GROWTH OF THE NORTH-WESTERN STATES.
The effects of a very favorable soil and climate, combined with a free government, and laws which secure to every one the fruits of his own labors, are strikingly illustrated in the unexampled growth and prosperity of these countries. And the future promises to excel the past. The ancient prophecy that a nation should be born in a day, was never more remarkably verified than in the case of the six states west and north-west of Pennsylvania. Men who can hardly be called old, remember the time when these territories were peopled almost exclusively by a few roving savages; and now we see them occupied by large and flourishing communities of civilized men, to whom the voice of war and oppression are unknown, every man sitting in his own domicil "without any to make him afraid."
In 1790, the whole of that region contained only a few small settlements of whites. Those at Marietta and Cincinnati in Ohio, and the old French settlements of Detroit, Vincennes, Kaskaskia, and Cahookia included every one which was large enough to possess a village. Detroit was the largest; and it was then only a little village.
The following figures will show the future increase of the population of the six States just mentioned, exclusive of Iowa:
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Population. Growth. In 1790, 3,000
1800, 50,230 1,600 per cent.
1810, 272,324 450 per cent.„
1820, 792,719 191 per cent.„
1830, 1,470,028 86 per cent.„
1840, 2,924,728 99 per cent.„
1850, 4,526,930 55 per cent.„
A better view of the actual growth may be had by taking the additions at decennial periods, thus:
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From 1790 to 1800, 47,230 1800 to 1810, 222,094 1810 to 1820, 677,004 1820 to 1830, 1,454,700 1830 to 1840, 1,602,202
We thus see that the actual additions are yet increasing, although, by an arithmetical law, the ratio is decreasing, as the basis on which the ratio is taken enlarges.
The relations of the Northwestern States to the Union, in power and representation, may be seen by the following tables:
