t the three counties between the Bald
Mountains and the Holston River constituted an independent state, to
which they gave the name of Franklin; and they went on to frame a
constitution and elect a legislature with two chambers. For governor
they chose John Sevier, one of the heroes of King's Mountain, a man of
Huguenot ancestry, and such dauntless nature that he was generally known
as the "lion of the border." Having done all this, the seceders, in
spite of their small respect for Congress, sent a delegate to that
body, requesting that the new state of Franklin might be admitted into
the Union. Before this business had been completed, North Carolina
repealed her act of cession, and warned the backwoodsmen to return to
their allegiance. This at once split the new state into two factions:
one party wished to keep on as they had now started, the other wished
for reunion with North Carolina. In 1786 the one party in each county
elected members to represent them in the North Carolina legislature,
while the other party elected members of the legislature of Franklin.
Everywhere two sets of officers claimed authority, civil dudgeon grew
very high, and pistols were freely used. The agitation extended into the
neighbouring counties of Virginia, where some discontented people wished
to secede and join the state of Franklin. For the next two years there
was something very like civil war, until the North Carolina party grew
so strong that Sevier fled, and the state of Franklin ceased to exist.
Sevier was arrested on a warrant for high treason, but he effected an
escape, and after men's passions had cooled down his great services and
strong character brought him again to the front. He sat in the senate of
North Carolina, and in 1796, when Tennessee became a state in the Union,
Sevier was her first governor.

These troubles show how impracticable was the attempt to create a
national domain in any part of the country which contained a
considerable population. The instinct of self-government was too strong
to allow it. Any such population would have refused to submit to
ordinances of Congress. To obey the parent state or to set up for one's
self,--these were the only alternatives which ordinary men at that time
could understand. Experience had not yet ripened their minds for
comprehending a temporary condition of semi-independence, such as exists
to-day under our territorial governments. The behaviour of these
Tennessee backwoodsmen wa