California Romantic and Resourceful / A plea for the Collection, Preservation and Diffusion of Information Relating to Pacific Coast History

by John Francis Davis

The convention was one of the keenest and most intelligent that ever assembled for the fulfillment of a legislative responsibility. Six of the delegates had resided in California less than six months, while only twenty-one, exclusive of the seven native Californians, had resided here for more than three years. The average age of all the delegates was 36 years. The debates of that convention should be familiar to every citizen of this State. No Californian should be unfamiliar with the great debate on what was to constitute the eastern boundary of the State of California, a debate accompanied by an intensity of feeling which in the end almost wrecked the convention. The dramatic scenes wrought by the patriotism that saved the wrecking of the convention stand out in bold relief. The constitution adopted by this convention was ratified November 13, 1849, and, at the same election, an entire State and legislative ticket, with two representatives in Congress, was chosen. The senators and assemblymen elect met in San Jose on December 15, 1849. On December 20, 1849, the State government of California was established and Governor Peter H. Burnett was inaugurated as the first Governor of the State of California, and soon thereafter William M. Gwin and John C. Frémont were elected the first United States Senators of the State of California. Notwithstanding the fact that there had never been any territorial form of government, notwithstanding the fact that California had not yet been admitted into the Union, these men were all elected as members of the State government, and the United States Senators and members of Congress started for Washington to help get the State admitted.

Immediately upon the inauguration of Governor Burnett, General Riley issued this remarkable proclamation:

"To the People of California: A new executive having been elected and installed into office, in accordance with the provisions of the Constitution of the State, the undersigned hereby resigns his powers as Governor of California. In thus dissolving his official connection with the people of this country he would tender to them his heart-felt thanks for their many kind attentions and for the uniform support which they have given to the measures of his administration. The principal object of all his wishes is now accomplished—the people have a government of their own choice, and one which, under the favor of Divine Providence, will secure their own prosperity and happiness and the permanent welfare of the new State."

No matter what the legal objections to this course might be, notwithstanding the fact that Congress had as yet passed no bill for the admission of California as a State into the Union, and might never pass one, California broke all precedents by declaring itself a State, and a free State at that, and sent its representatives to Washington to hurry up the passage of the bill which should admit it into the Union.

The brilliant audacity of California's method of admission into the Union stands without parallel in the history of the nation. Outside of the original thirteen colonies, she was the only State carved out of the national domain which was admitted into the Union without a previous enabling act or territorial apprenticeship. What was called the State of Deseret tried it and failed, and the annexation of Texas was the annexation of a foreign republic. The so-called State of Transylvania and State of Franklin had been attempted secessions of western counties of the original states of Virginia and North Carolina, respectively, and their abortive attempts at admission addressed to the Continental Congress, and not to the Congress of the United States. With full right, then, did California, by express resolution spreading the explanation upon the minutes of her constitutional convention[[7]], avowedly place upon her great seal her Minerva—her "robed goddess-in-arms"—not as the goddess of wisdom, not as the goddess of war, but to signify that as Minerva was not born, but sprang full-armed from the brain of Jupiter, so California, without territorial childhood, sprang full-grown into the sisterhood of states.

When it is remembered that California was not admitted into the Union till September 9, 1850, and yet that the first session of its State Legislature had met, legislated, and adjourned by April 22, 1850, some appreciation may be had of the speed limit—if there was a limit. The record of the naive self-sufficiency of that Legislature is little short of amazing.

On February 9, 1850, seven months before the admission of the State, it coolly passed the following resolution: "That the Governor be, and he is hereby authorized and requested, to cause to be procured, and prepared in the manner prescribed by the Washington Monument Association, a block of California marble, cinnabar, gold quartz or granite of suitable dimensions, with the word 'California' chiseled on its face, and that he cause the same to be forwarded to the managers of the Washington Monument Association, in the city of Washington, District of Columbia, to constitute a portion of the monument now being erected in that city to the memory of George Washington." California did not intend to be absent from any feast, or left out of any procession—not if she knew it. Looking back now, our belief is that the only reason she required the word "California," instead of the words "State of California," to be chiseled on the stone was that the rules of the Monument Association probably prohibited any State from chiseling on the stone contributed by it any words except the mere name of the State itself. And the resolution was obeyed—the stone was cut from a marble-bed on a ranch just outside Placerville, and is now in the monument!

On April 13, 1850, nearly five months before California was admitted into the Union, that Legislature gaily passed an act consisting of this provision: "The common law of England, so far as it is not repugnant to or inconsistent with the Constitution of the United States, or the Constitution or laws of the State of California, shall be the rule of the decision in all the courts of the State."

Among other things, three joint resolutions were passed, one demanding of the Federal Government not only a change in the manner of transporting the mails, but also in the manner of their distribution at San Francisco, a second urging upon Congress the importance of authorizing, as soon as practicable, the construction of a national railroad from the Pacific Ocean to the Mississippi River—not from the Mississippi River to the Pacific Ocean, but from the Pacific Ocean to the Mississippi River—and a third urging appropriate grants of land by the General Government to each commissioned officer of the Army of the United States who had faithfully and honorably served out a complete term of service in the war with Mexico. Each of the last two resolutions, with grim determination, and without a suspicion of humor, contained this further resolution: "That His Excellency, the Governor, be requested to forward to each of our Senators and Representatives in Congress, a certified copy of this joint resolution."

These resolutions were passed five months before the State was admitted into the Union. If the Senators and Representatives were not yet actually "in Congress"—well, they were at least in Washington—and busy. The desire to be admitted into the Union had developed into a yearning to be considered a part of the Union, had ripened into the conviction that the State was, potentially at least, actually a part of the Union, a yearning and a conviction that became almost pathetic in their intensity. The Legislature adjourned, and for nearly five months the population of San Francisco assembled on the Plaza on the arrival of every Panama steamer, waiting—waiting—waiting for the answer, which, when it did come in the following October, was celebrated with an abandon of joy that has never been equaled on any succeeding Ninth of September.