Chapter X: Part 10

_Population._--The population in 1880 was 648,936; in 1890, 661,086; in 1900, 694,466; and in 1910, 742,371.[4] From 1880 to 1900 there was an increase of only 7%, a percentage which was exceeded in every other state in the Union except Nevada and Vermont. Of the total population of 1900, 599,291, or 86.3%, were native whites, 93,330 were foreign-born, 1,319 were negroes, 798 were Indians, 119 were Chinese, and 4 were Japanese. Of the inhabitants born in the United States, 588,211, or 97.8%, were natives of New England and 560,506 were natives of Maine, and of the foreign-born 67,077, or 71.8%, were natives of Canada (36,169 English and 30,908 French), and 10,159, or 10.8%, were natives of Ireland. Of the total population, 199,734 were of foreign parentage--i.e. either one or both parents were foreign-born--and 89,857 were of Canadian parentage, both on the father's and on the mother's side (41,355 English and 48,502 French). The French-speaking inhabitants probably number considerably more than 50,000. They are of two quite distinct classes. One, numbering about 15,000, includes those who became citizens by the establishment of the northern boundary in 1842 and their descendants. They are largely of Acadian stock. The state has established among them a well-appointed training school for teachers, conducted in the English language, the graduates of which render excellent service in the common schools. The other class is of French-Canadian immigrants, who find profitable employment in the manufacturing centres. The colony of Swedes established by the state near its north-eastern border in 1870 has proved in every way successful. The Indians are remnants of the Penobscot and Passamaquoddy tribes, the Passamaquoddies being a little the more numerous. The Penobscots' chief gathering places are on the islands of the Penobscot river north of Old Town; the Passamaquoddies', on the shores of Passamaquoddy Bay and the banks of the Saint Croix river.

Roman Catholics are more numerous than all the Protestant sects taken together, having in 1906 a membership of 113,419 out of a total of 212,988 in all denominations. In the last decade of the 19th century the urban population (i.e. population of places having 4,000 inhabitants or more) increased from 226,268 to 251,685, or 11.2%; the semi-urban population (i.e. population of incorporated places, or the approximate equivalent, having less than 4,000 inhabitants) increased from 14,221 to 26,674, or 87.5%; while the rural population (i.e. population outside of incorporated places) decreased from 420,597 to 416,134, or 1%. The principal cities of the state are: Portland, pop. (1910), 58,571; Lewiston, 26,247; Bangor, 24,803; Biddeford, 17,079; Auburn, 15,064; Augusta (the capital), 13,211; Waterville, 11,458; Bath, 9,396; Westbrook, 8,281; and Rockland, 8,174.

_Administration._--Maine has had but one state constitution; this was ratified in December 1819, about three months before the admission of the state into the Union. It admits of amendment by a two-thirds vote of both houses of the legislature followed by a majority vote of the electorate at the next September election; or, as provided by an amendment adopted in 1875, the legislature may by a two-thirds vote of each house summon a constitutional convention. From 1819 to 1875 twelve amendments were adopted; in 1875, after nine more were added, the twenty-one were incorporated in the text; and between 1875 and 1899 nine more were adopted. Suffrage is conferred by the constitution on all male citizens of the United States who are at least twenty-one years of age and have, for some other reason than because of being in the military, naval or marine service of the United States, or of being students at college, lived in the state for three months next preceding any election; the following classes, however, are excepted: paupers, persons under guardianship, Indians not taxed, and, as provided by an amendment adopted in 1892, persons intellectually incapable of reading the state constitution in the English language or of writing their names. State elections were annual until 1897 when they were made biennial; they are held on the second Monday in September in even numbered years, Maine being one of the few states in the Union in which they are not held in November.

The governor is the only executive officer of the state elected by
popular vote. There is no lieutenant-governor, the president of the
Senate succeeding to the office of governor in case of a vacancy, but
there is a council of seven members elected by the legislature (not
more than one from any one senatorial district), whose sole function
is to advise the governor. The governor's term of office is two years
(before 1879 it was one year); and the constitution further directs
that he shall be at least thirty years of age at the beginning of his
term, that he shall be a native-born citizen of the United States,
that when elected he shall have been a resident of the state for five
years, and that he shall reside in the state while in office. His
power of appointment is unusually extensive and the advice and consent
of the council (instead of that of the Senate as in other states) are
required for his appointments. He appoints all judges, coroners and
notaries public, besides all other civil and military officers for
whose appointment neither the constitution nor the laws provide
otherwise. The governor is commander-in-chief of the state militia.
Any bill of which he disapproves he can within five days after its
passage prevent from becoming a law unless it is passed over his veto
by a two-thirds vote of each house of the legislature. He and the
council examine and pass upon election returns; he may summon extra
sessions of the legislature, and he may grant pardons, reprieves, and
commutations in all cases except impeachment, but the manner of
hearing applications for pardon is in a measure prescribed by statute,
and he must present to the legislature an account of each case in
which he grants a pardon. His salary is $2,000 a year. The seven
members of the council, the secretary of state, the treasurer, the
attorney general and the commissioner of agriculture are elected
biennially by a joint ballot of the two houses of the legislature,
which also elects, one every two years, the three state assessors,
whose term is six years.

