Jefferson Territory

Jefferson Territory

The Provisional Government of the Territory of Jefferson was an extralegal and unrecognized United States territory that existed from October 24, 1859 until the creation of the Colorado Territory on February 28, 1861. The Jefferson Territory included land officially part of the Kansas Territory, the Nebraska Territory, the New Mexico Territory, the Utah Territory, and the Washington Territory, but remote from the governments of those five territories. The government of the Jefferson Territory, while democratically elected, was never legally recognized by the United States Government, although it managed the territory with relatively free rein for 16 months. Many of the laws enacted by the Jefferson Territorial Legislature were reenacted and given official sanction by the new Colorado General Assembly in 1861.