the General Assembly at the ensuing session
for an act to separate this district from the present government, on terms
honorable to both and injurious to neither, in order that it may enjoy all
the advantages and rights of a free, sovereign and independent republic."

In 1786, Virginia passed the act providing for the separation of Kentucky,
but she made it conditional on the willingness of the Congress of the
United States to admit Kentucky as one of the States of the Union, and
upon the willingness of Kentucky to become a member of the Union as soon
as separated from Virginia, thus preventing Kentucky from becoming an
independent republic, or a part of any foreign nation. It was during these
days that enemies to both Kentucky and the nation were busiest in their
efforts secretly to plan for either an independent government or an
alliance with Spain. Kentucky became a State in 1792, being the fifteenth
in the Union.

Progress

While the preceding pages have dealt largely with the struggle for
existence in the frontier country, it must not be understood that during
these years the entire attention of the settlers was given to waging war
against the Indians. The Indian invasions were altogether too frequent,
and their savage cruelty entirely too terrible to be mentioned here, and
this continued for many years after the country was supposed to be
entirely free from terrors of the sort. Yet the people had all the while
been doing remarkably well, not only in their efforts to conquer the
wilderness, but to establish a civilization which compared favorably with
the progress made in the more settled sections of our country at that
time.

The question of land titles offered a fine field for litigation, and among
the brilliant lawyers attracted to the country was Henry Clay of Virginia,
who in his twenty-fifth year was elected to the State Legislature of
Kentucky, and at thirty was a United States Senator. From this period,
with but few brief intervals, his long life was spent in the public
service, and in the highest positions within the gift of the people. It
was he who said, "I would rather be right than be President."

In 1787, there was established at Lexington The Kentucky Gazette, by John
Bradford. This was the first newspaper to be published west of the
Allegheny Mountains. Since they had no rural delivery in those days the
paper was sometimes weeks old before the people re