 
The Legislative Committee, at their second session, August 5, 1845, met under the revised and amended organic law, which had been previously adopted by the people by a majority of two hundred and three. There were between two and three hundred votes against the revision or amendments. Many voted against it, on account of its allowing the Hudson’s Bay Company’s English and French followers an equal voice with the Americans and others, and on account of its allowing the Legislature the power to regulate the introduction, manufacture, and sale of liquors. McCarver claimed that he was Speaker of the house, under the organic law as revised. This caused some discussion and voting and the introduction of a resolution requesting him to resign his position as Speaker, which he declined to do. Gray moved that the vote electing him Speaker of the house be reconsidered. McCarver then proceeded to organize the house, to suit his views of matters, by appointing new committees, and went forward as if no previous committees had been appointed. When his appointments were all made, Gray inquired if, in the opinion of Mr. Speaker McCarver, the house was properly organized. He replied that it was. Gray then appealed to the house, and was sustained, McCarver having denied his own position by appointing new committees. On motion of Mr. Straight, Mr. McCarver was removed from his office as Speaker, and Robert Newell elected pro tem. Applegate, for reasons never fully explained, introduced two resolutions, which show either a short-sighted view of matters, or a foolish policy on his part, to wit:
On motion, the vote referring said resolution to committee of the whole was reconsidered, when the rules were suspended, the resolution read a second time, and referred to committee of the whole. On the fifth day of the session, the resolutions of Mr. Applegate were called up, and Messrs. Applegate, Garrison, Hendricks, Hill, H. Lee, B. Lee, McClure, and Smith voted for, and Foisy, Gray, Straight, and McCarver against. Newell asked to be excused. These resolutions had the effect, designed or not, to destroy the credit of the provisional government. On the sixth day of the session, Gray, Foisy, and Straight presented, and, on motion, were allowed to enter, their protest against their adoption, as follows:—
The effect of these resolutions was at once manifest. Measures were taken to procure the launch of the Peacock (which had been left in On the 11th of August, in the midst of business under the order of the day, Mr. Applegate came in, apparently under considerable excitement, and in quite an earnest manner asked that the rule be suspended, to allow him to present a bill to prevent dueling. No immediate or pressing reason was assigned, but from the earnest manner of Mr. Applegate, and from what a number of the members knew, or pretended to know, the rule was suspended, Mr. Applegate’s bill to prevent dueling read first time; rule further suspended, his bill read by title second and third time and passed, and on his further motion, a special messenger, P. G. Stewart, Esq., was sent with it to the governor, for his approval and signature; and in half an hour’s time from its introduction and reading in the house it became a law in this vast country, bounded by the Russian possessions on the north, the Rocky Mountains on the east, California on the south, and the Pacific on the west. Not long after this telegraphic law on dueling was passed, it was discovered that a young man by the name of Holderness had considered himself insulted and slandered by some report said to have originated with Dr. White. Holderness was about to send him a challenge, or at least there was a prospect that they might fight, if either of them had the courage to do so. This law gave the doctor an honorable excuse to decline the challenge, and have Holderness indicted and punished for sending it. This matter was engineered through so handsomely by Mr. Applegate, that Dr. White expressed himself highly gratified and pleased. On the next day, the 12th, Mr. Applegate was honored with an important dispatch from Dr. White, which he presented in due form, together with a resolution of thanks to Dr. White, and an order was entered on the journal to have the doctor’s communication filed for publication. This was not exactly what the doctor wanted, as the sequel will show. He had found that Applegate had the talent and influence requisite to carry through the resolutions necessary to accomplish his purposes. He, having spent a part of the summer in running about the Wallamet Valley, made a trip over to the coast, and one into the Cascade On motion of Mr. Applegate—
On the adoption of the above, the vote was unanimous, which vote was taken by yeas and nays; and, on motion, the house decided that the members should not sign their names to said resolutions. It will be seen by the statement of Applegate in the first part of this resolution, or preamble, that he wished to deny an attempt to resist the government of the United States on the part of the people and provisional government; and the fact that Dr. White had allowed him to examine his official papers, and present them to the Legislative Committee, shows the manner he was working with Applegate to get documents, resolutions, and papers from the Legislature into his hands; also the desperate effort there was made to get a unanimous vote favoring White as the bearer of those documents. Dr. White had from the first denied the right of the settlers to organize a provisional government unless they would elect him as their gov
