Elias Kent Kane

County:
Randolph 
Picture:
Image Courtesy of Elaine Shemoney Evans
Location:
The marker is located off of Route 3 in Chester’s Evergreen Cemetery, near the Governor Shadrach Bond Historical Marker.
Latitude:
37.9174
Longitude:
-89.8267
Dedication Date:
01/01/1986
Dedication By:
VFW Post 3553, American Legion Post 487, the Chester Chamber of Commerce, and The Illinois State Historical Society
Marker Description:
Elias Kent Kane, architect of the State’s first constitution, was born in New York in 1794. Kane studied law and began his practice in Tennessee. In 1814, he moved to Kaskaskia, where he was appointed a judge of the Illinois territory. Active in politics, in 1818, Kane was a delegate to the first state constitutional convention. He dominated the convention, which framed a constitution that allowed the retention of slavery. Governor Shadrach Bond appointed Kane as the first Secretary of State. A Jacksonian Democrat, Kane was elected to the United States Senate in 1824, where he served until his death in 1835.
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