Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly volume 37.djvu/161

 to select additional land adjacent to the old site; but the senate rejected the proposal.

In the closing hours of the session, near midnight of November 9, limited by law to twenty days, the house bowed to the will of the senate and approved the bill with a $2,500,000 appropriation, the state's portion, fifty-five percent, being spread over a three-year term for imposition of taxes; and locating the site for the capitol on the land "now owned by the state” and defining its boundaries,—in other words, the old site. Administration of the act was vested in a state capitol reconstruction commission, to be composed of nine citizens of Oregon appointed three each by the governor of the state, the president of the senate, the speaker of the house. Governor Martin on November 15 transmitted the engrossed bill to the secretary of state, allowing it to become a law without his signature.

The commission was appointed on November 25, of the following: T. H. Banfield, Portland; Dr. E. C. Dalton, St. Helens; J. H. Lake, Portland; George R. Lewis, Pendleton; G. A. Marshall, Baker; J. A. McLean, Eugene; Dr. H. H. Olinger, Salem; R. W. Sawyer, Bend; Mrs. Gordon Voorhies, Medford. On December 1 the commission met in Salem and organized by electing J. A. McLean chairman and Dr. H. H. Olinger, vice chairman. Subsequently Alton John Bassett of Portland was elected secretary.

For technical adviser the commission on January 2, 1936, engaged Carl F. Gould, a noted architect of Seattle. Decision was made to hold a nation-wide competition under a program to be laid out by Mr. Gould and approved by the American Institute of Architects. The program was given to the architects desiring to compete in early March, with May 22nd as the deadline for receipt of the plans.

One hundred twenty-three plans were submitted in the competition submitted by architects in seventeen states and the District of Columbia. The plans were judged under strict conditions of anonymity by the following jury: T. H. Banfield and Mrs. Gordon Voorhies representing the commission; E. B. MacNaughton of Portland, representing the public; Walter Horstman Thomas of Philadelphia and David Clark Allison of Los Angeles, architects chosen from outside the state.