The Portland daily press., 1883-06-23
The Would-Be State.

The Southern part of Dakota, if correctly
voiced by the Huron Convention, wants 10
become State of the Union. The ambition
is laudable. Whether Congress should or
hould not crafty it is for that body to de-
eide. Dakota has more land than any State
In the Union except Texas, and there is
enough of it to make two, three or four
large States. The southern line of the terri
tory runs along the 43d parallel of latitude.
except in its easterly portion where it is de-
nected somewhat to the South so as to fol
low the course of the Nobrara and Nilsson
ern boundary, the same being the southerly
line OF the British possessions. The scheme
of the promoters of the convention at HUI
ron Is to divide the territory into two nearly
equal parts along the 10th parallel and erect
State out of the southern portion. So
much of the plan is not new, for it was a
part of the movement in Congress last win
ter for the admission of South Dakota,
which might possibly have been successful
II it had not been for the opposition made
oy one or two prominent Republicans for
the purpose of compelling payment of the
repudiated Yankton bonds.
The convention which has now undertake
en- the job of erecting State without the
Intervention of Congress has double diff
Guilty to deal with. In the first place, the
area over which 1t is proposed to establish
the new government has no separate poll IL
cal existence of any sort, and Congress j,
the only power that can make legal divi-
sion of the territory, and in the next place
the methodical way Of forming new State
is for Congress to pass an enabling act in
the first instance, authorizing the people of
the territory out of which it is proposed to
make State to come together in convention
and formally organize State government.
After that is done the State would, aceol d.
all recent presidents, be admitte
pretty much as matter of course.
An attempt is made to justify the present
proceeding by the fact that several States
have been admitted after the formation of q
State government without the usual prelim-
mary of Congressional enabling act, and
that two at least Tennessee and Michigan
set up a form of State government that
covered only a portion of the territory be-
ionSiiss o-s-----------.aatirely.
The precise method OF admitting nowz
: States is not regulated by the federal consti-
tuition, which sfrnpfy-rAAuides that new
States may be admitted by Congress- WIN
certain restrictions as to interference with
the jurisdiction of existing States. The
doctrine which now seems to prevail in
southern Dakota-that the inhabitants of any
geographical area within the limits of the
United States and outside of any State have
a right, when their number lie sufficiently
large and the territory which they represent
is of proper size, to organize State govern
ment and demand admission as matter of
right-wouli hardly be satisfactory if ap-
piled to Utah or New Mexico, each of which
fulfills the conditions and neitb---oI which
has the kind of penpis-tr1at would be wei
coined into the Union. There can hardly
be one rule for Dakota and another for the
rest of the territories.
NEW YORK World: If the Virginia gen.
tlemen who are carrying on their very an
Gent and honorable war against the ssssssiiuu-s
ger - in thezname of D.