District of Maine | |||||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Part of Massachusetts | |||||||||
1780–1820 | |||||||||
History | |||||||||
• Established | 25 October 1780 | ||||||||
• British occupation of the east | September 1814–February 1815 | ||||||||
March 6, 1820 | |||||||||
• Statehood | 15 March 1820 | ||||||||
| |||||||||
Today part of | Maine |
The District of Maine was the governmental designation for what is now the U.S. state of Maine from October 25, 1780 to March 15, 1820, when it was admitted to the Union as the 23rd state. The district was a part of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and before American independence had been part of the British province of Massachusetts Bay.
Year | Pop. | ±% |
---|---|---|
1760 | 20,000 | — |
1770 | 31,257 | +56.3% |
1780 | 49,138 | +57.2% |
1790 | 96,540 | +96.5% |
1800 | 151,719 | +57.2% |
1810 | 228,705 | +50.7% |
1820 | 298,335 | +30.4% |
Source: 1760–1780; [1] 1790–1820 [2] |
Originally settled in 1607 by the Plymouth Company, the coastal area between the Merrimack and Kennebec rivers, as well as an irregular parcel of land between the headwaters of the two rivers, became the province of Maine in a 1622 land grant. In 1629, the land was split, creating an area between the Piscataqua and Merrimack rivers which became the province of New Hampshire. It existed through a series of land patents made by the kings of England during this era, and included New Somersetshire, Lygonia, and Falmouth. The province was incorporated into the Massachusetts Bay Colony during the 1650s, beginning with the formation of York County, Massachusetts, which extended from the Piscataqua River to just east of the mouth of the Presumpscot River in Casco Bay. Eventually, its territory grew to encompass nearly all of present-day Maine. The large size of the county led to its division in 1760 through the creation of Cumberland and Lincoln counties.
The northeastern portion of present-day Maine was first sparsely occupied by Maliseet Indians and French settlers from Acadia. The lands between the Kennebec and Saint Croix rivers were granted to the Duke of York in 1664, who had them administered as Cornwall County, part of his proprietary Province of New York. In 1688, these lands (along with the rest of New York) were subsumed into the Dominion of New England. English and French claims in western Maine would be contested, at times violently, until the British conquest of New France in the French and Indian War. With the creation of the Province of Massachusetts Bay in 1692, the entirety of what is now Maine became part of that province.
When Massachusetts adopted its state constitution in 1780, it created the District of Maine to manage its northernmost counties, bounded on the west by the Piscataqua River and on the east by the Saint Croix River. By 1820, the District had been further subdivided with the creation of Hancock, Kennebec, Oxford, Penobscot, Somerset, and Washington counties.[ citation needed ]
A movement for Maine statehood began as early as 1785, and in the following years, several conventions were held to effect this. Starting in 1792, five popular votes were taken but all failed to reach the necessary majorities. [3] During the War of 1812, British and Canadian forces occupied a large portion of Maine including everything from the Penobscot River east to the New Brunswick border with the goal of annexing them to Canada as the Colony of New Ireland. [4] A weak response by Massachusetts to this occupation and possible British annexation contributed to increased calls in the district for statehood.[ citation needed ]
The Massachusetts General Court passed enabling legislation on June 19, 1819, separating the District of Maine from the rest of the Commonwealth. [5] The following month, on July 19, voters in the district approved statehood by 17,091 to 7,132.
County | For statehood [6] | For status quo [6] | ||
---|---|---|---|---|
Votes | PCT | Votes | PCT | |
Cumberland | 3,315 | 70.4% | 1,394 | 29.6% |
Hancock | 820 | 51.9% | 761 | 48.1% |
Kennebec | 3,950 | 86.0% | 641 | 14.0% |
Lincoln | 2,523 | 62.2% | 1,534 | 37.8% |
Oxford | 1,893 | 77.5% | 550 | 22.5% |
Penobscot | 584 | 71.7% | 231 | 28.3% |
Somerset | 1,440 | 85.9% | 237 | 14.1% |
Washington | 480 | 77.7% | 138 | 22.3% |
York | 2,086 | 55.9% | 1,646 | 44.1% |
Total: | 17,091 | 70.6% | 7,132 | 29.4% |
The results of the election were presented to the Massachusetts Governor's Council on August 24, 1819. [6] The Maine Constitution was unanimously approved by the 210 delegates to the Maine Constitutional Convention in October 1819. On February 25, 1820, the General Court passed a follow-up measure officially accepting the fact of Maine's imminent statehood. [5]
At the time of Maine’s request for statehood, there were an equal number of free and slave states. Pro-slavery members of the United States Congress saw the admission of another free state, Maine, as a threat to the balance between slave and free states. They would support statehood for Maine only if Missouri Territory, where slavery was legal, would be admitted to the Union as a slave state. Maine became the nation's 23rd state on March 15, 1820, following the Missouri Compromise, which allowed Missouri to enter the Union as a slave-holding state and Maine as a free state. [7]
Maine is a state in the New England region of the United States, and the northeasternmost state in the Lower 48. It borders New Hampshire to the west, the Gulf of Maine to the southeast, and the Canadian provinces of New Brunswick and Quebec to the northeast and northwest, respectively. Maine is the largest state in New England by total area, nearly larger than the combined area of the remaining five states. Of the 50 U.S. states, it is the 12th-smallest by area, the 9th-least populous, the 13th-least densely populated, and the most rural. Maine's capital is Augusta, and its most populous city is Portland, with a total population of 68,408, as of the 2020 census.
