CONSTITUTION HALL THE KANSAS FREE STATE CAPITOL TOPEKA, KANSAS HISTORICAL INVESTIGATION AND HISTORIC SITE PROPOSAL WILLIAM SEALE, HISTORIAN COMMISSIONED BY FRIENDS OF THE FREE STATE CAPITOL GRANTED BY THE NATIONAL PARK SERVICE FUNDED BY THE NATIONAL UNDERGROUND RAILROAD NETWORK TO FREEDOM PROGRAM AND THE CITY OF TOPEKA, KANSAS COMMEMORATING THESE 150TH ANNIVERSARIES KANSAS TERRITORY TOPEKA, KANSAS 1854 –1861 1854 – 2004 C o n t e n t s Introduction 1 CONSULTANT REPORT Present View 2 Rendered Historic View 3 1. Historical Significance 4 2. Authentication of the Site 11 3. Present Condition of the Building 19 4. Recommended Use 21 5. How the Building Might Look 25 6. Collections 29 7. Interpretation 31 D.A.R. Commemorative Tablet Inscription 34 END OF REPORT William Seale, PhD 35 Partners in this Report 36 Committee to Restore Constitution Hall 37 Friends of the Free State Capitol 37 Major Supporters 38 Membership 40 2 Constitution Hall-Topeka 1856 INTRODUCTION To restore Constitution Hall in Topeka, the Kansas Free State Capitol at present-day 427-429 S. Kansas Avenue, we have benefited from an initial grant by the Kansas Legislature in 1998. The City of Topeka, the National Park Service, and private donors have contributed stabilization funds. To fulfill our responsibility as property stewards, we sought the professional services of a nationally known historian for an unbiased investigation that could authenticate the building, describe its present condition, relate its historical significance, and recommend its use. No one more completely fills that role as William Seale PhD, retained by the Kansas Legislature as architectural historian for the current restoration of the Kansas Statehouse. The results of his archival and on-site documentation are a mandate to restore Constitution Hall. He identifies the most appropriate use of this building so important in the history of Kansas and the United States. William Seale’s resume may be found at the back of this document. Robert S. Johnson Chris Meinhardt Friends of the Free State Capitol FRIENDS OF THE FREE STATE CAPITOL P.O. BOX 2551 TOPEKA, KANSAS 66601 KANSASCONSTITUTIONHALL.ORG 1 CONSTITUTION HALL-TOPEKA: No. 429 and No. 427 S. Kansas Avenue (Present-day street address) The front of Constitution Hall-Topeka shows two 20th century storefronts, thereby masking this single building dating from 1855. Examination of the structure discloses that the present roof is the original built of ad-hoc timber and farm implements, attesting to the building's authenticity. The original limestone walls and native timber floors are intact. This first permanent structure built in Topeka predates several lot and street address numbering systems. Examination of physical evidence and thorough analysis of lot numbering affirms this is the historic Free State Constitution Hall identified by the Daughters of the American Revolution in 1903, the same as identified by early Kansas Historical Society executives. A permanent commemorative tablet was placed in front of present 429 S. Kansas in 1903, under supervision by Zu Adams, the first head of Kansas Historical Society archives and daughter of Franklin G. Adams, its first executive director. The inscription and format of that tablet appear on page thirty-four of this report. That inscription and the placement of the tablet corroborate evidence of historic significance and location. Constitution Hall is a recognized historical landmark for nearly 150 years. Among restoration options in accord with the Secretary of the Interior Standards for the Treatment of Historic Properties, is replication of the original 1855 storefront under the guidance of a master preservation plan. 2 CONSULTANT REPORT No. 429 and No. 427 S. Kansas Avenue (Present-day street address) This contemporary architectural rendering is the result of analysis of historic renderings compared with documentation of current physical evidence. This shows the original storefront of Constitution Hall before construction of adjoining buildings. This view, looking southwesterly, compares with the masthead engraving of the Kansas Herald Tribune, Topeka, 1856. Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Journal (New York, London) published in 1855 an interior view showing the Topeka constitutional convention in session. The original design is compatible with the historical period. Two single doors are side-by- side a post at the center, each door leading into one of the two storefront rooms. These two rooms remain. New masonry buildings along S. Kansas Avenue abutted those already in place. In 1863, new buildings abutted Constitution Hall on the north and south sides. From 1863-1869, this was the first Kansas State Capitol. The stairway to the second floor was at first outside the south wall. Kansas Avenue was first graded in 1858 and the first sidewalk was an oak boardwalk in 1863. 