ILLINOIS
657
ILLINOIS
Illinois in 1858, and president in 1860. Lincoln was
a senatorial candidate at the same time. The elec-
tion resulted in Douglas's being chosen senator, but
certain of his declarations on the slave question
enraged the slaveholders of the South, split the Demo-
cratic party and made Lincoln a national figure and
President of the United States. When Fort Sumter
was fired on in April, 1861, most of the Illinois Demo-
crats followed the leadership of Stephen A. Douglas,
pledged their support to, and afterwards offered their
lives for, the cause of the Union. In the Civil War
Illinois furnished the equivalent of 214,133 men for
three years' service. It gave to the Union army men
like Logan, Grant, Shields, and Mulligan.
Ecclesiastical Statistics. — The ecclesiastical province of Chicago, which coincides in its territorial limits with the State of Illinois, comprises the Arch- diocese of Chicago, and the Dioceses of Belleville, Alton, Peoria, and Rockford. In it there are 1 arch- bishop, 6 bishops, 1217 priests, 211 ecclesiastical students, 806 churches, 84 missions, 86 chapels, 2 training schools for boys, 1 industrial school for girls, 12 orphan asylums, 2 infant asylums, 1 industrial and reform school, 100,872 young people under Catholic care, as pupils, orphans, and dependents, 1 working-boys' home, 3 working-girls' homes, 1 school for mutes, 11 homes for the aged, 50 hospi- tals, 5 committees nursing sick at their homes, and a Catholic population of 1,468,644. No records have been kept or census taken which would show the Catholic population according to race in Illinois, but the Catholics of Irish birth or descent far out^ number all others. Then in their order come the Germans, Poles and other Slavic people, Italians, Bohemians, and French. Chicago was made an episcopal see by Pope Gregory XVI, and Right Rev. William Quarter, a native of Ireland, was appointed as its first bishop. He was consecrated 10 March, 1844, and died 10 April, 1848. He began his labours with several priests in his diocese and no ecclesiastical students. He ordained twenty-nine priests and left forty clergymen and twenty ecclesiastical students. He built thirty churches, ten of which were either brick or stone; at his death all these were free from debt. His successors were Bishops James Van de Velde, Anthony O'Regan, and James Duggan.
In 1880 Chicago became an archdiocese, the Most Reverend Patrick A. Feehan being its first archbishop, during whose administration schools were built to accommodate 60,000 pupils. His successor is the Most Reverend James E. Quigley; having found that the Church had made such growth in his diocese, that it could not be effectively administered by one person, he petitioned Rome to erect the Diocese of Rockford, and include in it twelve counties then forming part of the archdiocese. The petition was granted 23 September, 1908. The Archdiocese of Chicago now comprises the Counties of Cook (including Chicago), Lake, Du Page, Kankakee, Will, and Grundy, and in Catholic population is next to the .\rchdiocese of New York (see Chicago, Archdiocese of). The Bishop of Alton is Rt. Rev. James Ryan; of Belleville is Rt. Rev. John Janssen. The Bishop of Peoria was Rt. Rev. John Lancaster Spalding, who has recently resigned on account of failing health; the admin- istrator is Rt. Rev. Peter J. O'Reilly. The Bishop of Rockford is Rt. Rev. Peter J. Muldoon, formerly auxiliary Bishop of Chicago.
Perhaps the most important event in the history of the Catholic Church in America since the Third Plenary Council of Baltimore was the first American Catholic missionary congress held in Chicago, 15-18 November, 1908, under the auspices of the Catholic Church Extension Society of the United States of America. At that missionary congress eighty-nine distinguished members of the American Catholic hier- archy, as well as His Excellency, the Most Reverend VII.^2
Diomede Falconio, were in attendance. The Catholic
Church Extension Society (see Missions) was founded
and fostered by Archbishop Quigley, who guided its
destinies and gathered around him the men who
made the Church Extension a great factor in the
Catholic life of America. The first Catholic missions
of Illinois were at Kaskaskia,Cahokia, Shawneetown,
Cave-in-Rock, Diamond Grove, Galena, Ottawa,
LaSalle, Alton, Prairie du Long, Belleville, Shoal
Creek, Prairie du Rocher, Edwardsville, Jasper
County, Edgar County, McHenry County, Lake
County, and Chicago. The first Catholic immigrants
to Illinois were the French, and these immigrants
were relatively few in their numbers. The first great
tide of Catholic immigration was in 1846, 1847, and
1848, when the Irish famine was at its height. 'These
Irish Catholic immigrants settled in great numbers
in the northern part of Illinois and especially Chicago.
The tide of Irish Catholic immigration flowed to
Chicago until recent years. From 184 1 untU 1850 there
was a large German Catholic immigration to Illinois.
Since 1890 there has been in Chicago a great influx
of Polish, Lithuanian, and Italian Catholics. The
Poles became so important in point of numbers in
recent years that Archbishop Quigley recommended
that an auxiliary bishop of the Polish race be ap-
pointed, which was done when Bishop Rhode, the
first Polish bishop in America, was consecrated at
Chicago, 29 July, 1908.
Catholics Distinguished in Public Life. — The most distinguished Catholic in public life in Illinois was General James Shields. He was born in Pomeroy, Tyrone, Ireland, immigrated to Illinois when a young man, became State Auditor, Justice of the Supreme Court of Illinois, General in the United States .\rmy and United States Senator from Illinois, and afterwards United States Senator from Minne- sota and Missouri. He fought in the battle of Cha- pultepec and was present at the taking of the city of Mexico. During the Civil War Gen. Shields again became a soldier and on 23 March, 1862, defeated Stonewall Jackson at Winchester, for which he was congratulated by General McClellan, and the words "Winchester, March 23, 1862" were ordered to be inscribed on the Pennsylvania flags. He was dis- tinguished as a lawyer, jurist, statesman, and soldier, and Ilhnois when invited in 1893 to place the statues of two of her most distinguished men in the Memorial Hall at Washington placed there the bronze statue of General James Shields. A few of the Catholics distinguished in public life are: Judge Gibbons, of the Circuit Court of Chicago, author of "Tenure and Toil; or the Rights and Wrongs of Capital and La- bor", and other works; Judge Marcus Kavanaugh, of the Superior Court, Chicago, formerly Colonel of the Seventh Illinois Regiment, author of "Scrapper Halpin" and other stories; Judge Clifford, of the Circuit Court, Chicago; W. J. Hynes, orator and lawyer, and formerly congressman; Dr. J. B. Murphy, a surgeon of world fame, honorary graduate of the Universities of Berlin, Sheffield, Vienna, Prague; ex-Judge Edward F. Dunne, formerly mayor of Chicago; Maurice T. Maloney, ex- Attorney-General of Illinois. John Dougherty, Lieutenant-Governor, was always a Catholic; Governor Bissell, Justice Mulkey of the Supreme Court, and Stephen A. Doug- las were converts.
Principal Religious Denominations. — The religious census of 1906 for Illinois gives a total population of 5,418,670, of whom 3,341,473 did not attend any church. Members of all denominations numbered 2,077,197, of whom 932,084 were Roman Catholics (the ecclesiastical authorities, however, computed their number as being 15 per cent greater, i. e. 1,071,- 896, while in 1909 they are believed to number 1,468,- 644); of Greek Orthodox there were 17,536; all kinds of Methodists, 263,344; all kinds of Lutherans, 202,-
