Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly vol. 26.djvu/352

286 stead. Thus, into Arcadian Oregon was first introduced party politics, and as time went forward partizanship became intensely bitter, while the advocacy of statehood soon resolved itself into a party question.

Governor Gaines reached Oregon City, August 18, 1850, by the sloop, Falmouth, and with him came the new Secretary, Edward Hamilton. In the meantime Lane had been elected delegate in congress to succeed Thurston, then recently deceased. Soon after, a heated controversy arose over the question of the location of the state capital, in which Governor Gaines, Secretary Hamilton, and United States Attorney Amory Holbrook were supported by but few members of the legislature. Their claim that Oregon City remained the capital notwithstanding a legislative enactment attempting to change it to Salem, (which had also the approval of two members of the supreme court, Judges Nelson and Strong,) was denounced in scathing terms by the majority members of the legislature, who insisted upon holding the session at Salem. The latter members, who were mostly democrats, were encouraged by the opinion of Judge O. C. Pratt, one of the Supreme Judges, who appeared before the legislature and read a long and carefully prepared address, criticising his associates on the supreme bench, and arguing in favor of the legality of the enactment. The question reached Washington for decision upon request of Governor Gaines, and the President and his Attorney General held that the Salem Act was invalid. It took an act of congress under the guidance of Delegate Lane to straighten out the tangle and to confirm the change of location of the capital to Salem.

This controversy generated political heat beyond its apparent importance and has its place here for that reason. Party spirit was intense, and the democrat majority at Salem showed a rancor that through the ten-year period of the Territory and afterward in the early years of statehood, was always characteristic of the