3 Author’s Note: This seven-chapter report presents physical evidence, historical justification and a concept for restoration of Constitution Hall–Topeka. Presently not included in organized educational programs on Kansas history or featured in Kansas tourism, the building is owned by a local not-for-profit group and stands across from the old Federal courthouse on Topeka’s historic “main street,” Kansas Avenue. The “Topeka” or Free State Constitution—written in Constitution Hall just after the United States established the Kansas Territory—is the first of the four Kansas constitutions. It is in long shadow a paradox: Although rejected by the Southern dominated Congress and thereby not accepted by proslavery officials of Kansas Territory, it lighted an emotional wildfire that hastened the coming of the Civil War. The antislavery Topeka Constitution had set the course for the Wyandotte Constitution under which Kansas entered the Union of states in 1861. The six years preceding Kansas statehood are among the most trying America has known, when Kansas became a national battleground. 1. Historical Significance Vivid in American chronicles of the 1850s are the fiery episodes that followed the Kansas-Nebraska Act, which organized the Territory of Kansas. They are the stuff of legends and color the history of the High Plains. Passed by the Congress on May 30, 1854, the ill-starred Kansas-Nebraska Act was the result of five months of debating and maneuvering by Senator Stephen A. Douglas, with the support of the Democratic Party in the Congress, as well as the presidential administration of Franklin Pierce. Pierce was one of two Democratic presidents whose political stands would deepen the wounds of "Bleeding Kansas.‖ The Kansas-Nebraska Act tabled the slavery or ―free state‖ issue in the Kansas Territory until the citizenry was sufficient in number to decide for themselves. A similar arrangement had been made for New Mexico in the Compromise of 1850.1 By its provision for possibly extending slave territory, the Kansas-Nebraska Act annulled the Missouri Compromise of 1820, and its prohibition of slavery north of latitude 36/30, which became the southern border of the Kansas Territory. An issue long believed settled was thus opened up again. Opposition to the bill was heated and over the months of debate over passage of the Kansas-Nebraska bill in Congress, emotions stirred to fury on both sides. The dominant Democratic Party, fairly unified since the days of Andrew Jackson, was torn asunder. On Kansas soil a frontier war erupted that made a lurid glare on the settlers' efforts to establish a system of laws and statehood. The leading step in this latter direction was the drafting of the Topeka constitution, which took place within the stone walls of ―Constitution Hall,‖ Topeka, the subject of this report. 1The difference in the instance of New Mexico was that of territory as opposed to statehood. New Mexico's voters were to decide whether the territory would be free or slave. 4 Placed in the climate of increasing political power built up by the abolitionists and intensifying hostility over the part of a threatened South, the Kansas-Nebraska Act polarized public opinion, pro and con, on the slavery issue to an extent not known before. Already in the month the bill was presented, opponents cast the seeds of what would become the Republican Party, which Abraham Lincoln would carry to presidential victory in a mere six years. From Missouri in the spring of 1855 thousands of so-called "border ruffians" swarmed to the territorial capital at Shawnee Indian Mission, not far from Kansas City, and by intimidation and stuffing ballot boxes at the election on March 30,1855, pushed the Kansas settlers aside and transformed the legislature into a pro-slavery body. It was to be called by historians the "overthrow of popular sovereignty in the Territory.‖2 The resulting outrage on the part of the settlers matched the chagrin of territorial governor Andrew H. Reeder, an appointee of President Pierce. He had to recognize the Shawnee legislature which, like himself, had authority based upon presidential backing. Reeder learned quickly not to trust that ―bogus‖ legislature and made every effort to block their activities. His vetoes were overturned. But the free state citizens of Kansas, with whom Reeder had some sympathy, were resolute. Wrote one observer to his wife in Pennsylvania; "It is the unanimous disposition of the settlers to resist any, every, and all laws that the present Assembly may pass.‖3 A de facto constitutional convention was held by the free state people of Kansas in the fall of 1855, at the town of Topeka, located well into the territory, some sixty-five miles west of Shawnee Indian Mission. This was a bold end-run to establish a free-state government, and then appeal to Congress to support it, bypassing the presidential authority claimed by the pro-slavery legislature.4 The Topeka convention was composed of Kansas settlers, some of whom would have been legislators at Shawnee Indian Mission had the March election not permitted the fraudulent voting by the border ruffians.