The legislature meets biennially at Augusta, the capital, and is
composed of a Senate of thirty-one members and a House of
Representatives of one hundred and fifty-one members. Members of each
house are elected for a term of two years: one senator from each
senatorial district and one to seven representatives (one for a
population of 1,500, and seven for a population of 26,250) from each
township, or, where the township or plantation has less than 1,500
inhabitants, from each representative district, according to its
population. There is a new reapportionment every ten years, counting
from 1821. Every senator and every representative must at the
beginning of his term have been for five years a citizen of the United
States, for one year a resident of the state, and for three months
next preceding his election, as well as during his term of office, a
resident of the township or district which he represents; and every
senator must be at least twenty-five years of age. All revenue bills
must originate in the House of Representatives, but to such bills the
Senate may propose amendments provided they relate solely to raising
revenue. Other bills may originate in either house. In September 1908
a constitutional amendment was adopted providing for referendum and
initiative by the people. Any bill proposed in the legislature or
passed by it must be referred to popular vote before becoming law, if
there is a referendum petition therefor signed by 10,000 voters; and a
petition signed by 12,000 voters initiates new legislation.

At the head of the department of justice is the supreme judicial
court, which consists of a chief justice and seven associate justices
appointed by the governor and council for a term of seven years. When
it sits as a law court, at least five of its justices must be present,
and it holds three such sessions annually: one at Augusta, one at
Bangor, and one at Portland. But only one of its justices is required
for a trial court, and trial courts are held two or three times a year
in each county for the trial of both civil and criminal cases which
come before it in the first instance or upon appeal. In Cumberland and
Kennebec counties there is a superior court presided over by one
justice and having extensive civil and criminal jurisdiction; and in
each of the counties there are a probate court for the settlement of
the estates of deceased persons and courts of the trial justice and
the justice of the peace for the trial of petty offences and of civil
cases in which the debt or damage involved does not exceed $20.

The principal forms of local government are the town (or township),
the plantation, the county and the city. As in other parts of New
England, the town is the most important of these. At the regular town
meeting held in March the electorate of the town assembles, decides
what shall be done for the town during the ensuing year, elects
officers to execute its decisions with limited discretion, and votes
money to meet the expenses. The principal officers are the selectmen
(usually three), town clerk, assessors, collector, treasurer, school
committee and road commissioner. A populous section of a town, in
order to promote certain financial ends, is commonly incorporated as a
village without however becoming a governing organization distinct
from the town. Maine is the only state in the Union that retains what
is known as the organized plantation. This is a governmental unit
organized from an unincorporated township having at least 200
inhabitants,[5] and its principal officers are the moderator, clerk,
three assessors, treasurer, collector, constable and school committee.
The county is a sort of intermediate organization between the state
and the towns to assist chiefly in the administration of justice,
especially in the custody of offenders, and in the making and care of
roads. Its officers are three commissioners, a treasurer, a register
of deeds, a judge and a register of probate, and a sheriff. They are
all elected: the commissioners for a term of six years, one retiring
every two years, the register of deeds and the judge and the register
of probate for a term of four years, and the others for two years.
Among other duties the commissioners care for county property, manage
county business and take charge of county roads. Maine has no general
law under which cities are chartered, and does not even set a minimum
population. A town may, therefore, be incorporated as a city whenever
it can obtain from the legislature a city charter which a majority of
its electorate prefers to a continuance under its town government;
consequently there is much variety in the government of the various
cities of the state.

By the laws of Maine the property rights of a wife are approximately equal to those of a husband. A woman does not lose nor a man acquire right to property by marriage, and a wife may manage, sell, or will her property without the assent of her husband. She may even receive as her own the wages of her personal labour which was not performed for her own family. In the absence of a will, bar or release, there is no legal distinction between the rights of a widower in the estate of his deceased wife and those of a widow in the estate of her deceased husband. The grounds for divorce in the state are adultery, impotence, extreme cruelty, desertion for three consecutive years next preceding the application, gross and confirmed habits of intoxication, cruel and abusive treatment, or a husband's gross or wanton refusal or neglect to provide a suitable maintenance for his wife.

Under the laws of Maine a householder owning and occupying a house and lot may hold the same, or such part of it as does not exceed $500 in value, as a homestead exempt from attachment, except for the satisfaction of liens for labour or material, by filing in the registry of deeds a certificate stating his desire for such an exemption, provided he is not the owner of an exempted lot purchased from the state; and the exemption may be continued during the widowhood of his widow or the minority of his children. A considerable amount of personal property, including apparel, household furniture not exceeding $100 in value, a library not exceeding $150 in value, interest in a pew in a meeting-house, and a specified amount of fuel, provisions, tools or farming implements, and domestic animals, and one fishing boat, is also exempt from attachment.

Maine was the first state in the Union to enact a law for prohibiting the sale of intoxicating liquors. An act for restricting the sale of such liquors was passed in 1846; the first prohibitory act was passed, largely through the influence of Neal Dow, in 1851; this was frequently amended; and in 1884 an amendment to the constitution was adopted which declares the manufacture of intoxicating liquors and their sale, except "for medicinal and mechanical purposes and the arts," forever prohibited. By the law enacted for enforcing this prohibition the governor and council appoint a state liquor commissioner from whom alone the selectmen of a town, the mayor or aldermen of a city, are authorized to receive the liquors which may be sold within the exceptions named in the amendment, and the selectmen, mayor or aldermen appoint an agent who alone is authorized to sell any of these liquors within their jurisdiction and who is forbidden to sell any whatever to minors, Indians, soldiers and drunkards. But the law labours under the disadvantage of all laws not vigorously sustained by general public sentiment, and is grossly violated. For the most part it is executed to the degree demanded by local sentiment in the several municipalities, thus operating in practice much the same as a "local option" law. The law looks to checking the demand by preventing the supply; and since habitual reliance on the stringency of law tends to the neglect of other influences for the removal of evils from the community, the citizens seem to absolve themselves from personal responsibility, both for the execution of the law and for the existence of the evil itself. There has been a strong movement for the repeal of the law, and the question of prohibition has long been an important one in state politics.