In the afternoon session the resolution of Mr. Newell was called up, and, on its final passage, the yeas and nays were demanded, and were as follows:— Yeas—Messrs. Applegate, Foisy, Hendricks, H. Lee, McClure, Newell, Straight, and the Speaker—8. Nays—Messrs. Gray, Garrison, Hill, B. Lee, and Smith—5. So the resolution was passed. Dr. White waited for the passage of this resolution (keeping quiet as to McCarver’s signing the others in violation of the order of the house), and as soon as it was safely in his pocket, left for Vancouver, on his way to the States. White had no sooner gone, than it leaked out that McCarver had signed the documents, and White had broken the seals, and destroyed private letters intrusted to him to convey to the States, and had made Garrison his confidant respecting breaking open and destroying the letters. Here was a muss on hand such as none but White and McCarver could “kick up.” Applegate was too much excited and insulted by these men to say any thing; but he presented through B. Lee a resolution as follows:—
Which was received, and referred to committee of the whole. In the afternoon, Dr. J. E. Long, clerk of the house, A. L. Lovejoy, Smith, and Hill were called before the house, and put on oath, to state what they knew of the matter. Mr. Applegate was chairman. The committee rose and reported that they had been engaged in investigating the subject referred to in Mr. B. Lee’s resolution, but had not adopted the resolution. McCarver had been allowed to explain his course. On motion of Mr. Applegate—
On the adoption of which the yeas and nays were called, and were as follows:— Yeas—Messrs. Applegate, Gray, B. Lee, McClure, and Newell—5. Nays—Messrs. Hill, Smith, and Straight—3. So the resolution was adopted. Messrs. Foisy, Garrison, Hendricks, and the Speaker were excused from voting. On motion, the house went into committee of the whole, Mr. Applegate in the chair. The committee rose, and reported, that the resolution of B. Lee having been under consideration, was laid upon the table. It is but justice to state that the clerk of the house, J. E. Long, favored Dr. White’s and Mr. McCarver’s course, and allowed McCarver to sign the documents he well knew the house did not wish him to sign. A majority of the house were inclined to believe that White had been slandered; and had McCarver allowed the documents to go as per vote, White’s designs, as stated by his opponents, would not have been revealed; so the messenger was sent for the documents on account of McCarver’s course. August 16, 1845.—The House met pursuant to adjournment. The rules were suspended to allow the introduction of resolutions, when, on motion of Mr. McClure, it was
On motion of Mr. Applegate, it was
The house appointed J. M. Garrison, Speaker, pro tem. McCarver, being thus plainly invited, left the house, and found that the clerk’s messenger had already gone for the documents. He returned in the afternoon and induced Mr. Smith, from Tualatin, to present the following resolution:—
On the 18th of August, the arrival of a letter from Dr. E. White was announced, which was read, as follows:—
On the 20th, on motion of Mr. Applegate, it was
These documents and papers, with depositions respecting White’s opening and destroying private letters, were prepared, duly signed, and sent on to the Sandwich Islands by Captain Couch, of the Lausanne, and reached Washington just in time for President Polk to refuse White an important commission in New Mexico. The President, on receiving the documents and learning of White’s course, asked an explanation, which he at first declined to give, on account of an attempt, as he alleged, of some low blackguards in Oregon to slander him. The legislative documents were referred to, when he found he was cornered, and left the President’s house without his appointment. Thus ended, for a time, the official course of a base and unprincipled man, who seemed only to live and move for selfish ends. His influence as a missionary, and as an officer of the government, were alike vile and unprincipled. He sought friends and partisans only to deceive and betray them. Applegate, McCarver, Garrison, Lee, McClure, and Newell were compelled to acknowledge his deception. In fact, no one but the Hudson’s Bay Company could make any use of him, and with them he was considered an irresponsible man, and only useful as a tool to combine the Indians, and divide and destroy the influence of the settlement, as he had done that of the Methodist Mission. The history of Dr. White, as connected with Pacific City and Spiritualism, and his secret agency under President Lincoln’s administration, are of small moment when compared with the moral blight he fixed on the cause of missions and religion, in his early relations in Oregon. All who have ever attempted to associate with him, or assist him, have been made to feel his immoral influence. He made great professions of sustaining the temperance cause, while acting as Indian agent, and still allowed the Hudson’s Bay Company to do as they pleased with their liquors, without a single word of complaint or remonstrance to the American government, while he pursued a high-handed and injudicious course toward the American citizen in his efforts to prevent the introduction or manufacture of liquors in the country. In his zeal, he hoarded a vessel of which Captain J. H. Couch was master, and asserted his right to search and seize all the liquors he had on board. Captain Couch, knowing his rights and duties better than the Indian agent did his, ordered his men to get ready a couple of swivels he had on board, ranging them fore and aft along the vessel. He then