On the 17th, Mr. Meek resigned his seat in the Legislative Assembly, preparatory to leaving for the United States with dispatches and a memorial to Congress.
As to what those dispatches were, we have no copy or public document that gives us any information, but we presume he carried a copy of Mr. McBean’s mutilated letter, and one of Sir James Douglas’s, such as we have already given; and also the following
Memorial to Congress.
“To the Honorable the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States in Congress assembled:
“Your memorialists, the Legislative Assembly of Oregon Territory, would respectfully beg leave once more to lay before your honorable body a brief statement of their situation and wants.
“Having called upon the government of the United States so often in vain, we have almost despaired of receiving its protection, yet we trust that our present situation, when fully laid before you, will at once satisfy your honorable body of the great necessity of extending the strong arm of guardianship and protection over this remote, but beautiful portion of the United States domain.
“Our relations with the proud and powerful tribes of Indians residing east of the Cascade Mountains, hitherto uniformly amicable and pacific, have recently assumed quite a different character. They have shouted the war-whoop, and crimsoned their tomahawks in the blood of our citizens. The Cayuse Indians, after committing numerous outrages and robberies upon the late immigrants, have, without the semblance of provocation or excuse, murdered eleven [seventeen] American citizens. Among the murdered were Dr. Marcus Whitman and his amiable wife, members of the American Board of Foreign Missions.
“Called upon to resent this outrage, we feel sensibly our weakness and inability to enter into a war with powerful tribes of Indians. Such outrages can not, however, be suffered to pass unpunished. It will be the commencement of future and more extensive murders, and our hitherto peaceful settlement will become the scene of fierce and violent warfare. We do not doubt the readiness of the people of this country to defend their lives and property, and to submit to all the privations incident to a state of war in a new and remote settlement like this. Circumstances warrant your memorialists in believing that many of the powerful tribes inhabiting the upper valley of the Columbia have formed an alliance for the purpose of carrying on hostilities against our settlements. The number of white population in Oregon is alarmingly insignificant compared with the swarms of Indians which throng its valleys.
“To repel the attacks of so formidable a foe, and protect our families and property from violence and rapine, will require more strength than we possess. We are deficient in many of the grand essentials of war,—such as men, arms, and treasure; for them, our sole reliance is on the government of the United States; we have the right to expect your aid, and you are in justice bound to extend it. For although we are separated from our native land by ranges of mountains whose lofty altitudes are mantled in eternal snows; although three thousand miles, nearly two-thirds of which is a howling wild, lie between us and the federal capital, yet our hearts are unalienated from the land of our birth. Our love for the free and noble institutions, under which it was our fortune to be born and nurtured, remains unabated. In short, we are Americans still,—residing in a country over which the government of the United States have sole and acknowledged right of sovereignty,—and under such circumstances we have the right to claim the benefit of its laws and protection.
“Your memorialists would avail themselves of this opportunity to invite your attention to other subjects of deep and vital interest to the citizens of this Territory. The very nature of our compact formed between the citizens of a republic and the subjects and official representatives of a monarchy, is such that the ties of political union could not be drawn so closely as to produce that stability and strength sufficient to form an efficient government. This union between the democrats of a republic and wealthy aristocratic subjects of a monarchy could not be formed without reserving to themselves the right of allegiance to their respective governments. Political jealousy and strong party feeling have tended to thwart and render impotent the acts of government, from its very nature weak and insufficient.”
The deep, dark, and infamous schemes of a foreign monopoly and religious bigots were but just developing themselves; but, thank God, there was strength enough in the provisional government, which was formed in the face of their combined opposition. They had yielded to its power, to gain time to organize their savage hosts to crush it; calculating, no doubt, that the Mexican war would prevent assistance reaching us from the United States. The Indians, let loose upon the settlements, would soon clear the country. That such was the general English idea, we know from two different English subjects. The one, a chief trader in the Hudson’s Bay Company, who said all they had to do was to organize the Indians, under the direction of their eight hundred half-breeds, to drive back any American force. The other, a gold commissioner, a Mr. Saunders, direct from England, in speaking of the small number of troops the English government had in British Columbia, remarked to us, that if they had not troops enough to subdue the Americans in British Columbia, “all they had to do was to let loose the Indians upon them.”
Such being the facts, it is not surprising that our Legislative Assembly should be made to feel its weakness, under this powerful combination,—the British monopoly that had refused to furnish necessary supplies to the provisional troops sent to punish the murderers of our citizens. It was not yet apprised of the efforts made by Mr. Ogden to supply the Indians with munitions of war, and the determination of the company not to allow itself to be considered by the Indians as favoring the American settlement of the country. Mr. Hines’ book, in which he says Dr. McLaughlin had announced to those Indians in 1843 “that in case the Americans did go to war with them, the Hudson’s Bay Company would not assist them,” had not yet been published. The memorial continues:—
“In establishing a regular form of government, creating tribunals for the adjustment of the rights of individuals, and the prevention and punishment of crime, a debt has accumulated, which, though an insignificant amount, your memorialists can devise no means of liquidating. The revenue laws, from not being properly executed, while they are burdensome to classes of our citizens and sections of country, are wholly disregarded by others, and whole counties, which for numerical strength are equal to any in the Territory, and fully participating in all the advantages of our compact, have never contributed any assistance in bearing the common burdens.[18]
[18] Champoeg County being one, and represented by Dr. R. Newell, then Speaker of the house.
“To coerce obedience to our temporary government would at once destroy the great object which called it into existence,—the peace and harmony of our country. Anxiously looking forward to that happy period when we should again be under the protection of our revered and parent republic, we have rather endeavored to maintain peace by forbearance, hoping that the dangers and difficulties to be apprehended from domestic discord and from the savages around us, would be postponed until we became an acknowledged people, and under the protection of our mother country.
“The action of your honorable body in regard to the land in Oregon would seem to justify the expectation that liberal grants would be made to our citizens; yet the uncertainty of our title, and the uneasiness which is felt upon this subject, urge to press this subject upon your attention. Our citizens, before leaving their homes in the United States for Oregon, have had the strongest inducements held out by Congress to settle in this country, and their just expectations will not be met short of liberal donations of land.
“On the subject of filling the offices that will be created in the event of the extension of the jurisdiction of the United States over this Territory, your memorialists would respectfully represent, that, as the pioneers of the American population in this country, the present citizens of this country have strong claims upon the patronage of the general government, and that it would be gratifying to have them filled by our fellow-citizens; but as few of them of an equally deserving number can enjoy this mark of the approbation of our parent republic, and in view of our peculiar and difficult situation, it is the opinion of your memorialists that it will be better for the future prosperity of our country, and that the great mass of the people will concur with them in requesting that important and responsible offices created here, such as the office of governor and the several judgeships, should be filled with men of the best talent and most approved integrity, without regard to their present location.”
In relation to this last paragraph, emanating as it did from the Legislative Assembly of Oregon, it may appear strange that a body of men possessing the talent and ability there was in that Assembly, should be so liberal in requesting that most of the important federal appointments for the Territory should be filled from abroad, or with strangers to the condition and wants of the people; but the fact is plainly stated, and it becomes our duty to impart such information as will explain so strange a request. No one will contend for a moment that we did not have the men who were abundantly qualified to fill those offices, for they have since been filled with far better satisfaction to the country by men who were then in it, than by those sent by the federal government; hence we are led to inquire what was the reason for this request.