The death penalty was abolished in Maine in 1876, restored in 1883, and again abolished in 1887.

_Penal and Charitable Institutions._--The state penal and reformatory
institutions consist of the state prison at Thomaston, the state
(reform) school for boys at South Portland, and a state industrial
school for girls at Hallowell, established in 1875 and taken over by
the state in 1899. The two schools are not places of punishment, but
reformatory schools for delinquent boys (from 8 to 16 years of age)
and girls (from 6 to 16 years), who have been committed by the courts
for violations of law, and, in the case of girls, who, by force of
circumstances or associations, are "in manifest danger of becoming
outcasts of society." The prison is in charge of a board of three
inspectors and a warden, and each of the other two institutions is in
charge of a board of trustees; the inspectors, warden, and trustees
are all appointed by the governor and council. Convicts in the prison
are usually employed in the manufacture of articles that are not
extensively made elsewhere in the state, such as carriages, harness,
furniture and brooms. The inmates of the state school for boys receive
instruction in farming, carpentry, tailoring, laundry work, and
various other trades and occupations; and the girls in the state
industrial school are trained in housework, laundering, dressmaking,
&c. Paupers are cared for chiefly by the towns and cities, those
wholly dependent being placed in almshouses and those only partially
dependent receiving aid at their homes. The charitable institutions
maintained by the state are: the military and naval orphan asylum at
Bath, the Maine institution for the blind at Portland, the Maine
school for the deaf (established in 1876, and taken over by the state
in 1897) at Portland, the Maine insane hospital at Augusta, the
Eastern Maine insane hospital at Bangor, and a school for the
feeble-minded (established in 1907) at West Pownal, each of which is
governed by trustees appointed by the governor and council, with the
exception of a part of those of the orphan asylum, who are appointed
by the corporation. Besides the strictly state institutions, there are
a number of private charitable institutions which are assisted by
state funds; among these are the eye and ear infirmary at Portland,
the Maine state sanatorium at Hebron for the treatment of
tuberculosis, and various hospitals, orphanages, &c. The national
government has a branch of the national home for disabled volunteer
soldiers at Togus, and a marine hospital at Portland.

_Education._--The school-district system was established in 1800 while
Maine was still a part of Massachusetts and was maintained by the
first school law passed, in 1821, by the state legislature; but,
beginning in the next year, one town after another received the
privilege of abolishing its districts, and in 1893 the system was
abolished by act of the legislature. A state board of education,
composed of one member from each county, was established in 1846, but
for this was substituted, in 1852, a commissioner of schools for each
county, appointed by the governor, and two years later a state
superintendent of schools was substituted for the county
commissioners. County supervision by county supervisors was tried in
1869-1872. Since these several changes the common school system has
been administered by towns and cities subject to an increasing amount
of control through enactments of the state legislature and the general
supervision of the state superintendent. The town officers are a
superintending school committee of three members and a superintendent.
The members of the committee are elected for a term of three years,
one retiring every year, and women as well as men are eligible for the
office. The superintendent may be elected by the town or appointed by
the committee, or towns having not less than twenty or more than fifty
schools may unite in employing a superintendent. In cities the
committee is usually larger than in towns and is commonly elected by
wards. Since 1889 each town and city has been required to furnish
textbooks, apparatus and supplies, without cost to the pupils. The
minimum length of the school year is fixed by a statute of 1893 at
twenty weeks; the average length is about twenty-eight weeks. A
compulsory education law, enacted in 1901, requires the attendance at
some public or approved private school of each child between the ages
of seven and fifteen during all the time that school is in session,
except that necessary absences may be excused. For the maintenance of
the common schools each town is required (since 1905) to raise
annually at least fifty-five cents _per capita_, exclusive of what may
be received from other sources, and to this is added the proceeds of a
state tax of one and a half mills on a dollar, one-half the proceeds
of the tax on savings banks, a 6% income from the permanent school
fund (derived mainly from the sale of school lands), and state
appropriations for the payment in part of the superintendence in towns
that have united for that purpose. Any section of a town may establish
and maintain a high school provided there be not more than two such
schools in one town, and the state makes appropriations for the
support of such schools equal to one-half the cost of instruction, but
the maximum grant to any one such school is $250.

