The years between petition and acceptance of statehood were trying years for all of Missouri but for the southern part of the state, where a large percentage of the problem people lived, the period was most difficult. Slave owners wanted Missouri listed as a slave state or left unattached, a large number of Indians had been resettled in the area by the U.S. Government which insisted that their tribal rights and lands be respected, the trade routes posed a difficulty because the trade that had been enjoyed for hundreds of years was being lost.
Trade over the east-west trails was lost as the result of the rapid development of the steamboat to ascend the Mississippi and Missouri Rivers to Westport thus shortening the westward journey by three hundred miles. The rapidity of change is shown in the records of improvement in steamboat travel: The steamboat named the Zeblon M. Pike reached St. Louis in 1817 but poling was required in swift waters, in 1818, the "St. Louis," steamed on past St. Louis and to the mouth of the muddy Missouri but made no progress up the swift river; on May, 1919, the "Maid of Orleans" steamed all the way to the port of Independence.
The state of Missouri became a catch-all for opposing groups and its admission to the union became a national issue resulting in excess of a three year delay between petition for statehood and admission. The petition for statehood was circulated in the fall of 1817 and the signed petitions stating that the people had spent eight years as first grade citizens, five years as second grade citizens and avowing that proper requirements in population and formation of a stable government had been met the petition was presented January 8, 1818 by John Scott, a Missouri Territorial Delegate.
Because the petitions were followed by a request to form a constitution, a Constitutional Convention was called and a constitution, patterned after that of the State of Kentucky, was written in 1820. Its writers felt that, although twenty eight years had passed since the Kentucky Constitution was written, its issues which covered universal suffrage, separation of church and state, disqualification of clergymen for public office, stable currency, prohibition that the Legislature could not pass laws to free slaves without the owner's consent, insurance of humane treatment for freed slaves and the forbidding of entry into the state to free Negroes or mulattos, were set out to meet Missouri's needs.
The people of Missouri had a claim to statehood beyond that of Illinois, Alabama, or Maine, all of which were given precedence over that of Missouri even though the claim was based upon international law. The Treaty Of Cession of the Territory to the United States stated, "The inhabitants of the ceded territory shall be incorporated in the union and be admitted as soon as possible to the enjoyment of all the rights, advantages and immunities of the citizens of the United States" and that, "after a period of territorial government, the area must soon be admitted as a state into the Federal Union."
The change in electing delegates to the Territorial Assembly from each county gave representation to areas that had the required number of people. On December 11, 1818, a new county named Wayne was organized from Missouri Territory. Named for, General Anthony Wayne of Revolutionary War fame (Mad Anthony). The county seat was called, Greenville after the site of the signing of a peace treaty by General Wayne. The site laid out was at first crossing the St. Francis River above the lake formed by the New Madrid earthquake. The southern line ran from the St. Francis River west along the 37 degree north latitude to the Osage Boundary and extended north and south forty miles.
As the south line runs across the, Current River at Watercress Spring and River Crossing it passed through the future site of Van Buren, the county seat of Ripley County. The land west of Current River became Kelley Township, named for Isaac Kelley who received land patent #l from Wayne County on November 28, 1823.
The communal and tribal ways of life slowly gave up its hold on the territorial assembly as delegates from the newly formed counties were elected. The people of the Riverways owned a number of slaves and those who didn't generally accepted them as a way of life. Though many had came to escape bondage they considered independence of central control as freedom.
On March 2, 1819, the Congress of the United States passed an act to establish the Territory of Arkansas with its north line extending, east and west, along the present southern boundary of Missouri.
Thus there remained a thirty four mile strip of land across the Riverways that was unattached to any county, state or territory. Missouri territory disclaimed ownership of the strip but the people wanted to be part of a new state.