392 COLONIAL ADMINISTRATION 



This policy is older than the Constitution. The government of the 

 Northwestern Territory had originally no source of authority but 

 the central government of the nation. It was strictly a colonial gov- 

 ernment, even if we sometimes balk at the name. The changes 

 effected in it as it passed from the earlier to the later stages corre- 

 spond with the development observed as an English crown colony 

 advances from its original position to the state of a colony with 

 representative institutions. Moreover, the status of the North- 

 western Territory, as also that of the subsequent territories under 

 the Union, was essentially that of a British colony. The organic law 

 of the British colony is an Act of Parliament as the organic law of 

 an American territory is an Act of Congress. The inhabitants of 

 the American territory have, however, generally escaped the un- 

 pleasant suggestions that might have been made to attach to their 

 position as colonists. The fact of their dependence on a political 

 superior outside of their borders was never especially emphasized, 

 and even the political division to which they have belonged was 

 given the colorless designation of territory. An important point of 

 difference between the continental territory as it has hitherto 

 existed under the United States and the British colony consists in 

 the fact that the status of the territory has been regarded as trans- 

 itory; that the territorial organization has been regarded as the first 

 step toward statehood. As long as we had to do in the territories 

 with societies made up of emigrants from the states, it was not diffi- 

 cult to carry out this idea practically. But when a colonial territory 

 was annexed that was largely populated by members of an alien race, 

 whose antecedents and ideas, traditions and customs, differ widely 

 from those of the bulk of the nation, the colonial question for the 

 United States assumed a new aspect. It was no longer possible to 

 emphasize the idea that the dependency will ultimately grow into 

 a state. It is not alone the number of inhabitants that determines 

 whether or not a territory shall be transformed into a state and 

 admitted into the Union. The character of the population is also 

 considered. New Mexico, with a population of 195,000, remained 

 a territory, while Idaho, with 161,000 inhabitants, Nevada, with 

 42,000, and Wyoming, with 92,000, became states. The determina- 

 tion of the time when a territory or dependency shall be converted 

 into a state is with Congress. If Congress in its wisdom finds that 

 it is not advisable to transform a territory into a state after fifty 

 years, there appears to be no constitutional power in the present 

 organization of the government to override it if it adheres to this 

 view after four hundred years. The United States has had terri- 

 torial dependencies throughout the whole period of its existence 

 under the Constitution. It would not, therefore, be doing great 

 violence to tradition or to the Constitution if it should continue to 



