Dakota Territory History, 1886

	This information appears in Chapter LVIII of "History of South 
	Dakota" by Doane Robinson, Vol. I (1904), pages 326-328 and was 
	scanned, OCRed and edited by Joy Fisher, http://www.rootsweb.com/~archreg/vols/00001.html#0000031

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CHAPTER LVIII

THE WEARY WAIT FOR STATEHOOD BEGINS. 

	With the opening of the new year, Messrs. Moody, Edgerton, Kanouse and 
Mellette joined delegate Gifford in Washington to urge the admission of the new 
state. They were given respectful hearings by the congressional committees and 
the senate, which was Republican, promptly passed the bill, but the Democratic 
house could not be induced to give up the political advantage accruing to its 
party by granting statehood, thus cutting off a considerable amount of patronage 
and at the same time adding several votes in congress to the Republican side.  
All sorts of temporizing expedients were resorted to.  No less than five bills 
were under consideration by the committee, one for the recognition of the Sioux 
Falls constitution, one for admission as a whole, one for division without 
admission, one for division on the Missouri river. It early became manifest that 
it was not the intention to take any action whatever. On May 4th the 
constitutional convention met and adjourned until July 12th, serving notice that 
unless at that time congress had acted favorably that the section of the 
constitution restraining the state from exercising its power to govern, would be 
submitted to the people for its repeal, but Senator Benjamin Harrison, who had 
the interests of the new state in charge in the senate, at once wrote 
discouraging such action as likely to prejudice the cause of Dakota before the 
people of the nation, to whom Dakota must look for ultimate justice.  At this 
juncture Hon. Abraham Boynton, now of Mitchell, but then a citizen of Lenox, 
came into great prominence in relation to the Dakota movement.  Mr. Boynton was 
a strong Democrat and had formerly been a leader in the movement for division, 
having been a member of the constitutional convention of 1883.  In common with 
many Democrats, he had changed his views on this subject, and at this time spent 
several months in Washington where among his Democratic partisans he acquired 
great influence and was accepted by them as authority upon all questions 
relating to the admission of Dakota.

	Among the large element of adventurous men which the boom had landed in 
Dakota, there were many who, not being firmly fixed in principle, made 
expediency the test of every political action and this class seeing that 
congress was not likely to admit South Dakota at once, were ready, for 
expediency's sake, to take up with anything which might be offered, and they 
soon began to weaken in their loyalty to the division movement, forgetting the 
interests of posterity and ready to accept statehood upon any terms that might 
be offered.  There were, however, thousands of divisionists who never faltered 
in their loyalty to the cause and they were sufficient to dominate the policy. 
Leaders among them were the officers chosen by the new state, though their 
motives were constantly assailed, but deep in the hearts of the rank and file 
the principle involved held dominance, as was demonstrated at every opportunity 
for expression.  Again there were a few entirely unselfish propagandists 
surrounding Yankton College, in which Joseph Ward was the leading spirit who 
never allowed the agitation to flag. Another strong incentive among the rank and 
file people was the protection which the Sioux Falls constitution threw about 
the school funds. It is, in the light of conditions then existing in Dakota and 
the large number of adventurers who projected themselves into politics, a really 
marvelous thing that a constitution not only literally without a job in it, 
should have been framed, but one on the other hand which rendered jobbery so 
almost impossible. The people were exceedingly loathe to give up this document, 
especially its provisions for the future of the school lands and school funds, 
fearing that the freebooters might get control of another convention and prevent 
the framing of another charter so desirable, and therefore they gave quiet but 
constant and tenacious support to the division movement as embodied in the state 
already erected.  The Huron contingent of course, having already secured the 
temporary seat of government, was anxious to retain whatever advantage she 
possessed and was therefore a constant agitator for the South state, and so from 
all these sources came sufficient vitality to keep the movement alive in spite 
of the temptations held out for a different course.

