium, for the purpose of trade and commerce, than the "bank rags," printed by the "rag barons,” as the presidents of the banks were then called.

Before we go further in the exposition of the civil history of the State, the general character of the people, and the civil commotions and disturbances, which had taken place in earlier times, and which may serve as a proper introduction to the history of the famous Mormon riots, which broke out in 1840, convulsing the State, claim our attention.

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CHAPTER V.

THE State of Illinois extends about 150 miles from east to west, by 400 from north to south. Such a disproportion in the geographical figure of a State, is certain to create a separate northern and southern interest, even if the people of such a State were of a common stock, which, not being the case with the people of Iliinois, will sufficiently account for their frequent disinclination to agree upon the adoption of such a policy, and such measures of government, as would have best suited the interests of the State, and aided in relieving her from the calamities, under which she was then suffering. The settlers of the Southern portion of the State were chiefly people from the Slave States, those of the northern section principally New Yorkers and New Englanders. Many of the inhabitants of the neighboring Slave States, who were poor, and did not relish a residence in a slave country, where the very negroes were wont to stigmatize them as the poor white folks, had removed to Illinois, where the immigration of slaveholders was strictly forbidden. The greater part of them were an honest and hospitable people, indifferent to wealth, and fond of social enjoyment.

The settlers of the northern part of the State, on the other hand, were industrious Yankees from the Eastern States, enterprising farmers, manufacturers, or merchants, who, by their restless energy and activity, soon converted the howling wilderness into a region covered with farms, churches, and villages, so that their settlements, though founded at a later period than those of the southern part, were soon ahead of the latter in point of civilization; and their success will sufficiently explain the envy, or rather, the hatred, which the southern people conceived against the Yankee settlers. Never having seen any Yankees, except a few wretched, cheating, pilfering New England pedlars, who perambulated the country with their assortments of wooden clocks or tin-ware, the southerners were led to believe, that