The state maintains five normal schools: that at Farmington
(established 1864), that at Castine (1866), that at Gorham (1879);
that at Presque Isle (the Aroostook state normal school, 1903), and
the Madawaska training school at Fort Kent, each of which is under the
direction of a board of trustees consisting of the governor, the state
superintendent of schools, and five other members appointed by the
governor and council for not more than three years. At the head of the
public school system is the university of Maine, near the village of
Orono in Orono township (pop. in 1900, 3257), Penobscot county. This
institution was founded in 1865 as the state college of agriculture
and the mechanic arts; in 1897 the present name was adopted. It
embraces a college of arts and sciences, a college of agriculture, a
college of technology (including a department of forestry), a college
of law (at Bangor), and a college of pharmacy. The most conspicuous of
its twenty-five buildings is the library, built with funds contributed
by Andrew Carnegie. In 1908-1909 the university had 104 instructors
and 884 students, of whom 113 were in the college of law at Bangor and
420 in the college of technology. The university is maintained with
the proceeds of an endowment fund derived chiefly from public lands
given by the national government in accordance with the land grant, or
Morrill, Act of 1862 (see Morrill, Justin S.) and from the bequest
($100,000) of Abner Coburn (1803-1885); by appropriations of Congress
under the second Morrill Act (1890), and under the Nelson Amendment of
1907, by appropriations of the state legislature, and by fees paid by
the students. Connected with the university is an agricultural
experiment station, established and maintained under the Hatch Act
(1887) and the Adams Act (1906) of the national Congress. The
government of the university is entrusted, subject to inspection of
the governor and council, to a board of eight trustees. Among the
important institutions of learning which have no official connexion
with the state are Bowdoin College (opened in 1802), at Brunswick;
Colby College (Baptist, opened in 1818), at Waterville; and Bates
College (originally Free Baptist but now unsectarian; opened in 1863),
at Lewiston. In 1900 5.1% of the state's inhabitants ten years of age
and over were illiterate (i.e. could neither read nor write, or could
read but not write); of the native whites within this age limit 2.4%
were illiterate, of the foreign whites, 19.4%. Of the foreign-born
whites 15.7% were unable to speak English.

_Finance._--The chief sources of the state's revenue are a general
property tax and taxes on the franchises of corporations, especially
those of railway and insurance companies and savings banks; among the
smaller sources are licences or fees, a poll tax, and a collateral
inheritance tax. The general property tax for state and local purposes
is assessed by local assessors, but their work is reviewed for the
purpose of equalization among the several towns and counties by a
board of state assessors, which also assesses the corporations. This
board of three members (not more than two of whom may be of the same
political party) is elected by a joint ballot of the two houses of the
legislature for a term of six years, one member retiring every two
years. The state is prohibited by the constitution from creating a
debt exceeding $300,000 except for the suppression of a rebellion, for
repelling an invasion, or for war purposes; and every city and town is
forbidden by an amendment adopted in 1877 from creating one exceeding
5% of the assessed value of its property. But the state was authorized
by an amendment adopted in 1868 to issue bonds for the reimbursement
of the expenses incurred by its cities, towns, and plantations on
account of the Civil War, and these bonds, with those issued by the
state itself during the Civil War, constituted the largest part of the
state's bonded indebtedness. The bonded debt, however, is rapidly
being paid; in January 1901 it was $2,103,000, and in January 1909
only $698,000.

_History._--During the 16th century and the early part of the 17th, the coast of Maine attracted various explorers, among them Giovanni da Verrazano (1524), Estéban Gomez (1525), Bartholomew Gosnold (1602), Martin Pring (1603), Pierre du Guast, Sieur De Monts (1604), George Weymouth (1605), and John Smith (1614), who explored and mapped the coast and gave to the country the name New England; but no permanent English settlement was established within what are now the borders of the state until some time between 1623 and 1629. In 1603 De Monts received from Henry IV. of France a charter for all the region between 40° and 46° N. under the name of Acadie, or Acadia, and in 1604 he built a fort on Neutral Island at the mouth of the Saint Croix river. This he abandoned in 1605, but some of his followers were in the vicinity a few years later. In the same year George Weymouth explored the south-west coast, kidnapped five Indians, and carried them to England, where three of them lived for a time in the family of Sir Ferdinando Gorges, who soon became the leader in founding Maine. In 1607 the Plymouth Company, of which he was an influential member and which had received a grant of this region from James I. of England in the preceding year, sent out a colony numbering 120 under George Popham (c. 1550-1608), brother of Sir John Popham, and Raleigh Gilbert, son of Sir Humphrey Gilbert. The colony established itself at the mouth of the Kennebec river in August, but, finding its supplies insufficient, about three-fifths of its number returned to England in December; a severe winter followed and Popham died; then Gilbert, who succeeded to the presidency of the council for the colony, became especially interested in his claim to the territory under his father's charter,[6] and in 1608 the colony was abandoned. In 1609 the French Jesuits Biard and Masse established a fortified mission station on the island of Mount Desert, and although this as well as the remnant of De Monts' settlement at the mouth of the Saint Croix was taken in 1613 by Sir Samuel Argall (d. 1626), acting under the instructions of the English at Jamestown, Virginia, some of these colonists returned later. In 1620 the Council for New England, the successor of the Plymouth Company, obtained a grant of the country between latitude 40° and 48° N. extending from sea to sea, and two years later Gorges and John Mason (1586-1635) received from the Council a grant of the territory between the Merrimac and the Kennebec rivers for 60 m. inland under the name of the Province of Maine. In 1629 they divided their possession, Gorges taking the portion between the Piscataqua and the Kennebec. Numerous grants of land in this vicinity followed within a few years; and in the meantime permanent settlements at York, Saco, Biddeford, Port Elizabeth, Falmouth (now Portland) and Scarborough were established in rapid succession. The Council for New England surrendered its charter in 1635. In the division of its territory Gorges retained the portion previously granted to him, and the region between the Kennebec and the Saint Croix north to the Saint Lawrence, though still claimed by the French as part of Acadia, was conveyed to Sir William Alexander (1567?-1640); later, in 1664, this was conveyed to the duke of York, afterwards James II. of England.

