Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly vol. 2.djvu/194

178 .) This was very necessary, as already large contracts were being made, not only in Mexico, but in Chili and other South American states for prisoners or peons, and in a short time the mines would have been overrun with this class of labor. It was only necessary that the action of Governor Smith should be indorsed by some substantial body, as his authority hardly extended to civil affairs, no regular state government having baen yet organized in California.

In order to test the sense of the meeting, Mr. Case moved that Captain Whiting be not allowed to stay here, which was carried unanimously.

Then Mr. Case moved that a committee be appointed to convey to Captain Whiting the sense of the meeting, a duty which I attempted to perform, but found it quite unnecessary, as Captain Whiting had been present at the meeting, and had watched closely all the proceedings, and the next morning he and all his debtors started to leave the mines. I also introduced a resolution that we furnish a copy of the proceedings of the meeting to the Placer Times.

This started the ball rolling, and action was taken by miners at many different bars, and within a week or ten days it was estimated that over seven thousand foreigners, mostly peons and debtors, were started from California, their masters all blaming Case.

I remained at Big Bar for forty days, then came back to Coloma, stayed there for two days, and than started for Sacramento, where I got an outfit and made my way back to Oregon. (Much of the ill-feeling that was afterwards shown toward Oregon and Oregonians by the Californians, probably had its origin in these early conflicts between the Oregonians and the California ranchers and importers of a semi-slave labor; but Oregonians in Cali-