The Confederation, however, did one piece of solid work worthy of everlasting praise. The Northwest Territory, embracing what is now Ohio, Indiana. Illinois, Michigan, and Wisconsin, had been ceded to the Union by the States which originally claimed it. July 13, 1787, Congress adopted for the government of the territory the famous Ordinance of 1787. It provided for a governor, council, and judges, to be appointed by Congress, and a house of representatives elected by the people. Its shining excellence was a series of compacts between the States and the territory, which guaranteed religious liberty, made grants of land and other liberal provisions for schools and colleges, and forever prohibited slavery in the territory or the States which should be made out of it. Thus were laid broad and deep the foundation for the full and free development of humanity in a region larger than the whole German Empire. The passing of the Ordinance was probably due in large measure to the influence of the Ohio Company, a colonist society organized in Boston the year before. It was composed of the flower of the Revolutionary army, and had wealth, energy, and intelligence. When its agent appeared before Congress to arrange for the purchase of five million acres of land in the Ohio Valley, a bill for the government of the territory, containing neither the antislavery clause nor the immortal principles of the compacts, was on the eve of passage. The Company, composed mostly of Massachusetts men, strongly desired their future home to be upon free soil. Their influence prevailed with Congress, eager for revenue from the sale of lands, and even the Southern members voted unanimously for the remodelled ordinance. The establishment of a strong and enlightened government in the territory led to its rapid settlement. Marietta, 0., was founded in April, 1788, and other colonies followed in rapid succession. CHAPTER X. RISE OF THE NEW CONSTITUTION [1787] The anarchy succeeding the Revolution was as sad as the Revolution itself had been glorious. The Articles of Confederation furnished practically no government with which foreign nations could deal; England still clung to the western posts, contrary to the treaty of peace, with no power anywhere on this side to do more than protest; the debt of the confederacy steadily piled up its unpaid interest; the land was flooded with irredeemable paper money, state and national; the confederacy's laws and constitution were ignored or trampled upon everywhere; and the arrogance and self-seeking of the several States surpassed everything but their own contemptible weakness.