History of Oakland County Michigan a narrative account of its historic progress, its people, its principal interests / compiled from the official records of the county, the newspapers and data of personal interviews, under the editorial supervision of Thaddeus D. Seeley.

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HISTORY OF OAKLAND COUNTY

Various provisions of the constitution provided for the improvements of roads, canals and navigable waters in the interior of the state,
as well as for the establishment of banks of issue, and wild speculation
and inflated and unsecured issues of paper money, so frequent in southern Michigan and the more settled sections of the northwest, brought on
the financial panic and the confusion of all permanent projects which
marked the period from 1837 to I847. Unfortunately, this was also
the period when the state was born and learning to walk alone. As the
finances of this wild era, with the inflated schemes of internal improvement, were thoroughly mixed with legislative measures and state politics, the progress of the young commonwealth was very slow and unsteady during its first decade of life, and Oakland county did her full
share in maintaining the disturbing combination. Some of her ablest
men represented her in both houses of the legislature during that period,
but they were also ambitious to see their section of the state advance,
as it did, notwithstanding the failure of half a dozen of its banks, under
both the "wild-cat" and "safety fund" dispensations.
CHAMPIONS OF PUBLIC IMPROVEMENTS
Fully ten years before the coming of the "wild-cat" schemes the big
men of Oakland county saw the necessity of getting it in close touch
with the more developed sections centering in Detroit, and even when
Michigan was a territory they became active and prominent in state politics, by championing such measures as the improvement of the Clinton
river and the construction of the Detroit & Pontiac Railroad. The
Clinton River Navigation Company of 1827 was, in fact, the first corporation created for that purpose in the territory, while the incorporation
of the Dletroit & Pontiac Railroad in I830 was one of the pioneers of
its kind in Michigan, although the latter was not completed to Birmingham until I839 and was not on solid ground until nearly ten years later,
and at the time of the collapse of the internal improvement schemes, the
Clinton river had been "improved" by state money only as far as Rochester, these enterprises were pushed with such vigor and ability in the
territorial legislative council by such good men as Stephen Mack, Roger
Sprague, William F. Moseley, Thomas J. Drake, Stephen V. R. Trowbridge, Daniel LeRoy, Charles C. Haskell and Samuel Satterlee, that
Oakland county was fully and favorably advertised in the legislative
halls. At the later period mentioned (1837-47), under state patronage of public improvements, our good friends, Drake, Trowbridge and
LeRoy, were reenforced in the senate by Elijah F. Cook, John Benton,
Daniel B. Wakefield, Isaac Wixson, Sanford M. Green and others.
THE STATE CONSTITUTIONS
To trace further the gradual development of the civil system of the
state which seems necessary in order to obtain a clear idea of Oakland's
participation in the politics of the commonwealth-the second constitution of I850 was that providing for popular election of all heads of
state departments and judges of the supreme court.