Mississippi Admitted to the Union
Mississippi, the 20th state of the United States, was officially admitted to the Union on December 10, 1817, after being part of the Mississippi Territory established in 1798. The region has a rich history, once inhabited by the Mound Builders, who constructed impressive earthworks and left behind artifacts indicative of their advanced culture between the 9th and 15th centuries. By the time of European contact, the area was home to significant Native American tribes, including the Chickasaw, Choctaw, and Natchez. The first European explorers, notably Hernando de Soto in the 1540s, laid the groundwork for further exploration and colonization, leading to the establishment of French settlements in the late 17th century.
The territory faced numerous challenges, including conflicts with Native American tribes and territorial disputes among European powers. Following the American Revolutionary War, Mississippi was formally organized as a territory and saw its eastern portion become Alabama in 1817. After its admission to the Union, Mississippi played a pivotal role in the Civil War, becoming the second state to secede from the Union in 1861 and ultimately experiencing significant devastation during the conflict. Reconstruction efforts in the post-war period led to the abolition of slavery and the extension of voting rights to Black citizens, culminating in Mississippi's full restoration to the Union on February 23, 1870. This history highlights the complexities of Mississippi’s past, including its cultural heritage and tumultuous journey through statehood and civil rights.
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Mississippi Admitted to the Union
Mississippi Admitted to the Union
The Mississippi Territory, organized in 1798, produced two states. They were Mississippi, the 20th state, and Alabama, the 22nd state. Alabama became a territory in its own right on March 3, 1817, and nine months later on December 10, 1817, the parent territory of Mississippi was admitted to the Union as a state.
Mississippi was once the homeland of the people known as Mound Builders, whose archaeological remains and earthworks excited wonder and admiration when Europeans first encountered them. Scattered about the state are ancient, artificially built hillocks, some rising as high as 60 feet and some covering several acres of ground. The mounds were used as burial sites and perhaps also as sites for temples, fortifications, and places of refuge when the Mississippi River and its tributaries flooded the valleys. The Mound Builders also left many artifacts, including agricultural implements, pottery, stone and wood carvings, and jewelry. Their culture along the lower Mississippi River flourished between 900 and 1500, and appears to have been in decline by the time Europeans arrived in the region.
At the time of European exploration, the region was inhabited by an estimated 30,000 Native Americans. Of these, the most important tribes were the Chickasaw in the north, the Choctaw in the central and southern parts of the region, and the Natchez along the Mississippi River. The first Europeans known for certain to have set foot in what is now Mississippi were a company of Spanish gold seekers led by Hernando de Soto, who arrived in 1540. Battered and exhausted by intermittent warfare with the natives as they journeyed inland from the Atlantic coast, de Soto's company entered Mississippi a few miles north of what is now Columbus. Continuing westward, they came upon the Mississippi River somewhere near what was is now the northwestern boundary of the state on May 8, 1541. After exploring the region west of the Mississippi, de Soto's company returned to the river. There de Soto died on May 21, 1542, and his body was committed to the waters of the river near Natchez. Since no gold was discovered, Spain had little interest in the region de Soto explored, and it was left undisturbed by Europeans for more than a century.
In 1673 Father Jacques Marquette and Louis Joliet, a trader from New France in Canada, descended the Mississippi River as far south as the mouth of the Arkansas River. Their accounts of the journey inspired further exploration by Ren‗-Robert Cavelier de La Salle, who in 1682 claimed the entire Mississippi watershed for France and gave it the name Louisiana in honor of French king Louis XIV. Other French explorations followed, and in 1699 Pierre Le Moyne, Sieur d'Iberville, founded the first permanent colony in the lower Mississippi valley. The settlement that grew up near the fort, which acquired the name of Biloxi from a local native tribe, alternated with Fort Louis de La Mobile-a settlement soon removed to the site of what is now Mobile, Alabama-as the seat of government for French Louisiana until 1723, when New Orleans in what is currently Louisiana became the capital of the French colony.
