372 
Constance G. Eirich 
vantage she might receive from her neighbors’ necessity. The 
boundary question did not assume its really great importance 
until the northern terminus of the Miami-Erie Canal came up for 
final decision. The inhabitants of the disputed district had 
acquiesced in being ruled by the Michigan Territory; however, 
the boundary line discussion soon led them to take the side of 
Ohio ; the population immediately concerned in the disputed area 
did not support Michigan. 
Population as a Factor 
Northern Ohio did not have a large population in 1830; in the 
Ohio part of the Maumee drainage basin there were about 11,000. 
The contiguous part of Michigan contained about 15,500. So far 
as the ratio of local population is concerned the advantage was 
with Michigan. In 1840 the population of these same regions 
of Ohio and Michigan was 56,680 and 75,555 respectively. From 
these statistics alone we would expect Michigan to have had the 
greatest influence, though we know such was not the case. 
The question in dispute was of interest to the entire population 
of each political division; consequently in this particular the 
strength of the two political divisions was measured by their rela- 
tive populations. In 1830 the population of Ohio was 937,903, of 
Michigan, 31,639; in 1840 Ohio numbered 1,519,467, while Michi- 
gan had only 212,267. Capitalists of Ohio, as well as eastern 
capitalists who were interested in Ohio, had faith in numbers, 
and accordingly exerted all the political influence possible. Mich- 
igan did not have a corresponding population-momentum, a 
vital geographic influence, though only a corollary of more basal 
geographic factors. A Michigan delegate to Congress, Mr. A. E. 
Wing, declared^ that a Cincinnati company, interested in the 
canal, and bodies of eastern capitalists, sent lobbies to Washington 
to induce Congress to extend the domain of Ohio to the northern 
boundary. Furthermore, Ohio’s population was an influential 
political body whose good will was essential to the President in 
the coming election, though this fact as a basis for the President’s 
action in the case may have operated only subconsciously. 
^ Soule, A. M., Southern and Western Boundary of Michigan. Mich. Pol. Sc. Ass., 
vol, ii, no. 2, May, 1896, p. 51. 
