Democratic Sentinel, Volume 19, Number 16, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 26 April 1895 — TO FOUND A STATE. [ARTICLE]

TO FOUND A STATE.

Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin Would Contribute to Its Territory. It is seriously proposed to create a new State by taking a part of the three States of Minnesota, Wisconsin and Michigan, which will be known as the State of “Superior,” or “the mineral State.” This idea is a modification of the new State plan so often repeated, and its creator is Captain Alex. McDougall, the inventor of the whaleback. Captain McDougall would cut out a territory bounded on the north by Canada, on the west by the Mississippi river, on the south by a line drawn from the Mississippi river along the southern boundary of the northern tier of Wisconsin counties and terminating at the extreme tip of the upper peninsula. Of course, the eastern boundary line would lie in the lakes, but that is immaterial to the plan.

What is aimed at particularly is to place the three great iron ranges, the Vermillion, the Mesaba and the Gogebic, in one State, so that the interests of none of them could be injured by conflicting legislation and all might be treated from the same basis. Should the new State, which would be the forty-fifth of the Union, be considered at all, it would have the additional advantage, the captain thinks, of solving the difficulties of long standing between Duluth and Superior, for, both cities being in the same State, their interests would be in the main almost identical. At least there would be no State line to vex and complicate their relations.

A West Superior correspondent, in writing of the matter, says Duluth and the northern part of Minnesota have no interests in common with the rest of the State. Wisconsin, it can truthfully be said, bears the same relation toward Superior and the northern portion of the State, and as for the upper peninsula, it is not, either from a commercial or geographical point of view, a part of the State of Michigan. The new State would be one of the richest in wealth in the Union; it would have more than 500 miles of water front and contain “the head of the lakes” harbor, which is the gateway for the trade and commerce of the entire northwestern country. “Superior,” or “the mineral State,” yyould at once become one of the greatest States of the Union, it is firmly believed by its advocates. Agitation of the subject will begin immediately throughout the three commonwealths involved and the representatives in the several Legislatures who come from the territory immediately .involved will, after their adhesion is secured, begin making political combinations in order to effect their purpose.