Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly volume 16.djvu/238



218 HARRISON C. DALE

The company which the Oregon Provisional Emigration Society planned to send out in 1840 would have ignored the problem of organization by electing its officers in New York City the previous fall, 51 while one of the Oregon companies of the year 1853 simply evaded the problem by adopting no organization whatsoever, holding no meetings, and electing no captain or other officers. 52

In the administration of justice, moreover, despite the obvi- ous need at times of summary procedure, a manifest effort was made to preserve to each individual all his constitutional rights as a civilian that were consonant with the maintenance of order and discipline. Offences fell in general under two heads ; first, ordinary civil and criminal breaches of the law ; and second, infringements of discipline. Frequently these last were not made amenable to a law military exactly but rather to a droit administratif. At any rate, it was not unusual for the two classes of cases to be kept separate, which was an attempt to solve this problem of civil versus military govern- ment in matters judicial. For the administration of ordinary civil and criminal law, the company adopted by vote the statutes of a particular state 53 or some of its own devising 54 and then proceeded to elect a judge quite "distinct from their military leaders." 55 In such a court a jury trial was invariably allowed. Occasionally adjudging of cases against the disciplinary, and hence in a way military, regulations of the company was like- wise left to this civil court, but more generally, apparently, such cases were brought before the Council, an executive- judicial body of from nine to thirteen men, elected by the

51 "Notice to Emigrants," 5, Oregonian and Indians' Advocate, p. 286.

52 George B. Currey, Address, O. P. A. Transactions, 1887, p. 36. Cf. Palmer, Travels (Thwaites), p. 44.

53 Burnett, Recollections and Opinions, Oreg. Hist. Quart., V, 67. See also Wilkcs, History of Oregon, Part II, p. 70.

54 Bryant, W hat I Saw in California, p. 31. O. Johnson and W. H. Winter, Route Across the Rocky Mountains, 1846, reprinted in Oreg. Hist. Quart., VII, 69.

55 Minto, Address, O. P. A. Transactions, 1888, p. 94.