Indiana Politics Resource

Prior to becoming the nineteenth state on December 11, 1816, Indiana was part of the Northwest Territory.  The Northwest Ordinance, which created the Northwest Territory, was passed by United States Congress in 1787 and enacted the same year.  The Northwest Ordinance specified how parts of the Territory could become states.  It also said that no one who lived in the Territory could own slaves.  Arthur St. Clair was the governor of the Northwest Territory from 1787 until 1800.  In 1800, as Ohio was being admitted into the Union, the Northwest Territory was divided into two separate areas.  What would one day become Indiana was part of the Indiana Territory, which included Indiana, as well as what would become western Michigan, Illinois, Wisconsin, and the eastern part of Minnesota.  The area was home to about six thousand settlers, as well as about twelve thousand Native Americans. 

In 1805 the Michigan Territory was created from the northern part of the Indiana Territory.  Again in 1809, the Indiana Territory was divided creating the Illinois Territory, and leaving Indiana with what are still its boundaries. 

Although the Northwest Ordinance prohibited slavery, slavery was permitted in the Indiana Territory until 1810 when the state legislature outlawed slavery and ended the requirement that said that only land owners were eligible to vote (although still only adult white men were allowed to vote).  In 1805, Vincennes became the capital of the Indiana Territory.  In 1813 the capital was moved to Corydon, which would remain the capital until 1825, over eight years after Indiana was admitted into the Union.   William Henry Harrison was the first governor of the Indiana Territory, serving as governor until 1812, when he resigned his position to fight in the War of 1812.

While more and more settlers were moving into the Northwest Territory, the Native Americans who lived in the area were claiming that the land was theirs.  In 1793 President George Washington sent General “Mad Anthony” Wayne to the Northwest Territory to deal with the problems that were occurring with the Native Americans.  Wayne’s army set up Fort Wayne after defeating the Native Americans in the Battle of Fallen Timbers.  The Battle of Fallen Timbers resulted in the signing of the Treaty of Greenville, which allowed Americans to settle peacefully in the areas that would one day become Ohio and southeastern Indiana, while guaranteeing the Native Americans millions of acres of land in the northwestern part of the United States. 

While serving as governor of the Indiana Territory, William Henry Harrison was also the Superintendent for Indian Affairs in the American Northwest.  Harrison was largely responsible for getting the Native Americans to give up millions of acres of their land to the Americans, mainly by promising them large amounts of money that they rarely saw.  In 1809, the Treaty of Fort Wayne was signed, which gave three million acres of land to the Indiana Territory.  After the Treaty of Fort Wayne was signed, the leader of the Shawnee, Tecumseh, told Harrison that the land belonged to many different Native American tribes, not just the small group who had agreed to sell the land.  Tecumseh promised that the Native Americans would fight for their land if more was taken from them.  In 1811, Harrison decided to attack Prophetstown, the town where Tecumseh and his brother, The Prophet, lived.  The battle, known as the Battle of Tippecanoe, resulted in many Native Americans leaving the area with Tecumseh, but it was not a victory for either side. 

In 1811, Jonathan Jennings, a member of Congress from the Indiana Territory, petitioned the United States government to allow Indiana to become a state.  The matter was delayed until after the War of 1812, when a census reported that 63,000 adults lived in Indiana, well over the number required for statehood.  Congress passed an enabling act in 1816, which set up the boundaries of the state.  It was at this time that the capital was moved from Vincennes to Corydon, a more central location for the new territory.  A state constitution also had to be written at this time.  Forty-three delegates met in Corydon to draft the Indiana Constitution in 1816.  The Indiana state government was set up very much like the federal government, with three branches, executive (the governor), legislative (the General Assembly), and judicial (the Indiana Supreme Court).  The first elections in Indiana were held in 1816, at which time Jonathan Jennings was elected as the first governor of Indiana.  While many of the early settlers in Indiana lived in the southern part of the state, people quickly began buying land in the northern part of the state.  Corydon was no longer an ideal location for the capital, so it was moved to the center of the state and name Indianapolis in 1821; the government moved to the new capital in 1825. 

In the early 1800s, many settlers were moving into the area, including a group led by George Rapp who wanted to start a utopian society.  In 1825, Rapp and his followers moved out of Indiana and sold the land to Robert Owen, who renamed the town New Harmony.  Owen wanted to make New Harmony a center for learning and a model community.  While New Harmony never did achieve what Owen had hoped for, many of the ideas that the people in New Harmony created still exist today, including kindergarten, public libraries, trade schools, and women’s clubs. 

