Ninian Edwards - Territorial Governorship

Territorial Governorship

The Illinois Territory was created in 1809. It included all of what today is the state of Wisconsin, as well as parts of Minnesota and Michigan. Its population was almost entirely concentrated in the south, in the region later known as Egypt. President James Madison first appointed Kentucky politician John Boyle as its governor. Boyle collected his salary for the position for 21 days but then resigned to take Edwards' job as Kentucky Chief Justice, while friends in Washington helped secure Edwards' appointment as territorial governor. In the meantime, Territorial Secretary Nathaniel Pope, a cousin of Edwards, had to assume the powers of acting governor, creating Illinois' first counties and appointing officials to form the new government. Only 34 years old at the time of his appointment, Ninian Edwards is the youngest man ever to govern Illinois as either a state or a territory.

Edwards settled in the American Bottom on land he received as a grant upon his appointment as governor. He named his new farm Elvirade, after his wife. Along with his family, Edwards brought a number of slaves, whom he did not free even though the Northwest Ordinance of 1787 had made slavery illegal in the territory. An 1803 "Law Concerning Servants" had been promulgated for the Indiana Territory by then-Governor William Henry Harrison that maintained the status of people brought into the territory "under contract to serve another in any trade or occupation". The law, which remained in force in the Illinois territory, permitted slavery to persist for decades under the guise of indentured servitude. Most of Illinois' early governors were slaveowners, and Edwards was no exception. Later, he may have made extra income by renting some of his "indentured servants" out for labor in Missouri.

The new territorial governor was sworn in on June 11, 1809. At first Edwards tried to avoid partisanship but soon found that faction was an inevitable result of his power to appoint officials and distribute government jobs. Although the First Party System continued to define national politics, the Federalist and Republican Parties never took hold in frontier Illinois. Rather, factional loyalties were created by personality, personal bonds such as kinship and militia service, and especially the distribution of patronage. In the early territorial years, two rival factions grew up around Edwards and Judge Jesse B. Thomas. These two factions formed Illinois' political landscape during its time as a territory and for its first several years of statehood.