Gorges named his tract the County of New Somersetshire, and immediately began the administration of government, setting up in 1635 or 1636 a court at Saco under the direction of his kinsman William Gorges. In 1639 he procured for his province a royal charter modelled after that of Maryland, which invested him with the feudal tenure of a county palatine and vice-regal powers of government. He called into existence a formidably large number of officers to govern it, but his charter was in conflict with the other (mutually conflicting) grants of the Council for New England, east of the Piscataqua; and Gorges and his agents met with a determined opposition under the leadership of George Cleeve, the deputy-president of the Lygonia, or "Plough" Patent, which extended along the coast from Cape Porpoise to Casco, and in issuing which the Council for New England had granted governmental as well as territorial rights. Moreover, Puritan Massachusetts, which was naturally hostile to the Anglicanism of Gorges and his followers, interpreted her charter so as to make her northern boundary run east and west from a point 3 m. north of the source of the Merrimac river, and on this basis laid claim to practically the whole of Maine then settled. The factional quarrels there, together with the Commonwealth government in England, made it easy for Massachusetts to enforce this claim at the time, and between 1652 and 1658 Maine was gradually annexed to Massachusetts. In 1672 Massachusetts extended her boundary eastward as far as Penobscot Bay. Ferdinando Gorges, a grandson of the original proprietor, brought before parliament his claim to Maine and in 1664 a committee of that body decided in his favour; but Massachusetts successfully resisted until 1677, when the king in council decided against her. She then quietly purchased the Gorges claim for £1,250 and held the province as a proprietor until 1691, when by the new Massachusetts charter Maine was extended to the Saint Croix river, and was made an integral part of Massachusetts.

The French still claimed all territory east of the Penobscot, and not only was Maine an exposed frontier and battleground during the long struggle of the English against the Indians and the French, but its citizens bore a conspicuous part in the expeditions beyond its borders. Port Royal was taken in May 1690 by Sir William Phipps and Louisburg in June 1745 by Sir William Pepperell, both these commanders being from Maine. These expeditions were such a drain on Maine's population that Massachusetts was called upon to send men to garrison the little forts that protected the homes left defenceless by men who had gone to the front. During the War of Independence, the town of Falmouth (now Portland), which had ardently resisted the claims of the British, was bombarded and burned, in 1775; in the same year Benedict Arnold followed the course of the Kennebec and Dead rivers on his expedition to Quebec; and from 1779 to 1783 a British force was established at Castine. The embargo and non-intercourse laws from 1807 to 1812 were a severe blow to Maine's shipping, and in the War of 1812 Eastport, Castine, Hampden, Bangor and Machias fell into the hands of the British.

Maine was in general well governed as a part of Massachusetts, but a geographical separation, a desire to be rid of the burden of a large state debt, and a difference of economic interests as well as of politics (Maine was largely Democratic and Massachusetts was largely Federalist) created a desire for an independent commonwealth. This was felt before the close of the War of Independence and in 1785-1787 conventions were held at Falmouth (Portland) to consider the matter, but the opposition prevailed. The want of protection during the War of 1812 revived the question, and in 1816 the General Court in response to a great number of petitions submitted to a vote in the towns and plantations of the District the question: "Shall the legislature be requested to give its consent to the separation of the District of Maine from Massachusetts, and the erection of said District into a separate state?" The returns showed 10,393 yeas to 6501 nays, but they also showed that less than one-half the full vote had been cast. Acting upon these returns the legislature passed a bill prescribing the terms of separation, and directed another vote of the towns and plantations upon the question of separation and the election of delegates to a convention at Brunswick which should proceed to frame a constitution in case the second popular vote gave a majority of five to four for separation; but as that vote was only 11,969 yeas to 10,347 nays the advocates of separation were unsuccessful. But a large source of opposition to separation was removed in 1819 when Congress, dividing the east coast of the United States into two great districts, did away with the regulation which, making each state a district for entering and clearing vessels, would have required coasting vessels from the ports of Maine as a separate state to enter and clear on every trip to or from Boston; as a consequence, the separation measures were carried by large majorities this year, a constitution was framed by a convention which met at Portland in October, this was ratified by town meetings in December, and Maine applied for admission into the Union. Owing to the peculiar situation at the time in Congress, arising from the contest over the admission of Missouri, the question of the admission of Maine became an important one in national politics. By an Act of the 3rd of March 1820, however, Maine was finally admitted into the Union as a separate state, her admission being a part of the Missouri compromise (q.v.).

