Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly volume 15.djvu/190



178 SAMUEL ROYAL THURSTON

Whigs there ; but I could not recollect the names of any I could recommend, and assured him that Mr. King would give satis- faction. I perceived he did not want to appoint a Democrat, but said he would let me know what would be done tomorrow. So I went to the House Session, and after that spent the whole evening in franking papers to Oregon, and went to bed at 11.

January 12, 1850 This day I went again to see the Secre- tary of the Treasury about the appointments of surveyors in Oregon. Could not see him and I wrote him a letter. Attended the session of the house which balloted or voted for Sergeant- at-Arms, but without a choice. Mr. Lane was withdrawn. I wrote to Mr. Cornwall about getting his son into the West Point Academy. Got some patent reports and franked them home to Oregon, also franked some speeches of Cass.

January 13, 1850 This day was Sunday. I attended class meeting in the morning, and then went to preaching. The text was, "The Lord rains" [reigns] and the drift of the discourse was to show that all things in the moral and physical world are [under] the immediate supervision of God.

After meeting I came home and wrote a letter to the editors of the Union, the purport of which was to draw from them an answer whether they are believers in the doctrine that a state has a constitutional right to resist the laws of the Union, if such state shall be of opinion that such laws are either im- politic or unconstitutional, and to know if they would favor, or oppose, such resistance for cause that California shall be admitted into the Union as a free state with her constitution as adopted. And in an accompanying note, I said to them, if resistance is to be made on such grounds, then let the blood of him who first makes the attempt wipe out the stain of the rebellion. I say so now. I then wrote a letter to my wife, and one to Chicopee. Today I had a long talk with a Mr. Fitch of Michigan, about going to Oregon to start a Demo- cratic paper. Went to bed between ten and eleven.

January 14, 1850 This day I drew up two bills, one appro- priating land for the improvement of the navigation of the Willamette and other rivers, and the other for payment of the