Viewing The Northwest Ordinance (1787)The Northwest Ordinance (1787)The Northwest Ordinance, effective July 13, 1787, organized the Northwest Territory, and established conditions for admitting new states to the union. It set forth six articles that constituted a "compact" between the original states and the people and future states in the new territory. That "compact" guaranteed such rights as trial by jury, right to bail, freedom of worship, sanctity of contract, respect for the property and lands of Indians and, significantly, it forbade slavery in the Northwest Territory. |