representative, too, I believe, took great pains among the members out of doors." In closing he makes this significant suggestion: "Should your next House of Representatives be of the character you expect, I should suppose they might petition the new President for the removal of the Governor with effect, and could send forward proofs and documents to support the charges against him." The "new President" was Thomas Jefferson, who was inaugurated a month afterwards, March 4, 1801; as subsequent events show, the suggestion did not fall upon barren ground.

The Second General Assembly of the Territory convened at Chillicothe, November 23, 1801. Edward Tiffin was elected Speaker of the House of Representatives, and Robert Oliver, President of the Council. This body met in the new State House, the construction of which was commenced in 1800. It was the first public edifice built of stone in the Territory. In it the first Constitutional Convention afterwards assembled, as well as the first State legislature, and it continued to be the capitol of Ohio until 1810.

A contemporary resident of Chillicothe gives this interesting description of the building: "The house occupied the room on the ground floor, a very uncomfortable, badly lighted and roughly finished room, with a fireplace at each end and a wide, open stairway out of one corner leading up to the second floor. All the wood which could be piled on the fires failed to heat the large room in winter. The senate occupied a room on the second floor. This was a low room with a platform for the Speaker's seat at one side, and long,

roughly made tables on the floor with plain Windsor chairs ranged behind for the reverend Senators."

It was during this Assembly that the contest between Governor St. Clair and the advocates of statehood reached its turbulent and sensational climax. It was the Governor's purpose to accomplish one of two things, and by so doing thwart the designs of Tiffin, Worthington, Massie and their followers. This was either to prevent statehood for an indefinite period, or if it was inevitable, to form a state that would be Federalist when admitted to the Union. The first bill of the session looked to this purpose. It was a direct challenge to President Jefferson and his supporters. It was a foolish move on the part of the Governor; and demonstrated that he exercised no judgment or discretion in his actions. The President and Congress were Republican, and it seemed a step towards self-destruction to present a measure distinctly in the interests of the Federal party, to those controlling powers.

The object of this bill was to so change the boundaries that the eastern state, when formed, should be bounded on the west by the Scioto River, and a line drawn from the intersection of that river with the Indian boundary to the western extremity of the Connecticut Reserve; the middle state, by a line running from the intersection of the Ohio with the western boundary of George Roger Clark's grant to the head of the Chicago River, and by that river and Lake Michigan, to the territorial line; and the western state by the Mississippi River.

In the Council it passed unanimously; in the House the friends of statehood opposed it bitterly but in