The boundary on the north had not yet been ascertained, and it had long been a subject of dispute between the United States and Great Britain. The treaty of 1783 (Article II.) had defined the north-east boundary of the United States as extending along the middle of the river St Croix "from its mouth in the bay of Fundy to its source" and "due north from the source of St Croix river to the highlands; along the said highlands which divide those rivers that empty themselves into the river St Lawrence from those which fall into the Atlantic Ocean, to the north-westernmost head of Connecticut river; thence down along the middle of that river to the forty-fifth degree of north latitude." Great Britain claimed that the due north line was 40 m. long and ran to Mars Hill in Aroostook county, and that the highlands ran thence westerly 115 m. to the source of the Chaudière; the United States, on the other hand, claimed that the northerly line was 140 m. long, running to highlands dividing the Ristigouche and the tributaries of the Metis; and there was a further disagreement with regard to the side of the highlands on which the boundary should be, and as to what stream was the "north-westernmost head of Connecticut river." The fifth article of the Jay treaty of 1794 provided for a commission to decide what the St Croix river actually was, and this commission in 1798 defined the St Croix, saying that its mouth was in Passamaquoddy bay and that the boundary ran up this river and the Cheputnatecook to a marked monument. The treaty of Ghent in 1814 (Article IV.) referred the question of the ownership of the islands in Passamaquoddy bay to a commission which gave Moose, Dudley and Frederick islands to the United States; and the same treaty by Article V. provided for the survey (which was made in 1817-1818) of a part of the disputed territory, and for a general commission. The general commissioners met at St Andrews, N.B., in 1816, and in New York City in 1822, only to disagree; and when the king of the Netherlands, chosen as arbitrator in 1829 (under the Convention of 1827) rendered in 1831 a decision against which the state of Maine protested, the Federal Senate withheld its assent to his decision. In 1838-1839 the territory in dispute between New Brunswick and Maine became the scene of a border "war," known as the "Aroostook disturbance"; Maine erected forts along the line she claimed, Congress authorized the president to resist any attempt of Great Britain to enforce exclusive jurisdiction over the disputed territory, and an armed conflict seemed imminent. General Winfield Scott was sent to take command on the Maine frontier, and on the 21st of March 1839 he arranged a truce and a joint occupancy of the territory in dispute until a satisfactory settlement should be reached by the United States and Great Britain. The Webster-Ashburton treaty of 1842 was a compromise, which allowed Maine about 5500 sq. m. less than she had claimed and allowed Great Britain about as much less than her claim; all grants of land previously made by either party within the limits of the territory which by this treaty fell within the dominions of the other party were to be "held valid, ratified and confirmed to the persons in possession under such grants, to the same extent as if such territory had ... fallen within the dominions of the party by whom such grants were made"; and the government of the United States agreed to pay to Maine and Massachusetts[7] "in equal moieties" the sum of $300,000 as compensation for the lands which they had claimed and which under the treaty they were called upon to surrender. The long controversy, which is known in American history as "The North-East boundary dispute," was not finally settled however until 1910.

It was the Democratic majority in the district of Maine that effected the separation from Massachusetts, and from the date of that separation until 1853 Maine was classed as a Democratic state, although it elected a Whig governor in 1838 and in 1840, and cast its electoral vote for John Quincy Adams in 1824 and 1828 and for W. H. Harrison in 1840. As a result of the slavery question, there was a party disintegration between 1850 and 1855, followed by the supremacy of the Republican party from 1856 to 1878. In 1878, of the 126,169 votes cast in the election for governor, Selden Connor (b. 1839), re-nominated by the Republicans, received 56,554; Joseph L. Smith ("National" or "Greenback"), 41,371; Alonzo Garcelon (1813-1906) (Democratic), 28,218; as no candidate received a majority of the votes, the election was left to the legislature.[8] The vote of the House eliminated Connor, and Garcelon was chosen in the Senate by a Democratic-National fusion. Again there was no election by popular vote in 1879, and Garcelon and his council, to secure the election of a fusion government, counted-in a fusion majority in the legislature by evident falsification of the returns. On the 3rd of January 1880 the Supreme Court declared the governor and council in error in counting in a fusion majority, but on the 7th the governor swore in a legislature with 78 fusion and only two Republican members, and, the governor's term having expired, the president of the Senate, James D. Lamson, became governor, ex-officio. On the 12th the legislative chambers were seized by the Republicans, whose organized legislature was declared legal by the Supreme Court, and who chose as governor Daniel Franklin Davis (1843-1897); whereupon, on the 17th, Joshua L. Chamberlain, to whom the peaceful solution of the difficulty had largely been due, retired from the task assigned him by Garcelon on the 5th of January "to protect the public property and institutions of the state" until Garcelon's successor should be duly qualified. In 1880 the Democrats and Greenbacks united and elected their candidate, but after 1883 Maine was strongly Republican until 1910.

The governors of the state have been as follows:--

William King Democrat 1820
William Durkee Williamson (acting) " 1821
Benjamin Ames (acting) " 1821
Albion Keith Parris " 1822
Enoch Lincoln " 1827
Nathan Cutler (acting) " 1829
Jonathan G. Hunton " 1830
Samuel Emerson Smith " 1831
Robert Pinckney Dunlap " 1834
Edward Kent Whig 1838
John Fairfield Democrat 1839
Edward Kent Whig 1841
John Fairfield Democrat 1842
Edward Kavanagh (acting) " 1843
Hugh J. Anderson " 1844
John Winchester Dana " 1847
John Hubbard " 1850
William George Crosby Whig and Free Soil 1853
Anson Peaslee Morrill Republican 1855
Samuel Wells Democrat 1856
Hannibal Hamlin Republican 1857
Joseph H. Williams (acting) " 1857
Lot Myrick Morrill " 1858
Israel Washburn " 1861
Abner Coburn " 1863
Samuel Cony Republican 1864
Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain " 1867
Sidney Perham " 1871
Nelson Dingley " 1874
Selden Connor " 1876
Alonzo Garcelon Democrat 1879
Daniel F. Davis Republican 1880
Harris Merrill Plaisted Democrat-Greenback 1881
Frederick Robie Republican 1883
Joseph R. Bodwell " 1887
Sebastian S. Marble (acting) " 1887
Edwin C. Burleigh " 1889
Henry B. Cleaves " 1893
Llewellyn Powers " 1897
John Fremont Hill " 1901
William T. Cobb " 1905
Bert M. Fernald " 1909
Frederick W. Plaisted Democrat 1911

