The Northwest Ordinance

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I thought I would have remembered this. Something I had written down about ten years ago in one of my “trivia” notebooks that I came across recently. Most of you know that I have been collecting trivia for many years now. All these notebooks were in my “home office” stashed away on a shelf. When I retired from my jewelry sales business, a couple years ago, I began to clean out this room. I’m sitting here at my computer and looking around the room and wondering if I will ever get everything out of here. Mostly, because I keep getting side-tracked with the many things that I am finding. This room was used for everything, because I don’t have an attic or a basement. So, I took the biggest bedroom upstairs and turned it into a “home office.” But, I also used the room for storage, putting in some shelves for storing photo albums, trivia notebooks, books, in general, and every other thing that I didn’t want in the other rooms. I’ve explained this before, I know, but I just came across some new notebooks and took a break to look through a few of them to see what I might be able to share here on myLot. What I found interesting was several things that I could share on myLot. For instance, this bit of information on some American history. If you live in Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan or Wisconsin, you might be interested in reading this. Of course, you might already know all about it. Since I wrote it down in my own handwriting, I obviously have read it before, but I didn’t remember it. SO, here’s what I wrote: “The Northwest Ordinance was passed on July 13, 1787. This ordinance established the Northwest Territory in the region north of the Ohio River and east of the Mississippi and mapped out the instructions for dividing this vast area into smaller territories that would eventually join the Union as new states. This area today is known as the MID-west. The states that were formed were as follows. Ohio (1803) Indiana (1816) Illinois (1818) Michigan (1837) and Wisconsin (1848). " What I also wrote down was how these territories would be governed, which was the most interesting part. Once the territory had a minimum of “5000 free adult male residents,” a legislature would be established and a non-voting representative could be sent to Congress. A territory could apply for admission into the Union only AFTER it reached 60,000 inhabitants. The ordinance also guaranteed civil rights, freedom of religion, and trial by jury. It also forbade slavery. While it also PROMISED fair treatment to Native Americans, conflict continued in the area. This is probably WHY I wrote this down. Because I have always been interested in the Native American population in this country and have been greatly saddened by how they have been treated. Did you know anything about this ORDINANCE? Do you live in any of these states mentioned here?