West Virginia

WEST VIRGINIA

WEST VIRGINIA. The British landed on the Virginia coast in 1606 but exploration into the interior was slow. Besides curiosity, the main motivation for westward expansion was the fur trade, which played a large role in the commercial success of the colony. Sir William Berkeley, William Byrd, and Abraham Wood organized and financed a number of western expeditions. In 1671 Thomas Batts and Robert Fallam led the first expedition, organized by Abraham Wood, to travel far enough west to reach what would become the Virginia-West Virginia border. The rugged and mountainous physical characteristics of the territory earned the state the title of "the Switzerland of America." A relatively small population of Native Americans inhabited the area, the largest group of whom were the Iroquois. By 1669, the Iroquois and other groups like the Cherokees, Delawares, and Mingos used the land mostly for hunting and as a source of salt.

The first settler of record is Morgan Morgan who made his home in Berkley County at Bunker Hill in 1726. By the late 1700s, settlers, mostly Scotch-Irish and German, had penetrated the wilderness of the Allegheny Plateau. On the far western border, settlers arrived in Wirt County in 1796, and Wood County was organized in 1798. The first census reported 55,873 persons living within the borders of what would become West Virginia. By 1800 the number increased to 78,592. A number of towns incorporated during the 1780s: Lewisburg (1782), Clarksburg (1785), Morgantown (1785), Charles Town (1786), Frankfort (1787), and Middleton and West Liberty (1787). These first settlers were true pioneers entirely dependent on themselves and their environment for survival.

By the start of the nineteenth century, small industries such as saw mills, gristmills, salt manufacturing, and boatyards had started in the west. Transportation also improved and opened western Virginia for commercial pursuits. The opening of the Mississippi River meant businesses had a route around the region's mountains. Roads also developed. The 1818 Cumberland Road, from Cumberland to Wheeling, particularly benefited the west. However, it was the railroad that created the most change. As railroads penetrated through the trans-Allegheny region, populations in already settled areas doubled and even tripled, new places were settled, coal mines were opened, and other natural resources were harvested. As the region settled and became prosperous the west Virginians became more dissatisfied with the state's eastern government.

West Virginia remained part of the larger colony and then state of Virginia until the Civil War. Tension between the two regions of eastern and western Virginia was evident in the early nineteenth century. The Virginia constitution, adopted in 1776, provided the east with a number of advantages. For example, the document granted voting rights to white men owning twenty-five acres of worked land or fifty acres of unworked land, which favored the plantation culture of the east, not the small farmers of the west. The constitution also provided that slaves be taxedless than any other kind of property, which again benefited the east. To complicate matters the slave population was counted in determining representation in the state legislature. As a result of the east's dominance there was a corresponding distribution of funds. The majority of money for public works and government buildings went to the east.

In 1798 John G. Jackson, Harrison County delegate, presented the state government with a petition calling for amendments to the 1776 constitution. Although the petition was rejected, Jackson continued by writing for the Richmond Examiner with the pseudonym "A Mountaineer." His arguments became the foundation for reform. The legislature still refused to call a constitutional convention but made attempts to appease the westerners. The West, however, continued to voice their discontent and in 1828 the legislature finally agreed to a constitutional convention.

The western delegates had a number of goals including the extension of voting rights to all white men; representation based on white population; and election of county officials instead of appointment. The convention in Richmondon 5 October 1829 included past and future presidents, jurists, and an array of other statesmen. Unfortunately for the West, the convention's officers were elected using the traditional method, which meant the east had a distinct and profound advantage. Voters defeated every western goal. In response, every western delegate (except one too sick to attend) voted against the new constitution. Angered, some westerners called for immediate secession. In response the east granted some concessions over the next twenty years. However, the concessions still did not resolve the need to revise the 1776 constitution. A second convention called the Reform Convention convened in 1850. Despite the uneasy relationship between eastern and western delegates, they reached agreements on the remaining 1829 issues. The convention gave white males age twenty-one and older the right to vote; it made numerous offices elective; and it reformed the jury system.

During the 1850s the sectional troubles of the nation overshadowed Virginia's newfound harmony. Joseph Johnson, governor from 1852 to 1856, was the first popularly elected governor and also the first governor from the west. Johnson provided the western region with a real and psychological boost. Railroads continued to grow, as did commercial success. The region's population expanded and new counties formed. By the late 1850s, however, national tension over slavery began to disrupt Virginia. The two regions responded very differently to the growing sectional crisis. Westerners tended to remain moderate while the easterners were adamantly against abolition. Even after John Brown's 1859 raid on Harpers Ferry in western Virginia, the westerners remained moderate and calm, much to the chagrin of easterners who were outraged by Brown's actions.

Virginia as a whole was against secession. Even after the election of Abraham Lincoln and the secession of seven southern states in 1860 and early 1861, Virginia was still undecided. The course changed with Lincoln's call for volunteers after the 12 April 1861 firing on Fort Sumter, South Carolina. Virginia passed a secession ordinance on 17 April by a vote of eighty-five to fifty-five. Of forty-seven western delegates, thirty-two voted against secession, eleven favored secession, and four did not vote. The western delegates hurried back to their home counties and began to organize themselves for resistance.