York County is the southwesternmost county in the U.S. state of Maine, along the state of New Hampshire's eastern border. It is divided from Strafford County, New Hampshire, by the Salmon Falls River and the connected tidal estuary, the Piscataqua River. York County was permanently established in 1639. Several of Maine's earliest colonial settlements are found in the county, which is the state's oldest and one of the oldest in the United States. As of the 2020 census, its population was 211,972, making it Maine's second-most populous county. Its county seat is Alfred. York County is part of the Portland–South Portland, Maine Metropolitan Statistical Area.
The 16th United States Congress was a meeting of the legislative branch of the United States federal government, consisting of the United States Senate and the United States House of Representatives. It met in Washington, D.C. from March 4, 1819, to March 4, 1821, during the third and fourth years of James Monroe's presidency. The apportionment of seats in the House of Representatives was based on the 1810 United States census. Both chambers had a Democratic-Republican majority.
The Province of New Hampshire was an English colony and later a British province in New England. It corresponds to the territory between the Merrimack and Piscataqua rivers on the eastern coast of North America. It was named after the English county of Hampshire in southern England by Captain John Mason in 1629, its first named proprietor. In 1776 the province established an independent state and government, the State of New Hampshire, and joined with twelve other colonies to form the United States.
The Province of Maine refers to any of the various English colonies established in the 17th century along the northeast coast of North America, within portions of the present-day U.S. states of Maine, New Hampshire, and Vermont, and the Canadian provinces of Quebec and New Brunswick. It existed through a series of land patents made by the kings of England during this era, and included New Somersetshire, Lygonia, and Falmouth. The province was incorporated into the Massachusetts Bay Colony during the 1650s, beginning with the formation of York County, Massachusetts, which extended from the Piscataqua River to just east of the mouth of the Presumpscot River in Casco Bay. Eventually, its territory grew to encompass nearly all of present-day Maine.
The Kennebec River is a 170-mile-long (270 km) river within the U.S. state of Maine. It rises in Moosehead Lake in west-central Maine. The East and West Outlets join at Indian Pond and the river flows southward. Harris Station Dam, the largest hydroelectric dam in the state, was constructed near that confluence. The river is joined at The Forks by its tributary the Dead River, also called the West Branch.
Cornwall County was a county of the former Province of New York, established on September 5, 1665 from 25,100 square miles (65,000 km2) of land that had been granted to the Duke of York in modern Maine. As established, the grant ran all the way from the St. Lawrence River to the Atlantic Ocean, between the Kennebec and St. Croix rivers, and produced what today is most of Aroostook, Piscataquis, Washington, Hancock, Penobscot, Waldo, Knox, Lincoln, Kennebec, Somerset, and Sagadahoc counties.
Devonshire County, Massachusetts was a short-lived county formed in 1674 during colonial territorial disputes between the Massachusetts Bay Colony and the Province of New York. The county existed from 1674 to 1675, and encompassed land claimed by Massachusetts between the Kennebec River and Penobscot Bay in what is now Maine. This overlapped the New York claim, which extended from the Kennebec to the Saint Croix River. Settlements in the territory were attacked during King Philip's War (1675-1676) and the area was abandoned until the 18th century. It was incorporated into the Province of Massachusetts Bay in 1692, which initially governed it as part of York County. The area is now divided into a number of Maine counties.
The Gulf of Maine is a large gulf of the Atlantic Ocean on the east coast of North America. It is bounded by Cape Cod at the eastern tip of Massachusetts in the southwest and by Cape Sable Island at the southern tip of Nova Scotia in the northeast. The gulf includes the entire coastlines of the U.S. states of New Hampshire and Maine, as well as Massachusetts north of Cape Cod, and the southern and western coastlines of the Canadian provinces of New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, respectively.
George Thatcher was an American lawyer, jurist, and statesman from the Maine district of Massachusetts. He was a delegate for Massachusetts to the Continental Congress in 1787 and 1788. He was an associate justice of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court from 1801 to 1824.
Yorkshire County, Massachusetts was a county in what is now the U.S. state of Maine.
Mark Langdon Hill was United States Representative from Massachusetts and from Maine. He was born in Biddeford on June 30, 1772. He attended the public schools, then became a merchant and shipbuilder in Phippsburg. He was an overseer and trustee of Bowdoin College. He is the nephew of John Langdon. New Hampshire governor, Senator and patriot.
Maine's 2nd congressional district is a congressional district in the U.S. state of Maine. Covering 27,326 square miles (70,770 km2), it comprises nearly 80% of the state's total land area. The district comprises most of the land area north of the Portland and Augusta metropolitan areas. It includes the cities of Lewiston, Bangor, Auburn, and Presque Isle. The district is represented by Democrat Jared Golden, who took office in 2019.
The Missouri Compromise was federal legislation of the United States that balanced desires of northern states to prevent the expansion of slavery in the country with those of southern states to expand it. It admitted Missouri as a slave state and Maine as a free state and declared a policy of prohibiting slavery in the remaining Louisiana Purchase lands north of the 36°30′ parallel. The 16th United States Congress passed the legislation on March 3, 1820, and President James Monroe signed it on March 6, 1820.
The history of the area comprising the U.S. state of Maine spans thousands of years, measured from the earliest human settlement, or approximately two hundred, measured from the advent of U.S. statehood in 1820. The present article will concentrate on the period of European contact and after.
U.S. Route 1 (US 1) in the U.S. state of Maine is a major north–south section of the United States Numbered Highway System, serving the eastern part of the state. It parallels the Atlantic Ocean from New Hampshire north through Portland, Brunswick, and Belfast to Calais, and then the St. Croix River and the rest of the Canada–United States border via Houlton to Fort Kent. The portion along the ocean, known as the Coastal Route, provides a scenic alternate to Interstate 95 (I-95).