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Northwest Ordinance Activity

Activity 1 Map of the Northwest Territory

Use the map to help answer the following questions:

1. What are the natural water boundaries of the Northwest Territory?
2. Which line of latitude formed the northern boundary of Illinois?
3. Use the scale of miles to determine how long the Northwest Territory was from the
southern tip of Illinois to the northern-most point of Michigan.
4. Use the scale of miles to approximate the east-west distance of the Northwest
Territory from the eastern edge of Ohio to the western side of Illinois.
5. Use the map that shows how land in the Northwest Territory was divided. Each
township consisted of a 6-mile-by-6-mile section of land that was then divided into 36
one-mile-square sections. The article reveals that land in the Old Northwest sometimes
sold for as little as eight cents per acre. At that rate, how much would a speculator in the
late-eighteenth century pay for one section of land? Note that one section (one-mile-byone-mile) is 640 acres. What would eight cents buy today?

6. For the sake of a modern comparison, land in many of the urban areas of Illinois sells
for more than $50,000 per acre. If a real estate developer had to pay $50,000 an acre for
one of the old 640-acre sections of the Northwest Territory, how much would he or she
have to pay?
7. Speculate on how the Northwest Territory would have been settled if the grid system
for surveying and marketing the lands had not been used.
Activity 2 Applying Census Data
Slaves Free Blacks White Men White Women Total
NW Territory (1800) 135

500

27,007

23,364

51,006

NW Territory (1820) 1,109 6,584

412,040

374,095

792,719

Illinois (1810)

168

613

6,380

5,121

12,282

Illinois (1820)

919

457

29,401

24,387

55,211

Answer the following questions using the census chart above:

1. How many slaves were in the Northwest Territory in 1800?
2. By 1820, did Article 6 of the Northwest Ordinance limit the growth of slavery?
Explain your answer.
3. In part, the framers of Article 6 intended to protect white laborers from slave
competition. Did the plan work?
4. The Northwest Ordinance states that "whenever any of the said States shall have
60,000 free inhabitants therein, such State shall be admitted, by its delegates, into the
Congress of the United States, on an equal footing with the original States..." Illinois
gained admission to the Union in 1818. Did Illinois meet the population requirement
established in the Northwest Ordinance? What does your answer tell you about the
adaptability of the Ordinance or the accuracy of the census data?
5. Both in Illinois and the rest of the Northwest Territory, men outnumbered women.
What would help explain this phenomena?
6. Compare the total population of the Northwest Territory in 1800 with the total
population of the area in 1820. What does the comparison reveal about western migration
during the first twenty years of the nineteenth century?

Activity 3 Compare: The US Constitution and the Northwest Ordinance

The Constitution and the Northwest Ordinance were both written in the summer of 1787.
The Bill of Rights to the Constitution was ratified in 1791. Excerpts from both documents
appear below.

U. S. Constitution

Northwest Ordinance

First Amendment
Congress shall make no law respecting
an establishment of religion, or
prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or
abridging the freedom of speech, or of
the press; or the right of the people
peaceably to assemble, and to petition to
government for a redress of grievances.

Article 1
No person, demeaning himself in a peaceable
and orderly manner, shall ever be molested on
account of his mode of worship or religious
sentiments, in the said territory.
Article 2
The inhabitants of the said territory shall
always be entitled to the benefits of the writ of
habeas corpus, and of the trial by jury.

Article 1, Section 9
The privilege of the writ of habeas
corpus shall not be suspended, unless
Article 2
when in cases of rebellion or invasion the All persons shall be bailable, unless for capital
public safety may require it.
offenses ... All fines shall be moderate; no
cruel or unusual punishments shall be inflicted.
Amendment 7
In suits at common law... the right of trial Article 2
by jury shall be preserved.
No man shall be deprived of his liberty or
property, but by the judgment of his peers or
the law of the land; should the public
Amendment 8
Excessive bail shall not be required, nor exigencies make it necessary for the common
excessive finds imposed, nor cruel and preservation, to take any person's property or
unusual punishments inflicted.
to demand his particular services, full
compensation shall be made for the same.
Amendment 5
(N)o person shall be deprived of life,
Article 3
liberty, or property, without due process Religion, morality, and knowledge being
of law; nor shall private property be
necessary for good government and the
taken for public use without just
happiness of mankind, schools and the means
compensation.
of education shall forever be encouraged. The
utmost good faith shall always be observed
towards the Indians; their lands and property
shall never be taken from them without their
consent; and in their property, rights, and
liberty they shall never be invaded or distrubed
unless in just and lawful wars authorized by
Congress; but laws founded in justice and
humanity shall, from time to time, be made for
preventing wrongs being done to them and for
preserving peace and friendship with them.

U.S. Constitution

Northwest Ordinance

Article 6
This Constitution, and the laws of the
United States which shall be made in
pursuance thereof... shall be the supreme
law of the land.

Article 4
The said territory, and the States which may be
formed therein, shall forever remain a part of
this Confederacy of the United States of
America, subject to the Articles of
Confederation.

Article 4, Section 1
No person held to service or labor in one
state, under the laws thereof, escaping
into another, shall, in consequence of any
law or regulation therein, be discharged
from such service or labor, but shall be
delivered up on claim of the party to
whom such service or labor may be due.

Article 5
There shall be formed in the said territory not
less than three nor more than five states; and
boundaries of the states as soon as Virginia
shall alter her act cession and consent to the
same, shall become fixed and established ...
And whenever any of the said states shall have
60,000 free inhabitants therein, such state shall
be admitted by its delegates into the Congress
of the United States, on an equal footing with
the original states, in all respects whatever;
and shall be at liberty to form a permanent
constitution and state government: provided
the constitution and government so to be
formed shall be republican, and in conformity
to the principles contained in these articles,
and, so far as it can be consistent with the
general interests of the Confederacy, such
admission shall be allowed at an earlier period,
and when there may be a less number of free
inhabitants in the state than 60,000.
Article 6
That any person escaping into the same
(territory), from whom labor or service is
lawfully claimed in any one of the original
States, such fugitive may be lawfully
reclaimed and conveyed to the person claiming
his or her labor or service as aforesaid.

Using the chart, answer the following questions.

1. Identify similarities between the two documents and discuss why these similarities
exist.

2. Discuss any civil liberties enjoyed by residents in the Northwest Territory in advance
of the residents in the original states. Name at least five.

3. In 1790, approximately 100,000 white settlers lived beyond the Appalachian

Mountains. By 1818, when Illinois gained admission to the Union, the population west of
the Appalachians had climbed to two million. The growth of this region can in part be
attributed to provisions in the Northwest Ordinance. How did each provision facilitate
settlement of the western territory?
Article 3
Article 5
Article 6
4. Using this information, name three reasons why Americans choose to move to the
Northwest Territory.

5. Using Article 3, how were Indians supposed to be treated? Did it happen and how do
you know?

6. According to Article 6, how were runaway slaves to be treated? How do you know?

7. Would this have encouraged runaway slaves to come to the Northwest Territory?
Why or why now?