Territorial disputes arose between the French and the native tribes and between the French and the English, who claimed a part of the Mississippi region as lying within the so-called Carolina grant made in 1629-1630 to Sir Robert Heath by King Charles I of England. Because of these difficulties and bad administration as well, the colony was unprofitable for France. At the end of the French and Indian War in 1763, all of the French Louisiana territory east of the Mississippi River except for New Orleans came under British rule. The southern third of what is now Mississippi and Alabama was incorporated in the new British province of West Florida, which was occupied by Spain during the American Revolution. Mississippi took almost no part in that conflict. Under the Treaty of Paris of 1783, which officially ended the Revolutionary War, Great Britain recognized American claims to land south to the 31st Parallel that included much of what had been part of West Florida.
On April 7, 1798, the Mississippi Territory, comprising the southern portions of modern day Mississippi and Alabama, was created by act of Congress. The territory was enlarged in 1804 and 1812 so that it came to encompass all of what are now the states of Mississippi and Alabama. Natchez was the territorial capital until February 1, 1802, when the seat of government was moved to the nearby town of Washington. The territorial period was made stormy by conflicts with the native tribes, internal civil war, border warfare with the Spanish, and the War of 1812.
In March 1817 the Mississippi Territory was reduced when its eastern part was organized as the Alabama Territory. The western part adopted a state constitution on August 15, and on December 10 Congress voted the new state of Mississippi into the Union. The first state governor was David Holmes, the former territorial governor, who served until 1820. The state government held its legislative sessions at Natchez and Washington during the early years of statehood. In 1821 a legislative commission appointed to locate a permanent state capital chose as its site Le Fleur's Bluff on the Pearl River, which was renamed Jackson in honor of Andrew Jackson. The legislature convened at Jackson for the first time in January 1822.
When the issue of secession became critical after the election of Abraham Lincoln as president in 1860, on January 9, 1861, Mississippi voted to secede from the Union, and became the second state of the Confederacy. One of Mississippi's former United States senators, Jefferson Davis, became the first and only president of the Confederate States of America.
A number of Civil War battles were fought in Mississippi, including the Union campaigns against Vicksburg, which were climaxed by a 47-day siege that forced the surrender of the city on July 4, 1863. After the fall of Vicksburg, most of the Confederate troops within the state were moved elsewhere, and Union forces met with little resistance when they occupied Mississippi. The last Confederate forces in Mississippi surrendered on May 4, 1865. Due to the war, the state was in ruins and its manpower was critically depleted. Of the approximately 80,000 men who went to war, only about 28,000 returned and many of the survivors were disabled. Ranking fifth in per capita wealth before the war, Mississippi dropped to last place in the postwar period.
During the first months after the fall of the Confederacy, President Andrew Johnson attempted to follow the policy of reconciliation begun by Lincoln. Mississippi, like the other southern states, was provisionally administered by a presidentially appointed governor who called a constitutional convention that passed an amendment abolishing slavery and arranged for a general election in the latter part of 1865. However, the officials elected in Mississippi and elsewhere in the South showed little inclination to promote political, economical, or social equality for blacks. While they continued to denying voting rights to blacks, they demanded increased representation in Congress on the grounds that the recognition of citizenship for blacks had enlarged their constituencies. Angered by the unrepentant southern attitude and also fearful that the Democratic Party would regain political dominance with the support of a revived and predominantly Democratic South, the Republicans in control of Congress moved to disqualify the southern leadership under the newly enacted 14th Amendment. The 14th Amendment defined citizenship to include both blacks and whites, sought to guarantee the civil rights of blacks against unfavorable legislation by the states, and required equal protection under the law regardless of race. On March 2, 1867, the first Reconstruction Act was passed, challenging the constitutionality of all the southern governments except Tennessee and dividing the South into five districts under military commanders who were to remain in charge of the various states until each state had fulfilled certain conditions. These conditions included the election, with black participation, of delegates to a convention that would frame a new constitution and establish a new state government providing for black male suffrage. Another requirement was the ratification of the 14th Amendment by the new state legislatures. When these conditions had been met, the state was eligible for restoration to the full privileges of statehood. Mississippi, which was placed in the Fourth Military District, was one of the last three states to comply. Finally, in November 1869 a new state constitution, which abolished slavery and extended the franchise to black citizens, was ratified. On February 23, 1870, Mississippi was restored to its former status within the Union.