These differences probably would not have significantly influenced Kentucky's status with Virginia had the population of Fincastle County not risen so dramatically. With the influx of more people into Fincastle, Native Americans increased attacks on the Kentuckians. This instability most likely lead to Colonel Logan calling the first of the so-called Constitutional Conventions.
The first constitutional convention began in Danville on 27 December, 1784. Nine conventions took place from 1784 to1790. Delegates considered topics such as protection from the Native Americans, the inequalities of the Virginian tax system, separation from Virginia, and the desirability of entering into the Confederation of States. During these conventions, there was even some discussion of and support for the scheme by the infamous James Wilkinson to sever Kentucky from both Virginia and the Confederation. Wilkinson wanted Kentucky to become ward of Spain; this was based on Spanish control of the mouth of the Mississippi, which at the time was the most feasible outlet for Kentucky's marketable products.
Kentucky became the 15th state on 1 June 1792. (LRC; pages 1-14.)
Kentucky retains a unique place in the Union both politically and culturally. Perhaps the greatest period in that special relationship with the Union begins with Kentucky's refusal to secede from the Union in 1861. However, Kentucky emotionally joined the "Lost Cause" after the end of the Civil War. As the most centrally located of the border states, Kentucky shares much of the State's Rights within a federal system but maintains the keen sense of nationalism of the border states, whose very peace depended on union.
As a border state, Kentucky remained politically pro-Union. In the past, Kentucky offered the country with great pro-Union political leaders, including Henry Clay, "who developed the idea of the 'American System' to promote unity through national development, and who was the principal founder of the Whig Party, whose principles were union first and foremost… In electing representatives and senators to the U.S. Congress, they cultivated seniority and consequently political power in the hope of bringing federal government funds and benefits to Kentucky. That power reached its high point in the 1930 to 1940s when Alben Barkeley was a US senator and then vice president. (Penny Miller. Kentucky Politics and Government. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1994, xv-xxv.)
"Sectionalism--the expression of social, economic, and especially political differences along geographic lines--is part and parcel of American political life." Kentucky is a border state, both Southern and Mid-Western. Because of its position in the Ohio River Valley, the population along the Ohio River, in particular, have similarities the Mid-West. Yet, when all is said, its 'Southerness' is what is critical. "In a sense, Kentucky has always belonged to the South with its sentimentality and in its culture, but has often reacted to national circumstances and trends with its head, as a kind of new Western extension. Indeed, the state's 'personality' is a product of that particular mixture of head and heart." (Miller; xv-xxv.)
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