Friday, October 23, 2015

THE DISARTICULATION OF WISCONSIN

The "Toledo War" was fought over a wedge of land ranging from five to eight miles wide on the border between Ohio and Michigan. Due to ambiguous and conflicting land descriptions, the governments of both Ohio and Michigan claimed ownership of the ground, which included the City of Toledo (pictured below). When the Territory of Michigan first applied for statehood in 1833, the State of Ohio was determined to hold the Michigan statehood hostage until Ohio got its way, and Ohio succeeded in delaying the resolution by Congress of the issue of the admission of the Wolverine State.

Tensions increased when governments from both Michigan and Ohio occupied the contested land, established separate local officials, and arrested citizens from the opposing entity who happened to be in the area. The dispute finally erupted into the exchange of gunfire in 1835. Fortunately, the only casualty during the conflict was a Michigan sheriff who suffered a non-fatal stabbing wound inflicted in a tavern by a drunkard from Ohio.

Finally, in 1837, Michigan gave up, accepted the Ohio version of the boundary line, and was admitted into the Union. As a consolation prize, Congress carved the Upper Peninsula out of the Territory of Wisconsin and gave it to Michigan. Michigan officials initially thought they had been royally shafted by the deal, but their rancor eventually dissipated upon the discovery of huge reserves of copper, iron, and timber in the UP.

As you will recall, Illinois, when it was admitted to the Union in 1818, stole a 41 mile-wide strip, including what is now Chicago, from the southern border of Wisconsin.

The bottom line is that the Cheeseheads really got screwed in the process in the making of their state.

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