Page:History of California, Volume 3 (Bancroft).djvu/26

8 A final meeting of the diputacion was held April 7th, when the majority were in favor of punishing recalcitrant friars by taking from them the management of the mission temporalities, and then on May 2d the sessions were suspended by the governor, until new instructions could be obtained from national authorities. His reason for this action was that the term for which the body had been organized according to the Spanish constitution had now expired, and the new constitution made no provision for a territorial diputacion.

General Miñon, appointed the year before to be ruler of California, did not accept the position, so that in January 1825 a new appointment had to be made.

The choice fell upon Lieutenant-colonel José María Echeandía, an officer said to have been director of a college of engineers in Mexico. His appointment as gefe político superior and comandante general militar of both Californias was perhaps dated the 31st of January. In June he sailed from San Blas to