The territorial assembly met for 120-day sessions in Guthrie. The first legislative session was narrowly divided between Republican and Democratic Party members, with Republicans having a slight edge in representatives. However, the Democrats allied with delegates from the People's Party (Populists) and thereby controlled both houses. Populist delegates were elected as presiding officers in both. The legislators spent most of the session arguing about the locations of the capital, the state university, state teachers' college, and the agricultural school. Only near the end of the session did they begin to address other issues necessary to create and maintain the territory. Steele became so disgusted by the political stalemate that he resigned his position and returned to Indiana. The Oklahoma Territorial Legislature met for the last time in 1905.