Transportation in Indiana was still difficult during this time, with only a few roads leading to and from Indianapolis.  The federal government had funded a project which would build a road from the east into the new states in the west; this National Road reached Indiana in 1829.  The National Road, which was built to be used year round, went through Richmond, Indianapolis, and Terre Haute.  Indiana was now connected to the east and eventually, as the National Road continued on to Saint Louis, Missouri, to the west as well.  Another attempt to expand transportation in Indiana was the building of the Wabash and Erie Canal.  Many states were building canals around this time, and New York had completed their Erie Canal in 1825.  The Erie Canal was a very successful canal and made a lot of money for the state of New York.  Unfortunately, it was one of the very few canals that was profitable.  Indiana felt that a canal would allow farmers to get their crops to market faster.  The canal was begun in 1827.  Construction moved slowly.  The section of the canal from Fort Wayne to Huntington opened on July 4, 1835, after almost three years of construction.  Financially, the Wabash and Erie Canal was a failure, costing Indiana and investors millions of dollars.  The state of Indiana was almost bankrupted by the failure of the Wabash and Erie Canal, leading the General Assembly to draft a new state constitution that prohibited state debt except for certain emergencies.  It also made elections more frequent, increased the number of elected offices, and prohibited further Negro immigration into the state. 

By the middle of the 19^th century there were increasing tensions, particularly between the North and South.  Indiana’s stand on these issues can be summed up by an inscription placed in the Washington Monument “Indiana knows no North, no South, nothing but the Union.”  Hoosiers believed that preserving the Union was a necessity, both politically and economically.  At this time, less than 1% of Indiana’s population was black.  While slavery was prohibited in Indiana by this time, and there were not many strong feelings of pro- or anti-slavery movements in Indiana, there was an anti-black attitude.  There were many “Black Laws” in Indiana.  Blacks weren’t allowed to vote.  They weren’t allowed to testify in court in cases in which a white man was involved.  They were not allowed to attend public schools, even if they paid their own tuition.  In the 1851 State Constitution blacks were prohibited from settling in the state.  These types of laws were common in the South and in many Northern states, including Ohio (until 1849) and Illinois.  There was also a small anti-slavery movement in Indiana, mostly from religious organizations, such as the Quakers, which sought to improve the condition of blacks in the state.

In 1860, Republican Oliver P. Morton became governor of Indiana after governor-elect Henry S. Lane was elected to the Senate.  Morton felt that war was inevitable and was preparing the state of Indiana for it.  With the attack on Fort Sumter and Lincoln’s call for volunteers, Morton himself issued a call for volunteers from Indiana.  Indiana’s quota was just over 4,600 men, but within a week 12,000 men from Indiana had volunteered, more than the federal government was ready to handle.  Altogether Indiana sent about 250,000 men as volunteers, about 15% of Indiana’s population in 1860.  Of those 250,000 almost 25,000 were killed during the Civil War and thousands of others were maimed. 

While support for the Union was strong in Indiana, Democrats in particular were still opposed to the North attacking the South.  The Democrats reluctantly supported the war, mainly out of a concern that they would be attacked by the South.  They also did not want the war to be a crusade to subjugate the South or to abolish slavery.  At the beginning of the war, Governor Morton attempted to unite the Democrats and Republicans, giving many military appointments to Democrats.  In the election of 1862, the Democrats took control of the General Assembly and began to refuse to give Governor Morton the money and supplies he was demanding.  The Democrats and Republicans in the General Assembly were constantly fighting, with the Democrats refusing to give Morton the funds he needed and the Republicans bolting from the session, refusing to return to vote on legislation when it looked as though a Democratic militia bill might pass.  Governor Morton, in an attempt to get the funds he needed, turned to James Lanier, a former resident of Indiana, and borrowed money for what he needed.  On two occasions he borrowed over $1 million from James Lanier without the approval of the Indiana legislature.  The Democrats called Morton a dictator, but were unable to stop him.

