The problem
was whether to violate the doctrine of the rights of man as well as
the treaty and hold these people perpetually as colonists, or, by
providing for their erection into States, further imperil the sectional
balance of power, further endanger the sovereignty of the individual
States, and contribute to the growing strength of the Central
Government.
In his Ordinance of 1784, Jefferson had provided for eventual and not
immediate statehood for the inhabitants of the Western territory.
Manifestly a State could not be made out of vacant land; it must await
a sufficient number of inhabitants. But this excuse for holding citizens
temporarily in a subordinate position was not valid in Louisiana, where
the southern point of the great triangle already contained a sufficient
number of inhabitants for statehood. Moreover, Napoleon had sufficient
thought for these pawns in the game of diplomacy to insert in the
treaty of cession a provision that statehood should be given them "as
soon as possible." The Jeffersonians were compelled to resort to loose
construction in interpreting this phrase.
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