Freeborn County, Minnesota - Chapter 21: Events Peeliminary to the Organization of the Minnesota Tekkitoey, 1882

ffUconsin State Boundaries - First Bill for the Organization of Minnesota Terri' tory, A, D, 1846 - Change of Wisconsin Boundary - Memorial of Saint Croix Valley citizens - Various names proposed for the New Territory - Convention at Stillwater - H. H. Sibley elected Delegate to Congress. - Derivation of word Minnesota.

Three years elapsed from the time that the territory of iliiiuesota was proposed in Congress, to the final passage of the organic act. On the sixth of August, 1846, an act was passed by Congress authorizing the citizens of Wisconsin Territory to frame a constitution and form a state government. Tlie act fixed tlie Saint Louis river to the rapids, from thence south to the Saint Croix, and thence down that river to its junction with the Mississippi, as the western boundary.

On the twenty -third of December, 1846, the delegate from Wisconsin, Morgan L. Martin, introduced a bill in Congress for the organization of a territory of Minnesota. This bill made its western boundary the Sioux and Red River of the North. On the third of ^March, 1847, permission was granted to Wisconsin to change her boundary, so that the western limit would proceed due south from the first rapids of the Saint Louis river, and fifteen miles east of the most easterly point of Lake Saint Croix, thence to the Mississippi.

A number in the constitutional convention of Wisconsin, were anxious that Rum river should be a part of her western boundary, while citizens of the valley of the Saint Croix were desirous that the Chippeway river should be the limit of Wisconsin. The citizens of Wisconsin Territory, in the valley of the Saint Croix, and about Fort Snelliug, wished to be included in the projected new territory, and on the twenty-eighth of March, 1848, a memorial signed by II. H. Sibley, Henry M. Rice, Franklin Steele, William R. Marshall, and others, was presented to Congress, remonstrating against the proposition before the convention to make Rum river a part of the boundary line of the contemplated state of Wisconsin.

On the twenty-ninth of May, 1848, the act to admit Wisconsin changed the boundary line to the present, and as first defined in the enabling act of 1846. After the bill of Mr. Martin was introduced into the House of Representatives in 1846 it was referred to the Committee on Territories, of which Mr. Douglas was chairman. On the twentieth of January, 1847, he reported in favor of the proposed territory with the name of Itasca. On the seventeenth of February, before the bill passed the House, a discussion arose in relation to the proposed name. Mr. Winthrop of Massachusetts proposed Chippewa as a substitute, alleging that this tribe was the principal in the proposed territory, which was not correct. Mr. J. Thompson of Mississippi disliked all Indian names, and hoped the territory would be called Jackson. Mr. Houston of Delaware thought that there ought to be one territory named after the " Father of his country," and proposed Washington. All of the names proposed were rejected, and the name in the original bill inserted. On the last day of the session, ilarch third, the bill was called up in the Senate and laid on the table.

When Wisconsin became a state the query arose whether tlie old territorial government did not continue in force w^est of the Saint Croix river. The first meeting on the subject of claiming teiTitoricil privileges was held In the building at Saint Paul, known as Jackson's store, near the corner of Bench and Jackson streets, on the bluff. Tills meeting was held in July, and a convention was proposed to consider their position. The first public meeting was held at Stillwater on August fourth, and Messrs. Steele and Sibley were the only persons present from the west side of the Mississii.pi. This meeting issued a call foi a general convention to take steps to secure an early territorial organization, to assemble on the twenty-sixth of the month at the same place. Sixty-two delegates answered tlie call, and among those ]ires(nt, were W. D. Pliillips, J. V,'. Bass, A. Lar[ientenr, J. M. Boal, and othere from Saint Paul. To the convention a letter was presented from Jlr. f'atlin, who claimed to be acting governor, giving his opinion that the Wisconsin territorial organization was still in force. The meeting also appointed Mr. Sibley to visit Washington and rei>resent their vaews; but the Hon. .lolm 11. Tweedy having resigned his ollice of delegate to Congress on September eighteenth, 1848, Mr. Catlin, who had made Stillwater a temi)or;iry residence, on the ninth of October issued a proclamation ordering a special election at Stillwater on the tliirtieth, to fill a vacancy occasioned by the resignation. At this election Henry II. Sibley was elected as delegate of the citizens of the remaming portion of Wisconsui Territory. His credentials were presented to the House of Representatives, and the committee to whom the matter was referred presented a majority and minority report ; but the resolution introduced by the majority passed and Mr. Sibley took his seat as a delegate from Wisconsin Territory on the lifteenth of January, 1849.

Mr. H. M. Kice, and other gentlemen, visited Washington during the winter, and, uniting with Mr. Sibley, used all their energies to obtain the organization of a new territory.

Mr. Sibley, in an interesting commimication to the Minnesota Historical Society, writes : " When my credentials as Delegate, were presented by Hon. James Wilson, of Xew Hampshire, to the

House of Representatives, there was some curiosity manifested among the memljers, to see what kind of a person liad been elected to represent the distant and wild territory claiming representation in Congress. I was told by a New England member with whom I became suljsequently quite intimate, tliat there was some disappointment when I made my appearance, for it was expected that the delegate from this remote region would make his debut, if not in full Indian costume, at least, with some peculiarities of dress an<l manners, cliaracteristic of the rude and semi-civilized people who had sent him to tlie Capitol.''

The territory of ilinnesota was named after the largest tributary of the Mississijipi within its limits. The Sioux call the ^Missouri Minneslioshay. muddy water, but the stream after which tiiis region is named, Minne-sota. Some say that Sota means clear; others, tui-bid; Schoolcraft, bluish green. Nicollet wrote. " The adjective Sotah is of dillicult translation. The Canadians translated it by a pretty eqiiivalent word, brouille, perhaps more properly rendered into English by .blear. I lune entered upon this explanation l)e cause the word really means neither clear nor turbid, as some authors have asserted, its true meaning being found in the Sioux ej.pression Ishtali-sotah, blear-eyed." From the fact that the word signilies neither blue nor white, but the peculiar appearance of the sky at certain times, by some, ^linnesota has been defined to mean the sky tinted water, which is certaiidy poetic, and the late Rev. Gideon H. Pond thought quite correct.