A number of mass town meetings were held all over the west. The most significant of these was at Clarksburg organized by John S. Carlile. The meeting called for each West Virginia county to send five of its wisest men to Wheeling. During the first Wheeling Convention, 13–15 May 1861, Carlile's group wanted to separate from Virginia immediately. A more conservative group, led by Waitman T. Willey, wanted to wait until the people had a chance to vote on the secession ordinance. After three days of growing tension Carlile agreed to wait until the referendum.

The ordinance passed 23 May 1861. The second Wheeling Convention convened 11–25 June 1861, and nullified the secession ordinance and formed the "Restored" government of Virginia. On 24 October 1861, west Virginians voted 18,408 to 781 in favor of creating a new state. The constitutional convention met from 26 November 1861 until 18 February 1862. It outlined a new government and the physical boundaries of the state. According to the U.S. Constitution, any new state must have the permission of its parent state before it can achieve statehood. West Virginia asked the Restored government at Wheeling for permission to form a new state. On 13 May 1862, the Restored governor Francis Pierpont approved the formation of a new state. The West Virginia state bill went to Congress on 29 May 1862. After debate on the slavery issue the bill passed with one amendment. The Willey Amendment was a compromise; it provided for emancipation of slaves over twenty-one and the emancipation of younger slaves when they reached twenty-one. The bill passed and President Abraham Lincoln signed it on 31 December 1862. The people of the fifty western Virginian counties voted in favor of the statehood bill on 26 March 1863, and on 20 June 1863, West Virginia officially became the thirty-fifth state. Among other names considered for it were Kanawha, Western Virginia, Allegheny, and Augusta; of the forty-four votes the name "West Virginia" received thirty.

After the Civil War, Virginia and West Virginia struggled over an issue of compensation. After a number of legal battles, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that West Virginia owed Virginia $12,393,930. The debt was paid off over time with the last installment made in 1939.

Throughout the Civil War the Union held the advantage in West Virginia. Supporters for both the Union and the Confederacy lived in West Virginia, and the war literally split families as some members fought for the North and others for the South. West Virginians also served in militias and irregular units sympathetic to the Confederacy. The fighting in the western theater was guerrilla in nature consisting of raids, arson, robbery, and intimidation.

Reconstruction was difficult for West Virginia, despite its Union loyalty. Hostility between former Confederate and Union soldiers was a serious problem. Some Confederate sympathizers continued violence causing Arthur Boreman, West Virginia's first governor, to recommend citizens organize themselves for protection. The majority of Confederate veterans, however, were not violent and in some cases federal troops were called to protect former Confederates from Unionist violence.

Another concern was that former Confederates, most of whom held Democratic views, would threaten the existence of the new state. Lincoln's reelection in 1864 lessened those fears, but his assassination in 1865 aroused them again. Governor Boreman traveled to meet with now President Andrew Johnson, who promised West Virginia his support. Boreman's administration also restricted former Confederates from holding public office and curtailed their voting rights. The laws did not relax until a new governor, William E. Stevenson, took office. By 1871, former Confederates were allowed to vote and hold office.

With restrictions removed, the Democrats slowly came to power in West Virginia, controlling the state from 1871 until 1897. The state held a constitutional convention in 1872 where sixty-six of seventy-eight members were Democrats. The new constitution omitted the word "white" from voter qualifications, placed executive power with the governor, and made changes in the judicial and legislative branches. The Democratic Party consisted of a diverse group of former Confederates, Unionists, former Whigs, and Bourbon Democrats. Republicans resumed control in 1897 and stayed in power until 1933 when Democrats regained their influence.

Sectional difference also affected the location of the state's capital. The capital was in Wheeling from 1863 until 1870. Associating the city with radical Republicanism, the Democratic legislature moved the capital to Charleston where it stayed until 1875. Charleston, however, was much smaller than Wheeling, and it was harder to reach since it did not have a railroad or an established structure for shipping. Legislators moved the capital back to Wheeling. Finally, in 1877 the legislature agreed to hold a referendum to establish a permanent capital. The voters chose among Charleston, Clarksburg, and Martinsburg; Charleston won and officially became the permanent capital of West Virginia on 1 May 1885.

In 1863 over 80 percent of West Virginians were involved in agriculture. The most important crop was corn, but wheat, oats, hay, and potatoes were also important. By the late nineteenth century, extractive industries such as coal mining, lumbering, and oil and gas production had overshadowed agriculture, taking wealth from the land without returning profit to the state.

The bituminous coal industry soared after the Civil War and climbed until the Great Depression. In 1914 coal production was 69,783,088 tons and by 1929 the production was 139,297,146 tons. The importance and place of coal in West Virginia created a new socioeconomic structure. As big business moved into the region the agrarian society became a mass of landless wage earners. Mining towns created a system of worker dependence on the company. A variety of people sought employment in West Virginia's mines, including newly freed slaves and new immigrants. As smaller coal companies consolidated into large powerful corporations they gained more and more influence over local and state governments. The vast wealth that coal mining generated went to absentee landowners who cared little about the land, environment, or people.