See S. L. Boardman, _Climate, &c., of Maine_ (Washington, 1884);
Walton Wells, _The Water Power of Maine_ (Augusta, 1869); G. H.
Hitchcock, _General Report on the Geology of Maine_ (Augusta, 1861);
G. H. Stone, _The Glacial Gravels of Maine and their Associated
Deposits_ (Washington, 1899); T. Nelson Dale, _The Granites of Maine_
(Washington, 1907), being Bulletin 313 of the U. S. Geological Survey;
B. F. De Costa, _Sketches of the Coast of Maine and Isle of Shoals_
(New York, 1869); H. D. Thoreau, _The Maine Woods_ (Boston, 1881 ); L.
L. Hubbard, _Woods and Lakes of Maine_ (Boston, 1883); T. S. Steele,
_Canoe and Camera, a Two Hundred Mile Tour through the Maine Forests_
(New York, 1882); William MacDonald, _The Government of Maine, Its
History and Administration_ (New York, 1902); _Maine Historical
Society Collections_ (Portland, 1831- ); W. D. Williamson, _History
of the State of Maine_ (Hallowell, 1832); J. P. Baxter, _Sir
Ferdinando Gorges and his Province of Maine_ (Boston, 1890) and
_George Cleeve of Casco Bay_ (Portland, 1885); George Folsom, _History
of Saco and Biddeford, with notices of other Early Settlements and of
the Proprietary Governments in Maine_ (Saco, 1830); J. L. Chamberlain,
_Maine, Her Place in History_ (Augusta, 1877); E. S. Whitin, _Factory
Legislation in Maine_ (New York, 1908).

FOOTNOTES:

[1] This condition results from the fact that Maine and the adjacent
region were worn down nearly to sea-level by stream erosion, except
certain peaks and ridges inland; then the region was elevated and
numerous river valleys were cut down below the general erosion
surface formed before. Thus we have a general "upland surface," above
which the mountain remnants tower, and below which the rivers have
been entrenched.

[2] This name is applied to a chain of lakes (the Rangeley, or
Oquossoc, the Cupsuptic, the Mooselookmeguntic, the Molechunkamunk or
Upper Richardson, the Welokenebacook or Lower Richardson, and the
Umbagog) in Franklin and Oxford counties, in the western part of the
state; the Umbagog extends into New Hampshire and its outlet helps to
form the Androscoggin River. These lakes are connected by straits,
have a total area of between 80 and 90 sq. m., and are from 1200 to
1500 ft. above the sea. They are sometimes called the Androscoggin
Lakes.

[3] The census of 1905 was taken under the direction of the United
States census bureau, but the statistics for hand trades were
omitted.

[4] According to previous censuses the population was as follows:
(1790) 96,540; (1800) 151,719; (1810) 228,705; (1820) 298,335; (1830)
399,455; (1840) 501,793; (1850) 583,169; (1860) 628,279; (1870)
626,915.

[5] An unincorporated township containing less than 200 inhabitants
may, on the application of three resident voters, be organized as a
plantation, but does not pay state or county taxes unless by special
legislative order. Other unincorporated districts, especially islands
along the coast, are called "grants," "surpluses," "gores" or
"tracts."

[6] By this charter, issued in 1578, Sir Humphrey Gilbert was
entitled to all territory lying within two hundred leagues of any
colony that he might plant within six years; although it had long
since lapsed, Raleigh Gilbert seems not to have been aware of it.

[7] An article in the Act relating to the separation of Maine from
Massachusetts stipulated that the lands within the District of Maine
which prior to the separation had belonged to Massachusetts should
after the separation belong one-half to Maine and one-half to
Massachusetts. In 1826 the wild lands of Maine were surveyed and
divided between the two states; and in 1853 Maine acquired from
Massachusetts, for $362,500, all of this land still remaining in
possession of the latter state.

[8] According to Art. V. of the constitution a majority of the total
number of votes cast was required for election; in case no candidate
should receive a majority, it was prescribed that the "House of
Representatives shall, by ballot, from the persons having the four
highest numbers of votes on the lists, if so many there be, elect two
persons and make returns of their names to the Senate, of whom the
Senate shall, by ballot, elect one, who shall be declared the
governor." An amendment, which became a part of the constitution on
the 9th of November 1880, provided that a plurality of the total
number of votes cast should be sufficient for election.

MAINE DE BIRAN, FRANÇOIS-PIERRE-GONTHIER (1766-1824), French philosopher, was born at Bergerac, on the 29th of November, 1766. The name Maine he assumed (some time before 1787) from an estate called Le Maine, near Mouleydier. After studying with distinction under the _doctrinaires_ of Périgueux, he entered the life-guards of Louis XVI., and was present at Versailles on the memorable 5th and 6th of October 1789. On the breaking up of the _gardes du corps_ Biran retired to his patrimonial inheritance of Grateloup, near Bergerac, where his retired life preserved him from the horrors of the Revolution. It was at this period that, to use his own words, he "passed _per saltum_ from frivolity to philosophy." He began with psychology, which he made the study of his life. After the Reign of Terror Maine de Biran took part in political affairs. Having been excluded from the council of the Five Hundred on suspicion of royalism, he took part with his friend Laîné in the commission of 1813, which gave expression for the first time to direct opposition to the will of the emperor. After the Restoration he held the office of treasurer to the chamber of deputies, and habitually retired during the autumn recess to his native district to pursue his favourite study. He died on the 20th (16th, or 23rd, according to others) of July 1824.

