Ephraim Cutler
Dunham Township, Washington County, Ohio
Marker Inscription
Ephraim Cutler arrived in Marietta in 1795 and became a leading southeast Ohio figure. At Ohio’s 1802 constitutional convention in Chillicothe, he drafted the anti-slavery clause in Article VIII. It passed by one vote, and Veto Lake honors his role.
Erected by Ohio History Connection
The Story
When Ephraim Cutler reached Marietta in 1795, the Ohio Country was a raw frontier at the edge of the young United States, freshly organized under the Northwest Ordinance. As a delegate to Ohio's 1802 constitutional convention at Chillicothe, Cutler championed the clause in Article VIII that barred slavery from the new state — language that reportedly carried by a single vote. Nearby Veto Lake keeps his name on the southeast Ohio landscape he helped shape.
Why it matters
Ohio's decision to enter the Union as a free state helped set the antislavery character of the Old Northwest, drawing a line that would define the nation's sectional divide for the next sixty years.
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Related people
- · Ephraim Cutler
Related events
- · Ohio Constitutional Convention of 1802
Themes & tags
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