Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly vol. 8.djvu/305

 LETTER OF DR. JOHN McLouGHLiN. away. Congress at length sent us an organic law, and in its sens'e of justice permitted those foreigners then within its limits to have a voice or vote in the conduct of public affairs on declaring their inten- tions to become citizens. At 'the earliest moment possible after the United States laws were extended over us, I availed myself, in good faith, of this opportunity; but, mark the sequel! The first Legisla- tive Assembly, the very men we aided to elect, passed an act seeking to disfranchise those of us whose accident it was to have been born on foreign soil, although our manhood and strength had been spent and wasted during almost a whole generation in preparing Oregon as a home for civilized man. And, while it is true that, from another and juster source, this injury has been since partially repaired, it still marks the temper with which our 'early devotion to the country and its pioneer settlers has been treated. Not content with this, Congress was unnaturally induced, through false representations coming from men high in authority, to insert a clause in the land bill which deprives the children of such as happen to be born on foreign so'il of all rights to their land claims, while the half-breed offspring of native Americans get title to theirs, and in addition, my own claim and home, and the only one I have on earth, was reserved; and, as if to propitiate the intended outrage upon me individually, and to approve the good and the just, an appeal was made to their sense of the value of education by donating this home of mine, and last resting place, to the endow- ment and uses of a university! Need I refer to the foul means used to attain this end from the American Congress? One example only is sufficient to show the turpitude of the rest; it was unblushingly stated that I continued to be a British subject and refused to take steps to become naturalized, when it was notorious throughout the entire Ter- ritory that I had publicly declared and filed my intention to become a citizen of the United States in the court of Claskamas County on the 30th day of May, 1849, a year and a half before the passage of the land law! This is painful, and I cannot dwell upon it if I would. I turn to legislative acts more pleasing; and, with deference to the opin- ions of many others, to what I submit is generally conceded to have been more honorable and just. In the estimation of the Legislative Assembly of 1850-51, no purpose, however garnished with a praise- worthy profession, could justify wrong; and, in this tone of political morality, refused to accept of the donation, and sought to confirm, by the passage of an act, to the purchasers what had been bought of me in good faith, although in conflict with the rigorous law of 27th September, 1850, which, by its terms, would persecute and take from me, without consent, in my declining years, my home and private property for the ostensible public use of educating the rising genera- tion. As far as that body went in doing what was right, I feel deeply