The Prince George's enquirer and southern Maryland advertiser. (Upper Marlborough, Md.) 1882-1925, 1906-07-13
THE RISE OF A CAPITOL.
BY L. X. BECK Err.

The Sangamon River of Illinois
flows threw the heart of garden as
rich and fertile as the one which the
Euphrates watered in the far distant
days of Adam and Eve.
The county of Sangamon was form
ed out of vast, verdant solitude of
$50 square miles.
Three commissioners were chosen
to set in motion county organization
of government, and they met, without
delay, at the cabin of John Kelly on
Spring Creek, a tributary of the San
canon.
Kelly had wandered into the State
in 1918 and had built himself cabin
on the edge of green -bordered
stream which he had named Spring
Greek.
The Sangamon officials sent forth
their report regarding the establish
ment of temporary county-seat of
justice and agreed that 'it should be
called by the name of Springfield"
A contract was made at once for
courthouse of rough logs to contain
one room ample for court, and with
plenty of space for the Office of county
officials, who were already named.
The courthouse was completed lin
twenty -four days and paid for in the
sum of forty-two dollars and fifty
cents.
AS it was evident that a constable
could not exercise his functions with
out provision for the safe-keeplng of
offenders, jail, to cost eighty-ive
dollars, was next projected to furnish
proper support to the court house by
holding in check population not yet
arrived, but hourly expected.
These expectations were not so ab-
surd as they seem, and within two
years the county commissioners de-
cided upon making the temporary
county. seat permanent.
Courts in the log quarters were
rude, but justice was administered
with generally even hand and the
early lawyers, Edwards, Kane, Thorn.
as, and others, were men whose learn
ing and ability were hardly surpassed
in later and more pretentious courts.
There was an indescribable quality
about these early administrations of
law and equity that somehow make
them of untold interest today.
Abraham Lincoln appeared in the
Sangamon county about 1881, and the
broad footprints he left during his So
journ of thirty years may easily be
followed.
For six years he was, by turns,
clerk in country store, merchant
soldier, postmaster, student, orator,
and last fullfedged lawyer. Bit by
bit, as the artist designs a choice
mosaic, this man was developing a
character whose bold outlines were to
stand out, an illuminating beacon to
all mankind.
In 1887 Lincoln became a citizen
of Springfield and began the practice
of law.
He was elected the same year to
represent Sangamon county in the
legislature, and was also at the head,
of a project to remove the capital
from Vandalia to Springfield.
AS every other town in the State
was desirousof the same distinction
the scheme seemed doubtful of realiza-
ton, nevertheless it was accomplish
ed.
While the delegates in convention
assembled We're here and there dis
cussing merits among themselves,
Lincoln gained the floor and called for
vote of those in favor of the removal
of the capital from Vandalia. There
was but one dissenting vote-Vanda-
lia's. Then, without delay, or discus
sion, he called for the vote of those de-
sirlng to remove the capital to Spring
field.
He was answered by such majori-
ty as gave the legislature the prompt
duty of passing a bill for the removal,
and thus Springfield carried off the
prize, as some rustic beauty has been
known to do in a social contest where
dozen bellies were concerned.
The pleasant hunting-ground of
John Kelly became in those sixteen
years a capital destined to be the
guardian of those sacred treasures of
our nation. the haunts, the home, and
the tomb of the illustrious Lincoln
The Four Track NeUs.
"They are in reduced circumstances