Maine History Online

King's political accomplishments were similarly prodigious. A Democratic-Republican, he served in both the Massachusetts House of Representatives and the Senate. He was a Major General of the Massachusetts militia and a Colonel in the U.S. Army during the War of 1812. His experiences in the war — reckoning Maine's coastal vulnerabilities, and Massachusetts' seeming indifference to the district's welfare — combined with King's own economic and political interests and led him to become a leading proponent of statehood for Maine.

The question of statehood was bound up in commercial interests, fears about newly migrated residents of the interior of Maine, and concerns about the ability of Massachusetts to protect an area with which it shared no common border.

Federalists sparred with Democratic-Republicans nationally and locally, but it was even more complicated regarding the statehood issue: Massachusetts Federalists desired separation and Maine Federalists opposed it.

Stymied repeatedly, the statehood issue rebounded following the War of 1812, fueled by shock over the dismal efforts of Massachusetts to defend its eastern district from British incursions.

King seized this neglect as evidence for his cause. He carefully shepherded the issue through a convention in Brunswick in 1816, successfully maneuvered Congress to support a new coasting law that eliminated one commercial objection to separation, and gathered growing support in Maine for the issue.

Despite King's best efforts, however, it was not until the issue of slavery, and federal desires to balance slave and free states, combined growing interest for separation in Maine with a national mandate for compromise. Maine was granted statehood and free status only when Missouri entered the Union as a slave state in 1820.

In King's words, "These are events, which constitute a memorable era in the history of our state, -- events for which you no doubt, as well as our fellow citizens in general, will acknowledge with gratitude that divine goodness, which directs and controls the concerns of men."

It took longer than expected, but proponents were satisfied, and Maine thanked William King for his work. As a skilled politician and born leader, King was the obvious choice for Maine's first governor, a position he held for only one term.

President James Monroe quickly tapped him to negotiate a treaty with Spain during Mexico's independence movement, which allowed the United States to avert, at least for a time, involvement with that issue –– ironic given King's own work toward Maine independence.

A failed second run for governor in 1834 did little to disrupt his other pursuits, including trustee positions at Bowdoin and Waterville (later Colby) Colleges. King died a wealthy and well-regarded citizen in 1852, just as the nation became irrevocably embroiled in a crisis that no amount of compromising could forestall.

Abolitionism

Economic, political, social, and religious reasons contributed to the decision of individuals and groups to support or oppose slavery.

Slavery conferred great wealth on some, unmitigated misery on others, and affected many not at all. Mainers fell into all three groups. Slavery existed in Maine, as it existed in all of the original colonies, but was sparsely spread and quickly eliminated following the Revolution. Even so, Maine continued to gain economically from slave-made commodities, and from the slave trade itself.

Men and women, black and white were involved in the abolition movement in Maine.

The Rev. Austin Willey (1806-1896) was editor of the Maine Anti-Slavery Society newspaper the Advocate of Freedom from 1839-1841, the Liberty Standard from 1842-1845, and the Portland Inquirer from 1851-1854. He later wrote The History of the Anti-Slavery Cause in the State and Nation (1886).

His newspapers helped rouse anti-slavery sentiment in the state.

In his book, Willey described the situation in Maine writing that it "was bound to the South by political and commercial bands of steel. let any ship-owner or master, or commercial parties be suspected of any sympathy with antislavery, and their chance for southern freight was at an end.

"The Whigs, being out of power, could wear a little fairer dress at home, but it is believed there was no harder free state to be revolutionized and placed morally and politically on the antislavery basis. Such was the condition of Maine when the spirit of Liberty began to kindle in the hearts of some of its noblest and best men and women in all parts of the state."

The anti-slavery movement began in Maine in 1833. State and local organizations formed and faded away, with new ones arising until the Civil War. The Rev. Thomas Robinson was a founding member of the Maine Anti-Slavery Society in 1834 and active in promoting abolition among Maine Baptists, who, like some other Protestant denominations believed spreading their Christian beliefs was adequate and that getting involved directly was not their duty.