On the 3d of March, an act was approved by the President for promoting the means of future intercourse between the United States and the government of China. By this act 40,000 dollars were placed at the disposal of the President to enable him to establish commercial relations with China. Under this act, Edward Everett, then minister and envoy extraordinary to England, was nominated and confirmed as commissioner. It may be here added, that Mr. Everett declining this honor, Caleb Cushing, of Newburyport, Massachusetts, was appointed to take his place, and John Tyler, son of the President, was appointed his private and confidential secretary. Fletcher Webster of Boston acted as secretary of the mission.
At the above date (March 3d) the President approved of another important act, viz., to provide for carrying into effect the treaty between the United States and Great Britain, concluded at Washington, August 9th, 1842. By this act, 300,000 dollars were to be paid in equal moieties to Maine and Massachusetts. Also the President was authorized to employ so much ofthe naval force as was requisite to fulfil the 8th article relating to the suppression of the slave trade.
The third session of the 27th congress closed on the 3d of March, 1843. Several important bills failed, among which may be mentioned a bill to reduce the postage on letters—a bill to authorize the adoption of measures for the occupation and settlement of the Oregon Territory, and for extending certain laws of the United States over the same—and a bill for the relief of Andrew Jackson.
On the 8th of May, Daniel Webster having accomplished the great object for which he retained his place in the cabinet, when his associates resigned, viz., the settlement of the north-eastern boundary between the United States and Great Britain, resigned the office of secretary of state, and Hugh S. Legare, attorney-general of the United States, was appointed temporarily to fill that office.
On the 8th of June, the President, accompanied by the secretary of the treasury and the postmaster-general, left Washington, for a visit to Boston to attend the celebration of the completion of the Bunker Hill Monument. During his progress, he was received with the honors due to the chief magistrate of a great and powerful nation. The celebration took place on the 17th. An oration was pronounced by Daniel Webster, commemorative of the great events by which our country had arisen to its exalted station, and of the virtues of those noble men who laid the foundation of our civil and religious institutions. It was a grand and imposing scene. Thousands were gathered to the spot once moistened by the blood of patriots; and grateful homage went up to Him, under whose fostering care the nation enjoyed a measure of prosperity unknown to any other nation on the globe.
But scarcely were the festivities of the occasion ended, when the melancholy intelligence was circulated that Mr. Legare, the attorney-general, and acting secretary of state, had suddenly deceased at his lodgings in Boston. He had followed the President to mingle in the joys of the occasion, but sickness fell upon him, and in a brief space he was numbered with the dead. He sustained the reputation of a man of rare endowments—of great requisitions, and exalted character. In consequence of this death, the President and suite soon returned to the seat of government.
On the 8th of July, 1843, the cabinet of the President was reorganized by the appointment of Abel P. Upshur, secretary of state; John C. Spencer, secretary of the treasury; J. M. Porter, secretary of war; C. A. Wickliffe, postmaster-general, and John Nelson, attorney-general.
The 1st session of the 28th congress commenced on the 5th of December, 1843. On the organization of the house of representatives, a flagrant violation of law was perpetrated by the majority. On the 25th of June, 1842, an act was passed by congress providing for the election of representatives in the several states by districts. This law, some of the states saw fit to set at defiance. New Hampshire, Georgia, Mississippi and Missouri, severally nullified this eminently democratic measure. In Georgia, indeed, the legislature framed and passed a districting bill, but the governor vetoed it, avowing in his message that he did this less from hostility to the district system, than to avoid the appearance of complying with the requisitions of congress.
On the organization of the house, the members from those states, twenty-one in number, appeared and claimed the right to vote. A protest from the whig majority was read, but in defiance of that, and the plain and explicit actof congress to the contrary, they were suffered to vote for speaker and clerk, and subsequently they were appointed upon various committees. When these flagrant violations of law had been perpetrated, the house directed the committee on elections to inquire into and report on the matter. That committee, as was foreordained, reported that the second section of the apportionment act was unconstitutional. The house promptly adopted the report, and thus the whole matter was settled, virtually on the basis that no law is of binding force, which conflicts with the interests or the will of the triumphant democracy. The choice of speaker fell on John W. Jones of Virginia, who had been returned by 33 majority, and whose seat was then contested by his opponent, John M. Botts.
In his annual message, the President represented the question between the United States and Great Britain, relating to the title of the Oregon Territory, as still unadjusted. Our minister at London had received instruction to submit to the British government propositions for the final settlement of the question, and the hope was indulged that this controversy of increasing interest might be brought to a speedy and happy termination.