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THE SECOND LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL.

(1789.)

THE ratification of the Constitution of the United States by a sufficient number of states having occurred during the latter part of the year 1784, and President Washington having assumed the reigns of government thereunder, it was construed to be the duty of the Executive to appoint such officers whose commissions, having been issued by the Congress under the old form of government, were held to have expired with that government. In pursuance of this conception of his duty, the President, in a letter dated New York, August 18, 1789, nominated for the officers of the Northwest Territory : Arthur St. Clair for Governor, and Messrs. Samuel Holden Parsons, John Cleves Symmes, and William Barton (vice Varnum deceased), Judges. The nominations were confirmed by the Senate of the United States, but Mr. Barton declining the apppintment, the President nominated Mr. George Turner, who was confirmed on the eighth day of September.
There is no public record of the acts of the council during the year 1789. In November of this year, Judge Parsons, who was the Chief justice of the court, was drowned in a ford in the Muskingum valley, while returning to the seat of government from a treaty council with the Indians of the Western Reserve.

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