LIST OF MEMBERS OF THE STATE PIONEER AND HISTORICAL SOCIETY.

(Continued from Page 151, Pioneer Collections, Vol. 7.)

PAPERS READ AT ANNUAL MEETING, 1885.

MEETING OF THE PIONEERS.

BY WM. LAMBIE, OF YPSILANTI.

When the blue skies are bending o'er us in the balmy days of June,
The wheat fields waving in the wind, and the roses bright with bloom,
Those who subdued the wilderness and laid the forests low

Are come to talk of work and joy in the days of long ago.
They, veterans of the sylvan woods, the bravest and the best,
Who out the towering forests hewed the sweet homes of the west,
Rejoicing altogether, with our Michigan advancing,
Meeting in mutual gladness, when the tribes go up to Lansing.
Flinging their banners to the breeze where so much wealth is seen,
The fruit of skill and labor that rewards the Wolverine.
From every county of the State we are glad to see them coming,
Good, brave, and honest workingmen and kind and lovely women.
From the fertile borders of the west, where the yellow peaches grow,
And the rolling waves of Michigan in grand expansion flow,
Where schooner, sloop, and steamer sail in beautiful array,
By shore and bank and crowded port and far off, quiet bay.
Round the northern gates and limpid lakes of clear, cool Mackinaw,
Past the salt of earth, the men of worth, and the pines of Saginaw.
Down Huron fair and Lake St. Clair, till Detroit comes in view,
And then fades away like a summer day o'er Erie's waters blue.
It's better than reading a romance to see what has been done,
To many thousand happy homes the wild woods have been won;
This great State of wealth and learning, where such rich harvests grow
Was only a wild and savage wilderness sixty years ago.

Here the red man twanged his battle bow and roamed the forest free,
He was careful of his elbow-grease and always spared the tree.
The war whoop of the hostile tribes rings no more o'er wooded hill,
The tomahawks are buried low, the red braves are sleeping still.
Round the beautiful peninsula fresh seas for ages rolled,
But there were no fields of golden grain, no flocks were in the fold.
There's beauty and beneficence, all that earth can give to man,
Rich fields, with wealth and learning, in our beautiful Michigan;

Long trains, rolling in abundance, to the city of the straits,
Hamlets, towns, and splendid cities, by streams and crystal lakes.
Marquette and the pictured rocks, and where St. Mary's waters flow,
Clear down the rail by the Jackson jail to the vineyards of Monroe.

On the Hoosier and Ohio line the railroad bells are ringing,

From shore to shore, aye, more and more, new wealth and pleasure bringing.
Matchless lakes and shoals of fish, herds of deer and towering pines,
Plaster, coal, and salt and silver, iron hills and copper mines.

Clear streams and healthy breezes on silver strand and blooming shore,
With all this world can give us till we need her wealth no more.
But we long for still a better state, where none grow old and gray,
Unfading flowers and immortal powers in realms of endless day.

LOCATING THE STATE CAPITOL AT LANSING.

BY HON. ENOS GOODRICH.

Ladies and Gentlemen of the Society of Michigan Pioneers:

In response to a resolution of your Society, and of the Historical Society of the State, I appear before you to present a brief article upon the location of the State capitol at Lansing, which, for purpose of a title, I will designate,

"SHADOWY REMEMBRANCES OF 1847, AND FAREWELL TO THE OLD STATE

CAPITOL."

From the usages of this Society, this article must necessarily be more noted for its brevity than for the historic matter it may contain.

In my humble efforts to discharge the duty assigned me I shall make no effort to lionize myself, or to make a hero of any particular person, for indeed there was no such hero. Each, as I believe, in his action upon the subject, discharged his simple duty; and if on returning home he failed to receive the applause of his constituents, he had what is worth far more,the approbation of his own judgment and an approving conscience.

Honored by my friends with a seat in the Legislature of 1847, I timidly took my seat in the old capitol in Detroit, a tyro at the business of legislation; but I soon had the consolation of learning that I was surrounded by plenty of others of the same sort. My first surprise was to find the Legis

lature, with few exceptions, a body of plain men. Finding this out, I began to breathe more freely, but through all the early days of the session my fears of violating some parliamentary rule and being brought to order by some of the few old stagers of the house, kept me in a state of needless consternation. But there was one redeeming circumstance. I had not come there expecting to enjoy a holiday visit. I found work before me, which made me feel at home, for, thank God, I had been taught to work when I was very young. At an early period in our Territorial history, Detroit had been made the capital, and when our first State constitution was adopted, Article 12, Section 9, of that instrument read as follows:

The seat of government for this State shall be at Detroit, or at such other place or places as may be prescribed by law, until the year 1847, when it shall be permanently located by the Legislature.”

In considering this passage of our organic law, I had been led to attach a peculiar importance to the word "permanently," and my convictions were that no location upon the extreme borders of the State could be permanent after the interior of the State had become settled. But when the Legislature of '47 was first organized the man who could have supposed it possible to wrest the capitol from Detroit and set it down in the midst of a dense forest on the banks of Grand river would have been considered a fit subject for a lunatic asylum. The fact was that we who represented the interior of the State felt the incubus of our disadvantages and our poverty. We decided to work together, and we "builded better than we knew." The result may be pointed to for all time to come as an evidence of what united action may accomplish, even under the most desponding circumstances. A brief glance at the strength of the State at that early period may be interesting at this point.

Our Legislative Manual contains the census of 1845, upon which the Legislature was apportioned. It shows the entire population of the State to have been 304,273. Of this number 184,637, being over three-fifths, were contained in the two southern tiers of counties, and 119,636 in all the rest of the State. Only four counties of the State could boast a population of twenty thousand each. These were: Wayne, 32,267; Oakland, 30,288: Washtenaw, 26,979. and Lenawee, 23,011. There were eight other counties with a population of 10,000 or upwards. This county of Ingham, against her population of 33,676 in 1880, then had but 5,267. Kent county in the intervening thirty-five years, from 1845 to 1880, has increased from 6,153 to 73,253; Shiawassee from 3,829 to 27,059. My adopted county of Tuscola, which at that time had no existence except as a wolfish appendage of Sagi

naw, has grown to 25,738 in 1880, and to-day has at least 30,000 inhabitants. Saginaw, whose waters now float the commerce of an empire, could then boast of but 1,218 souls, while now, dissevered and divided into many counties, she would alone constitute a respectable state. That part which retains the name of Saginaw had in 1880 a population of 59,095, Bay 38,081, and Tuscola 25,738, being 122,914 inhabitants for these three integral parts, and were the others subdivisions to be added, with the increase since 1880, it must now show a population of at least 200,000 souls. So it will be seen that were the northern counties called upon to measure arms with the south to-day, we should have a strong backing compared with the forlorn hope that so dauntlessly entered the contest of '47. What would my vener

able and unassuming friend, Judge Miller, with his constituency of 1,200 souls, have then thought had he been told that he should meet us here to-day representing in the same territory a population of nearly a quarter of a million, and a salt and lumber production far exceeding any other State in the American union, save Michigan alone?

But to return to the dim ages of 1847. At that time our Legislature consisted of twenty-two Senators and sixty-five Representatives, or members of the House. They were not then, as now, elected by single districts. There were seven Senate districts in the State. Thirteen of the twenty-two Senators lived in the two southern tiers of counties, against but nine in all the north. Of the sixty-five Representatives, thirty-seven lived in the two southern tiers of counties; while all the remainder of the State had but twenty-three. This analysis goes conclusively to show that, had the question been decided solely upon sectional issues, we of the interior would have been defeated by an overwhelming majority.

In the body to which I had the honor to belong, the first official mention of the capitol question, as shown by the journals, appeared in the fact that on the 6th of January the House went into committee of the whole, with Major Britton, of Berrien, in the chair, and that when the committee arose, they reported back a series of resolutions, one of which was: "That so much of the Governor's message as relates to the location of the seat of government be referred to a select committee, to consist of seven members." The journals next show that on the day following the Speaker announced the appointment, as such committee, of George B. Throop, of Wayne, Harvey Chubb, of Washtenaw, Alexander M. Arzeno, of Monroe, Patrick Marantette, of St. Joseph, John D. Pierce, of Calhoun, Enos Goodrich, of Genesee, and Alexander F. Bell, of Ionia. At the call of the chairman, Mr. Throop, the committee met at an early period. A very slight consultation