The United Mine Workers of America (UMWA), organized in 1890, attempted to unionize West Virginia's coal miners. The powerful companies used special police, blacklisting, and court injunctions to block the UMWA from even meeting. Miners often tried striking in hopes of securing better working conditions, which resulted in their eviction from the company-owned housing. Often tensions between miners and company guards led to violence. One of the most violent episodes, the Paint Creek Strike of 1912–1913, resulted in martial law. The other extractive industries, oil, gas, and timber, developed along similar lines. The cycle of feudalistic absenteeism and the extractive nature of West Virginia's industries ravaged the environment and left the people in poverty.

During World War I, UMWA membership increased from 7,000 members in 1913 to 50,000 members by the end of the war. World War I also brought interest in chemical and steel industries. Labor made some advances, such as a workers' compensation law, but the wartime demand and necessity of industrial goods outweighed other needs. The Great Depression hit the entire Appalachian region especially hard. A 40 percent reduction in coal production meant a rise in unemployment in an already economically depressed area. For people whose whole lives depended on the company town, the Red Cross and religious organizations were often the only places left to turn. Falling in line with the rest of the country, West Virginia began to vote out Republicans in favor of Democrats. Although at the close of World War II West Virginia shared the nation's prosperity, the state experienced a drop in population largely due to an increased use of technology. Mechanization reduced the need for employees, so people went elsewhere for work.

West Virginia had few public schools before the Civil War, but advances came quickly between 1872 and World War I. West Virginia University opened 2 September 1868, in Morgantown. Still, financing schools was hard for the poor region. West Virginia did, however, establish a minimum wage for teachers: about $22 a month. Between 1910 and 1925 the state saw a surge in the growth of high schools, but the depression meant education took a backseat to survival. The 1940s and 1950s brought a wave of reforms to the educational system, including better benefits for teachers, new textbooks, merging elementary and secondary schools, and programs like Head Start and Upward Bound. Education, however, remained a problem well into the 1980s, due to financial problems in the state. In 1984 the average public teacher's salary was more than $4,000 less than the national average. Despite efforts to enact legislation to improve salaries and redesign state education financing, West Virginia's schools continued to suffer. At the beginning of the twenty-first century, the state's high school and college graduation rates were the nation's lowest.

The governors during the 1960s began to initiate programs to help clean up the state's environment. William Wallace Barron created the Air Pollution Control Commission and a volunteer statewide cleanup program, and Hulett Carlson Smith's administration brought legislation to control air and stream pollution and strip mining. During the environmental movement of the 1970s, attention was finally given to the drastic impact extractive industries made on the region's land and people. Clear cutting and strip mining created pollution that ruined streams and landscapes. Government programs such as the Appalachian Regional Commission and private organizations strove to help rebuild the regions and increase money coming into the Appalachian regions with tourism. During the 1980s, West Virginia suffered severely from the recession and energy crisis. By 1984 the state had the nation's highest unemployment rate. Renewed attention helped to draw some people to the region. In 1970 the population was 1,744,237 and by 2000 the number had increased somewhat to 1,808,344 but both were still lower than the 1950 count of 2,005,552. In the year 2000 West Virginia's poverty rates remained the highest in the nation.

The population drop also cost West Virginia a congressional seat. Arch Alfred Moore Jr., governor from 1985 to 1989, developed a recovery program and tax cuts designed to attract new industries and revitalize the coal industry. While West Virginia failed to attract GM's Saturn automobile plant in 1985 (the plant went to Spring-hill, Tennessee), by 1990 over two hundred corporations were receiving tax credits and bolstering the state's economy. Jobs in the coal industry, however, continued to decline. The program of tax cuts also led to widespread corruption so severe that Moore was convicted of extortion in 1990. The next governor, William Gaston Caperton III (1989–1997), inherited the state's financial woes. To battle the long-term financial problems, he raised taxes and adopted a state lottery to no avail.

A great deal of financial help stemmed from the efforts of Senator Robert C. Byrd. In 1986 Byrd became chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee and promised to bring more than $1 billion of federal projects to West Virginia by 1995; by 1992 he had exceeded that goal. Besides various highway and water projects, West Virginia also received a new federal prison and the FBI relocated its fingerprint center from Washington, D.C. to Clarksburg. The state also benefited from a new appreciation of Appalachian culture and art. Artists and novelists helped awaken the nation to West Virginia's beauty and plight while historians, sociologists, and anthropologists began to create a new body of scholarly interest and work about the region.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Ambler, Charles Henry. West Virginia. New York: Prentice-Hall, 1940.

Rasmussen, Barbara. Absentee Landowning and Exploitation in West Virginia, 1760–1920. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 1994.

Rice, Otis. The Allegheny Frontier: West Virginia Beginnings, 1730–1830. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 1970.

———and Stephen W. Brown. West Virginia: A History. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 1993.

West Virginia Division of Culture and History. Available from http://www.wvculture.org/.

Lisa A. Ennis

See also Civil War ; Virginia ; Virginia v. West Virginia .