said to Mr. Indian Soon after, he learned that Dick McCary had put up a teapot distillery somewhere near his own house. He then got a party of men and went down and destroyed the whole concern, except the kettle, which answered for a bell, upon which he beat and drummed on his way back to Oregon City, and then took an adz and stove a hole in it, thus destroying it. If this had been done on the ground, no exceptions would have been taken to it; but White’s proceedings disgusted the friends of temperance so much, that a few days after, when Newell presented a communication from him to the Legislature, with a bill to prevent the sale of liquor, it was defeated—5 for and 8 against. The governor, having confidence in the morality and honesty of the people, suggested in his message the repeal of all laws for the collection of debts. He seemed to be of the opinion, that as they had lived and prospered under the mission and Hudson’s Bay Company’s rule without any such laws, the same rule would apply to a more numerous and civilized community. He was sustained in his opinion by Applegate, Hendricks, H. Lee, B. Lee, and Newell—5; Foisy, Gray, Garrison, Hill, McCarver, McClure, Straight, and Smith—8, were of a different opinion. This vote seemed to annoy Applegate, as he had taken an active part in shaping the governor’s suggestions into a bill to prevent litigation, and he seemed to insist upon the experiment being tried in a more extensive manner in the government of Oregon. It is due to this legislative body and to the governor to state, that none of them had ever had any experience in law-making until they found themselves in a country where there were no laws, and where the representatives were without law-books (with the single exception of a copy of the statutes of Iowa) to guide them. They had to originate, revise, and do as the majority thought best, in all the laws presented. That they were adapted to the time and the people then in the country there can be no question. This shows the innate love of law and order in the American people, as also a disposition to abide by and sustain right principles, though not immediately in the presence of prisons and punishment. Had there been no foreign influences in the country, it would, perhaps, have been safe to risk the governor’s suggestion, and Applegate’s This state of things did not accord with the feelings of a great majority of the people. They had ruled their own individual actions too long to submit quietly to any religious or political power, in which they had no voice. Hence they were ready for any mutual organization, that was of their own choice and creation. They adopted a system of currency suitable to the time and country. This system became necessary, from the known disposition of the Hudson’s Bay Company to oppress and force payment, in what did not then exist in sufficient quantity to meet the wants of the settlement; besides, they held the commercial power; and here again protection was required. The two petitions to the Congress of the United States of 1840 and 1842 state their policy as to internal matters. The first section of this currency law is:—
Who says we were not willing to give a poor family a good show to start with in Oregon in 1845?
On the second section of this act, there was a long and animated discussion, Newell and Garrison claiming that we had no right to subject the property of the Hudson’s Bay Company, and the Methodist and other missions, to our laws; McCarver and Hill, that we ought to exempt town sites and lots from execution. On its final passage, the vote was Applegate, Foisy, Gray, Hendricks, McClure, Smith, Straight, and H. Lee—8, for; Garrison, Hill, B. Lee, Newell, and McCarver—5, against. This body adjourned sine die on the 20th of August, 1845, and in consequence of there being no provision made for a new election in the amended organic compact, they were again called to meet on Tuesday, December 2, 1845, in accordance with the organic law, to arrange and fill up any deficiencies in the offices and laws. Applegate had resigned. There were present, Foisy, Garrison, Newell, and Barton Lee from Champoeg; Gray and Straight from Clackamas; Hill and McCarver from Tualatin; and McClure from Clatsop. Newell, of Champoeg, was elected on the final vote as Speaker; Dr. J. E. Long, clerk. Jefferson’s Manual, which had for the first time strayed across the Rocky Mountains, was presented to the house, and used to govern its proceedings, so far as it was applicable. I think it must have come into the Multnomah Circulating Library, in part payment for a share in that institution. Gray moved its adoption to govern the proceedings of the house, which was considered organized by the election of Speaker, clerk, and sergeant-at-arms. On the second day all the members were present except Applegate. The governor was called upon to issue his warrant to fill the vacancy, which he did. I think, however, that no election was held, as no representative appeared to claim the seat. An effort was made to locate the seat of government, but failed, on account of Dr. McLaughlin not having put in his bid in time to have it considered by the house; and a remonstrance was got up by Ermatinger and the Hudson’s Bay Company’s influence, with sixty names attached, against locating it at all. This was in accordance with the short-sighted policy of Dr. McLaughlin, aided by the influence secured over the people by such men as Ermatinger, Long, Newell, and McCarver, who had become a resident of Clackamas, while he represented Tualatin County. |
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