	One great hardship visited upon the settlers at this time was the policy 
adopted by Land Commissioner Sparks. Of course in the vast movement of settlers 
upon the public lands through which title could be secured through homesteads, 
pre-emptions and timber claims, there was a certain amount of fraud, though on 
the whole it may be stated at this distance of time, the percentage of those who 
acted in bad faith was marvelously small.  The people as a rule came out filled 
with hope and a desire to make homes and they settled upon the soil, broke the 
sod, built to the extent of their means and in every way showed the good faith 
of their action. Commissioner Sparks, however, reversed the common law rule and 
assumed that every action was in bad faith and placed the burden upon the 
settlers to show their honest intentions. Thousands of claims were cancelled 
arbitrarily; the borrowing of money upon a proved-up claim, before the issue of 
a patent, was held to be an evidence of bad faith the commutation of a homestead 
was held to be an abandonment of the right of pre-emption.  A reign of terror 
fell upon the homesteaders, who felt that they had no certainty of tenure in 
their lands.  A convention was held at Huron, largely represented from every 
section in the state, to protest against this policy.  The annual meeting of the 
Territorial Farmers' Alliance, in session at Watertown, sent an earnest protest 
to Secretary Lamar against the course being pursued by the land department, and 
influential Dakotans hastened to Washington and besieged the President and the 
secretary of the interior for relief.  Secretary Lamar was soon awakened to the 
injustice of the commissioner' s conduct and took action to modify the harsh 
feature of his policy and the settlers breathed free once more.

	The Republican territorial convention convened at Yankton, on September 
22d and Oscar S. Gifford was renominated by acclamation for delegate.  The 
platform uncompromisingly upheld the Sioux Falls constitution and the plea of 
the anti-divisionists for a submission of the question to the people of the 
whole territory was unceremoniously tabled. The matter had so long -gone 
unchallenged, had been so frequently and unanimously supported by the people 
that it was felt to be but a temporary expedient to ask that it be submitted. 
Harrison Allen, of Fargo, was made chairman of the committee.

	The Democrats met at Aberdeen on September 29th. The anti-division 
Republicans of central Dakota held out strong inducements of support to them if 
they would declare unequivocally for one state, but in spite of these 
inducements and the influence of the administration and of its representatives 
in the territory, the sentiment for division in the rank and file could not be 
overcome and Merritt H. Day, a strong divisionist, was nominated upon a platform 
that would concede no more than to favor submitting the question to the people.  
A. W. Bangs, of Grand Forks, was made chairman of the committee. The election in 
November returned Judge Gifford, the Republican, with a majority of thirty 
thousand, out of a total vote of one hundred five thousand, sixty-six thousand 
of which were cast in South Dakota.

	In July Judge William E. Church, Republican, who had been appointed three 
years before to succeed Judge Moody in the Black Hills district, resigned, and 
was succeeded by Charles M. Thomas, of Kentucky.

	Governor Pierce tendered his resignation in the summer, but it was 
December before the president found a successor for him, at that time appointing 
Judge Louis K. Church, of the Central Dakota circuit, to the position, James 
Spencer, of New York, being after a lapse of some months sent out to succeed 
Judge Church on the bench.

	Railroad building was revived during the season and a large amount 
constructed.  The Northwestern built its line from Centerville to Yankton, from 
Redfield to Faulkton, from Doland to Groton and from Columbia to Oakes. The 
Milwaukee extended from Ipswich to Bowdle and from Roscoe south for a distance 
of thirty miles; from Scotland to Mitchell and from Tripp to Armour, from 
Andover to Newark, and from Madison north to near Lake Preston. The Omaha 
extended from Salem to Mitchell and the Elkhorn reached Rapid City in the Black 
Hills. This latter had cut off the cross country freighting and staging from 
Pierre some months before, as the end of the track approached the hills, and 
quite changed the commercial relations of the two ends of the state. The Great 
Northern, then called the Manitoba, built its lines from Benson to Watertown and 
from Hankinson to Aberdeen, and the Burlington, Cedar Rapids & Northern built 
from Sibley to Sioux Falls. 

	A great drought accompanied by hot winds cut the crop in many sections and 
the price continued very low, facts which tended to accelerate the political 
movement among the farmers and a considerable number of Farmers' Alliance 
legislators were returned.

	W. H. Lyon, of Sioux Falls, this year brought out a little book entitled 
"The People's Problem," a sociological study, and which is said to have been the 
first private bookmaking enterprise in Dakota.

	The public health continued excellent and no death of any person who had 
acquired distinction in South Dakota is noted for the year.