The years after the Civil War ended were the Reconstruction Years.   There were many divisions during this period, including how to deal with the large population of newly freed blacks.  One group, who became known as the Radical Republicans, were in favor of giving blacks the vote immediately and punishing the administrators of the former Confederate Government.  Some in that group from Indiana included George W. Julian and Speaker of the House of Representatives Schuyler Colfax, who later went on to become Vice President under Ulysses S. Grant.  On the Conservative side were Daniel Voorhees and Senator Thomas H. Hendricks who favored a more gradual change in the South and less radical measures.  The “radicals” held the majority of the legislature and most of their policies went into effect; however, they still had much opposition, including passage of the 15^th Amendment to the Constitution that gave blacks the right to vote.  Twice during the process of passing the Amendment Democratic members of the Indiana General Assembly resigned in protest.  The second time the remaining members went ahead and passed the Amendment without the Democrats, who later regained control of the General Assembly and tried and failed to have the passage recalled.  However, passage of the 15^th Amendment didn’t immediately change the Indiana Constitution, or the situation for blacks in Indiana.  Blacks were still unable to vote in Indiana, and were prohibited from entering the state. 

Lincoln, who lived in Indiana for 14 years, was a Republican who favored a more humane and just treatment of the defeated South.  He had begun to institute some policies and was assassinated before they could be carried out.  Andrew Johnson attempted to follow Lincoln’s policies, but all his vetoes were overridden by the Radical Republicans who controlled the Congress for the 12 years following the Civil War. 

At the beginning of the 20^th century, Indiana was emerging from an agricultural state to a leading industrial manufacturing state.  Much of this was brought about by the discovery of natural gas in Indiana in 1886.  Glass, tinplate, and strawboard companies came to Indiana during this time.  Most of the largest industrial cities were in the northern-most part of the state, including Hammond, Gary, and South Bend; however Indianapolis and Fort Wayne were also leading industrial cities. 

Also during this time the automobile industry developed in Indiana.  The Dusenberg, which was built for the very wealthy, was manufactured in Indianapolis.  Many people believe that these were the finest cars ever built; but the Depression put them out of business.  Also at this time in Mishawaka, Indiana George Milburn was building cars run entirely on electricity.  It was in 1909 that the Indianapolis Motor Speedway was built, with the first race run in 1911.  Automobiles weren’t the only form of transportation that was being developed in Indiana during this time period.  Charles Henry from Lafayette, Indiana built the interurban.  It was an electric railway that ran between Lafayette and Indianapolis, and by 1920 the interurban lines ran all over the state, except for some small areas in the southwest, connecting all the major cities.  Unfortunately, the rise in popularity of the automobile marked the end for the interurban. 

Elwood Haynes, an inventor from Indiana, was doing much of his work, including the discovery of stainless steel and Stellite.  Stellite was used in the machine tool industry, and the use of the metal reduced the cost of manufacturing, as well as speeding up the process.  Haynes is also well known as an automotive pioneer; he manufactured Haynes automobiles for thirty years.

Indiana’s population was pretty evenly split between Democrats and Republicans in the last part of the 19^th century and early part of the 20^th century.  Because of this – and the fact that until the 1880s Indiana held its elections in October instead of November – both of the political parties tried to attract Indiana voters.  From 1868 until 1916 there were only three times that someone from Indiana wasn’t on a major party ticket.  One of those years, 1900, Eugene V. Debs of Indiana ran for President on the Socialist Party ticket. 

By 1920, for the first time in its history, 50% of Hoosiers resided in urban areas.   Also by this time the U.S. had entered into World War I.  Leading up to the War, most Hoosiers were opposed to U.S. involvement, particularly on the side of Great Britain.  There was a large population of German-Americans in Indiana at the time who were pro-German and a fairly large population of Irish-Americans who were anti-British.  However, by the time the U.S. entered the war Indiana was very supportive of Great Britain.   Indiana sent 118,000 troops to fight in WWI; 3,354 of whom died. 

Although Indiana was developing a large manufacturing base it was still largely an agricultural state and was hit hard by the Depression.  After the stock market crash in 1929 farm prices began to fall and many farmers in Indiana lost their land.  Unemployment also reached 25% in 1933 and affected the manufacturing industry in the state.   

Political power in Indiana, as it always has, passed between parties during this time, with Democrats taking control of Indiana government in 1933 and enacting the same social welfare programs being enacted nationally; by 1945 a Republican governor took office.

Indiana, like the rest of the country, was unwilling to get involved in the war that had broken out in Europe in the 1930s.  However, by the time the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor, Indiana, like the rest of the country, was ready to go to war.  Indiana provided 340,000 troops, 10,000 of whom died in World War II.  Also, Indiana lent the federal government nearly half a billion dollars.  And, as the rest of the country, manufacturing in Indiana turned to the war effort by 1942, receiving over $7 billion worth of war contracts.