Goodbye Jones County. After several years of “sharing a legislator,” Carteret and Jones counties are being sent their separate ways…if North Carolina’s legislative redistricting plan is upheld.
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Jones is going to be lumped in with Lenoir and Greene counties to form the 12th district in the N.C. House of Representatives, beginning with the next election.
Carteret County will remain the hub of the 13th district and pick up the southern section of Craven County – Harlowe precinct and about “half of Havelock.” (More on that later, but today’s column is meant to bid farewell to Jones County and its friendly people.)
Jones has been like a “little brother.” In 2022, the U.S. Census Bureau estimates that 8,837 people live in Jones, while Carteret has 69,578 residents. Jones is one of 42 North Carolina counties that is shrinking – not in land area but in population.
The North Carolina Department of Commerce annually ranks the state’s 100 counties based on economic well-being and assigns each a “tier designation.” This tier system is incorporated into various state programs to encourage economic activity in the less prosperous areas of the state.
The 40 most distressed counties are designated as Tier 1, the next 40 as Tier 2 and the 20 least distressed as Tier 3. Jones is Tier 1; Carteret is Tier 3.
Jones was established in 1779, carved out of Craven County, because the courthouse in New Bern was “too far away when transportation was limited to the use of horses, boats or one’s own feet.”
Jones County was named in
honor of Willie (pronounced Wiley) Jones, an aristocrat from Halifax County. He
was generally regarded as North Carolina’s most powerful legislative leader
from 1767 through 1789.
“Royal Gov. Josiah Martin
remarked that Jones was one of the loudest voices encouraging secession from
Britain and the establishment of an independent state,” according to Dr. Troy
L. Kickler, a history professor at Liberty University in Lynchburg, Va.
Prof. Kickler
After the Revolutionary War, “Willie Jones was a prominent Anti-Federalist during the ratification debate in North Carolina,” Dr. Kickler said. “Jones was influential in the political opposition to the federal constitution, and he had much to with North Carolina’s delay in entering the Union.”
“Believing states’ rights and individual rights were intertwined, Willie Jones, in particular, criticized the Constitution as an instrument of centralization and an encroachment of community rule,” Dr. Kickler said. “Jones’ insistence for an elucidation of individual rights in the Constitution contributed greatly to the eventual adoption of the Bill of Rights.”
“Jones heeded the advice
of Thomas Jefferson: For the sake of the Union, at least nine states should
ratify the Constitution, but to ensure that a Bill of Rights was adopted, at
least four states should not ratify it.
“Jones made sure North Carolina was one of the four: ‘I would rather be 18 years out of the Union than adopt it (Constitution) in its present defective form.’”
In 1788, North Carolina passed a resolution (184 to 84) not to approve or reject the Constitution,” Dr. Kickler said. For a year, North Carolina was not part of the Union.
“But when the U.S. Congress passed a Bill of Rights, North Carolina voted for the Constitution (195 to 77) in 1789,” the professor said.
Hence, North Carolina was officially the 12th state to join the Union. Rhode Island was the 13th.
“Willie Jones knew his
political work was done,” Dr. Kickler said.
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