the american territorial systemby john porter bloom

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Journal of the Southwest The American Territorial System by John Porter Bloom Review by: Maxine Benson Arizona and the West, Vol. 17, No. 2 (Summer, 1975), pp. 163-164 Published by: Journal of the Southwest Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/40168430 . Accessed: 16/06/2014 11:42 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp . JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. . Journal of the Southwest is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Arizona and the West. http://www.jstor.org This content downloaded from 194.29.185.216 on Mon, 16 Jun 2014 11:42:40 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

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Page 1: The American Territorial Systemby John Porter Bloom

Journal of the Southwest

The American Territorial System by John Porter BloomReview by: Maxine BensonArizona and the West, Vol. 17, No. 2 (Summer, 1975), pp. 163-164Published by: Journal of the SouthwestStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/40168430 .

Accessed: 16/06/2014 11:42

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at .http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp

.JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range ofcontent in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new formsof scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].

.

Journal of the Southwest is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Arizona andthe West.

http://www.jstor.org

This content downloaded from 194.29.185.216 on Mon, 16 Jun 2014 11:42:40 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

Page 2: The American Territorial Systemby John Porter Bloom

REVIEWS 163

mended to the general public, but rather to serious students of the Mohave or the other Yumans of Western Arizona.

Cliff Trafzer

The reviewer is a doctoral graduate of Oklahoma State University, Stillwater, and Curator of the Century House at Yuma, Arizona.

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THE AMERICAN TERRITORIAL SYSTEM. Edited by John Porter Bloom. Athens: Ohio University Press, 1973. 248 pp. $10.00.

In 1969 the first conference on the history of the territories was held at the National Archives in Washington under the direction of John Porter Bloom, editor of The Territorial Papers of the United States. This volume contains the

papers presented at that conference, along with notes on the ensuing discussions and descriptions of pertinent source materials in the National Archives.

Following a tribute and a memoir to Clarence Carter by Philip D. Jordan and Harold W. Ryan, respectively, the conference papers are grouped in five

major sections. The Northwest Ordinance section contains two papers: "Con- stitutionalism and the Settlement of the West: The Attainment of Consensus, 1754-1784" by Arthur Bestor; and "The Northwest Ordinance and the Principle of Territorial Evolution" by Robert F. Berkhofer, Jr. In the section entitled The Territories and the Congress are "Early Delegates in the House of Representa- tives" by Jo Tice Bloom and "Stephen A. Douglas and the Territories in the Senate," by Robert W. Johannsen. "The Role of the Territorial Supreme Courts: The Historian's View" by John D. W. Guice and "The Federal Judges of the Utah Territory from a Lawyer's Point of View" by William Lee Knecht appear in Territorial Courts of the Far West. In The Territories: Land and Politics are "The Federal Land Survey System and the Mountain West, 1870-1896" by Thomas G. Alexander and "Pattern and Structure in Western Territorial Poli- tics" by Kenneth N. Owens. The last section, The Territories in the Twentieth

Century, includes "George Curry of New Mexico: Territorial Governor in a

Changing Era" by Robert W. Larson, "United States Territories in Mid-Cen-

tury" by Robert R. Robbins, and "The American Territories of Today and Tomor- row" by Harrison Loesch.

As Bloom points out in his introduction, territorial history can be defined in a number of ways; for the conference, however, the definition used was that on which the Territorial Papers is based, with the resulting papers being "rather

strictly political history, illustrative of territorial administrative history." Method-

ologically, the essays also are cast in a traditional mode, with quantifiers and statisticians absent from the proceedings.

Although all of the papers maintain a high level of quality, the contributions

by Owens and Berkhofer are especially provocative. Owens ranges over the entire western political scene in an effort to observe the "few standard variations" that

This content downloaded from 194.29.185.216 on Mon, 16 Jun 2014 11:42:40 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

Page 3: The American Territorial Systemby John Porter Bloom

164 ARIZONA and the WEST

emerged, while Berkhofer discusses the Northwest Ordinance as "the culmination of American thinking about the nature of a colonial system for a republican empire." Both papers will repay careful attention. Fully as valuable as the papers are the discussions of sources available for territorial history in the National Archives. Indeed, one of the purposes of the conference, and of others in the Archives series, is to acquaint scholars with the nature and variety of materials in the various record groups, and this conference succeeded admirably in this mission.

In light of the notable contributions of the volume, criticisms are minor indeed. An index would have been a welcome addition, as would have been a series of maps. Also a matter of some regret is the lapse of time between the con- ference and the publication of the papers. However, on balance, one can only applaud the National Archives for its sponsorship of the conference and Bloom for his efforts as coordinator and editor. Ohio University Press as well has done

justice to the endeavor in its publication of The American Territorial System, a volume that belongs in the library of every Western historian.

Maxine Benson

Dr. Benson is Curator of Documentary Resources at the State Historical Society of Colorado, Denver, and a student of American territorial history.

PRELUDE TO GLORY. Edited by Herbert Krause & Gary D. Olson. Sioux Falls, South Dakota: Brevet Press, 1974. 279 pp. $7.95.

CURSE NOT HIS CURLS. By Robert Ege. Fort Collins, Colorado: Old Army Press, 1974. 152 pp. $8.50.

Nineteen-hundred and seventy-six, as we all know, is a celebration year. For some it will conjure up visions of a red-coated adversary and Paul Revere's fabled midnight ride. Others will be more inclined to narrow their vision a cen-

tury and recall a red-skinned warrior and George A. Custer's ill-fated mid-after- noon attack. Yes, with the centennial anniversary of the Little Big Horn but around the corner, Western Americana specialists can look for a new deluge of Custer books, memorabilia and commemorations.

One of the more interesting publications to capitalize on the Custer renais- sance is Prelude to Glory, a reprint of newspaper accounts of the 1874 gold-seek- ing Black Hills Expedition. This work was initiated through a grant by the South Dakota Bicentennial Commission, supported by Augustana College's Center for Western Studies, and edited by Herbert Krause and Gary D. Olson. Three West- ern and two Eastern newspapers sent correspondents with Custer on this fact-

This content downloaded from 194.29.185.216 on Mon, 16 Jun 2014 11:42:40 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions