Page:Centennial History of Oregon 1811-1912, Volume 1.djvu/313



THE CENTENNIAL HISTORY OF OREGON 1<)]

goii's first ai3(l last iiostiiuister-general, he did not sco what the boys were hmgliiug about.

At the next annual session of the legislature, eoiunienced and held at Ore- gon City, December 1, 184, we get hold of the first governor's message to any legislature west of the Rocky mountains. Geoi-ge Abernethy, whose portrait appears on another page, had been elected governor at the previous election. "We give below the proceedings introdiicing the message and the document itself :

"The speaker announced a comnninication from the governor. The reading of the communication was called for, when Mr. Newell moved that the secre- tary of the territory read the communication. The speaker decided the motion out of order; whereupon IMV. Newell appealed from the decision of the chair. The house sustained the decision of the speaker. Mr. Newell moved that the rules be suspended. Mr. T 'Vault demanded the yeas and nays, which were as follows: Ayes — Messrs. Chamberlain, Looney, McDonald, Newell, Peers, Straight and Tolmie, 7. Nays — Messrs Hall, Hembree, Lownsdale, Meek, Sum- mers, T 'Vault and ilr. Speaker, 7. So the rules were not suspended."

The communication from the governor was then read as follows:

"To the Honorable the Legislative A.ssembly of Oregon,

"Fellow Citizens: The duty of addressing you at the opening of your ses- sion again presents itself.

"The duty of legislating, for the welfare and happiness of the community, again devolves upon you.

"May we be guided and directed by that wisdom which never errs.

"The boundary question — a question of great importance to us as a people -;-there is every reason to believe, is finally settled. The following is an ex- tract from the Polynesian, a paper published at the Sandwich Islands, of the 29th of August, last: —

" 'The senate ratified the treaty upon the Oregon (piestion, by a vote of 41 to 14.'

"This the Polynesian credits to the New York Gazette, and Times, of the 10th of June; showing that a treaty had been entered into, and probably con- eluded, between the two governments. The provisions of the treaty are not yet known to us in Oregon, farther than what we eaji gather from the letter of Mr. George Seymour, the British commander-in-chief in the Pacific, to the agents of the Hudson's Bay Company at the Sandwich Islands, being an extract of a private letter from A. Forbes, Esq., consul at Tepic, to George Seymour:

" 'I send you an American newspaper, which ilr. Bankhead has requested may be forwarded to you, and which shows that the Oregon question is entirely settled ; the 49th degree is to run on to the Straits of Fuca ; the whole Island of Vancouver being left in possession of England; and the said Straits of Fuca, Puget Sound, &c., remaining free to both parties. The Columbia river is also to remain free to both parties, until the expiration of the charter of the Hudson 's Bay Company, when the whole to the south of the 49th degree, is to belong to America with the exceptions mentioned.'

"Should this information prove correct, we may shortly expect officers from the United States government, to take formal possession of Oregon, and extend over us the protection we have longed and anxiously looked for.