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Ohio was home to some early abolitionists

The first 20 years of the American Republic  had been led by the Federalists, who were mostly from the northeastern states and against slavery. Those included Adams, Hamilton, St. Clair and others. Even though he held slaves, Washington often sided with the Federalists, but had declared himself an Independent, hoping to avoid some of the infighting with the Anti-Federalists, the party being formed by Thomas Jefferson, most of whom supported slavery.

In 1788, Congress appointed its former president, Arthur St. Clair, the federal governor of America’s expansion west of the Ohio extending to the Mississippi River. Known as the Northwest Territory, the area was two-thirds the size of the original 13 colonies. The territory eventually included the states of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin and part of  Minnesota.

Before Congress had passed a law stating that both the president and vice president should be of the same party, Jefferson, who received the second most votes, became Adams’ vice president. Totally opposed to the Federalist Adams, Jefferson spent his next four years ignoring Adams while building his Anti-Federalist Party, which helped Jefferson upset Adams in 1801, thus preventing Adams’ second term as president. As often chronicled, Jefferson’s muckraking campaign was so untruthful and nasty that the two men didn’t speak to each other for 25 years.

By 1801 St. Clair had already been locked in a four-year struggle with Vice President Jefferson’s Anti-Federalists in Ohio. With President Jefferson’s pro-slavery position providing support, slavery became a much larger issue in Ohio, so much so that St. Clair was concerned Ohio would become a “slave” state, thus setting the precedent for future states in the territory.

As president of Congress in 1787, St. Clair had played a role in drafting the Northwest Ordinance, America’s  first document with a provision that outlawed slavery. He was concerned that when Ohio became the 17th state, its legislature would vote to overturn the provision, thus breaking the 8-8 deadlock between the “free” and “slave” states.

St. Clair made several efforts to configure the state so that it would have greater Federalist support to ensure that Ohio would be “free.” Each time that he did this, the opposition party successfully lobbied Congress to decline his request.

Finally, just before Ohio became the 17th state, St. Clair made an impassioned speech against slavery to the Ohio Legislature in 1802. Jefferson fired St. Clair after 14 years of service in the federal governor’s post.

As St. Clair predicted, one of the Ohio Legislature’s first actions was an attempt to overturn the Northwest Ordinance’s provision against slavery. The proposal lost by one vote and Ohio became “free,” setting a precedent for the next five states in the territory to also become “free” states, thanks in no small part to St. Clair.

As federal governor St. Clair appointed the territorial judges and established Ohio’s first nine counties, the last of which was Belmont County, and St. Clairsville, the county seat. His first two Ohio counties were named after his friends, Washington and Hamilton, naming Marietta and Cincinnati the county seats, respectively. He also changed the name Losantville to Cincinnati in honor of the Society of Cincinnatus, which was created to benefit veterans of the Revolutionary  War.

St. Clair Avenue in downtown Cleveland was named for this great patriot, as was the city of St. Clairsville, along with counties, cities, roads, lakes and parks in Pennsylvania and 11 other Midwest states.

The untold stories about this great patriot and founding father can be found in Phillips’ book, “Arthur St. Clair, The Invisible Patriot.”

You can reach Phillips at phillphx@aol.com. His new book,“Arthur St. Clair, The Invisible Patriot,” is available online.

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