Maine de Biran's philosophical reputation has suffered from two causes--his obscure and laboured style, and the fact that only a few, and these the least characteristic, of his writings appeared during his lifetime. These consisted of the essay on habit (_Sur l'influence de l'habitude_, 1803), a critical review of P. Laromiguière's lectures (1817), and the philosophical portion of the article "Leibnitz" in the _Biographie universelle_ (1819). A treatise on the analysis of thought (_Sur la décomposition de la pensée_), although sent to press, was never printed. In 1834 these writings, together with the essay entitled _Nouvelles considérations sur les rapports du physique et du moral de l'homme_, were published by Victor Cousin, who in 1841 added three volumes, under the title _Oeuvres philosophiques de Maine de Biran_. But the publication (in 1859) by E. Naville (from MSS. placed at his father's disposal by Biran's son) of the _Oeuvres inédites de Maine de Biran_, in three volumes, first rendered possible a connected view of his philosophical development. At first a sensualist, like Condillac and Locke, next an intellectualist, he finally shows himself a mystical theosophist. The _Essai sur les fondements de la psychologie_ represents the second or completest stage of his philosophy, the fragments of the _Nouveaux essais d'anthropologie_ the third.

Maine de Biran's first essays in philosophy were written avowedly from
the point of view of Locke and Condillac, but even in them he was
brought to signalize the essential fact on which his later speculation
turns. Dealing with the formation of habits, he is compelled to note
that passive impressions, however transformed, do not furnish a
complete or adequate explanation. With Laromiguière he distinguishes
attention as an active effort, of no less importance than the passive
receptivity of sense, and with Butler distinguishes passively formed
customs from active habits. He finally arrived at the conclusion that
Condillac's notion of passive receptivity as the one source of
conscious experience was not only an error in fact but an error of
method--in short, that the mechanical mode of viewing consciousness as
formed by external influence was fallacious and deceptive. For it he
proposed to substitute the genetic method, whereby human conscious
experience might be exhibited as growing or developing from its
essential basis in connexion with external conditions. The essential
basis he finds in the real consciousness, of self as an active
striving power, and the stages of its development, corresponding to
what one may call the relative importance of the external conditions
and the reflective clearness of self-consciousness he designates as
the affective, the perceptive and the reflective. In connexion with
this Biran treats most of the obscure problems which arise in dealing
with conscious experience, such as the mode by which the organism is
cognized, the mode by which the organism is distinguished from
extra-organic things, and the nature of those general ideas by which
the relations of things are known to us--cause, power, force, &c.

In the latest stage of his speculation Biran distinguishes the animal
existence from the human, under which the three forms above noted are
classed, and both from the life of the spirit, in which human thought
is brought into relation with the supersensible, divine system of
things. This stage is left imperfect. Altogether Biran's work presents
a very remarkable specimen of deep metaphysical thinking directed by
preference to the psychological aspect of experience.

The _Oeuvres inédites_ of Maine de Biran by E. Naville contain an
introductory study; in 1887 appeared _Science et psychologie:
nouvelles oeuvres inédites_, with introduction by A. Bertrand. See
also O. Merton, _Étude critique sur Maine de Biran_ (1865); E.
Naville, _Maine de Biran, sa vie et ses pensées_ (1874); J. Gérard,
_Maine de Biran, essai sur sa philosophie_ (1876); Mayonade, _Pensées
et pages inédites de Maine de Biran_ (Périgueux, 1896); G. Allievo,
"Maine de Biran e la sua dottrina antropologica" (Turin, 1896, in
_Memorie dell' accademia delle scienze_, 2nd ser., xlv, pt. 2); A.
Lang, _Maine de Biran und die neuere Philosophie_ (Cologne, 1901);
monographs by A. Kühtmann (Bremen, 1901) and M. Couailhac (1905); N.
E. Truman in _Cornell Studies in Philosophy_, No. 5 (1904) on Maine de
Biran's Philosophy of Will.

MAINE-ET-LOIRE, a department of western France, formed in 1790 for the most part out of the southern portion of the former province of Anjou, and bounded N. by the departments of Mayenne and Sarthe, E. by Indre-et-Loire, S.E. by Vienne, S. by Deux-Sèvres and Vendée, W. by Loire-Inférieure, and N.W. by Ille-et-Vilaine. Area, 2786 sq. m. Pop. (1906), 513,490. Maine-et-Loire is made up of two distinct regions, the line of demarcation running roughly from north to south along the valley of the Sarthe, then turning south-west and passing Brissac and Doué; that to the west consists of granites, felspars, and a continuation of the geological formations of Brittany and Vendée; to the east, schists, limestone and chalk prevail. The department is traversed from east to west by the majestic valley of the Loire, with its rich orchards, nurseries and market-gardens. The highest altitudes are found in the south-west, where north-east of Cholet one eminence reaches 689 ft. Elsewhere the surface is low and undulating in character. The department belongs entirely to the basin of the Loire, the bed of which is wide but shallow, and full of islands, the depth of the water in summer being at some places little more than 2 ft. Floods are sudden and destructive. The chief affluent of the Loire within the department is the Maine, formed a little above Angers by the junction of the Mayenne and the Sarthe, the latter having previously received the waters of the Loire. All three are navigable. Other tributaries of the Loire are the Thouet (with its tributary the Dive), the Layon, the Evre, and the Divatte on the left, and the Authion on the right. The Mayenne is joined on the right by the Oudon, which can be navigated below Segré. The Erdre, which joins the Loire at Nantes, and the Moine, a tributary of the Sèvre-Nantaise, both rise within this department. The climate is very mild. The mean annual temperature of Angers is about 53°, slightly exceeding that of Paris; the rainfall (between 23 and 24 in. annually) is distinctly lower than that of the rest of France. Notwithstanding this deficiency, the frequent fogs, combined with the peculiar nature of the soil in the south-east of the department, produce a degree of moisture which is highly favourable to meadow growths. The winter colds are never severe, and readily permit the cultivation of certain trees which cannot be reared in the adjoining departments.