Page:Portland, Oregon, its History and Builders volume 1.djvu/155

Rh promises no protection to life or property. We can boast of no civil code. We can promise no protection but the ulterior resort of self defense. We do not presume to suggest the manner in which the country shall be occupied by the government, nor the extent to which our settlement should be encouraged. We confide in the wisdom of our national legislators and leave the subject to their candid deliberations."

There were two other memorials like this sent to congress, but the happy well-paid congressmen were deaf to all appeals from distant Oregon.

And what was the position of the Hudson Bay Company all this time? All of its interests lay in the direction of an unsettled country. It was here to trap fur bearing animals, and to trade with the Indians for furs. It did not want the country settled by either Americans or any other people. As long as there were no settlers, the Indians would obey their orders and would be happy and content in the forest with their ways of living. To bring settlers that would convert the country into farms, build towns, start saw mills and establish herds of domestic animals would destroy the business of the fur company and drive it out. It was but natural that the company should oppose emigration and settlements. And in doing so it became the ally of the first American settlers. Whether consciously or unconsciously, cannot now be determined. With its power and influence with the Indians, its wealth and organization, and its knowledge of the country and means for bringing colonists from either Canada or the home country, it could have quickly and easily throttled all attempts to establish American settlements by establishing those devoted to the support of the British claim to the country. But to do so would have put in jeopardy the profits and future existence of the company as a business paying institution. The managers of the company in England undoubtedly expected and relied upon Chief Factor John McLoughlin and others to discourage settlements in Oregon; believing that without business support and encouragement the Americans would be starved out. Fortunate it was for the Americans that John McLoughlin was not built on the narrow gauge pattern of his employers in London. His great heart and humane sympathies would not permit him to view with cold blooded indifference the suffering and destitution of men and women who had risked their lives and everything else in the great struggle to reach Oregon. He helped them as much as he could, and not be unceremoniously kicked out before the first few Americans had secured a foothold on the Willamette valley. As it was, for this open handed aid to the Americans, he lost his position and a salary of twelve thousand dollars a year. With the most hopeful view of the case the Americans had the narrowest chance in the world to secure a foothold and establish an American settlement. Had they not succeeded Oregon would certainly have become a British province. With McLoughlin's opposition exerted against them, as his British employers desired it to be exerted, the Americans, unsupported by congress as they were, could never have succeeded. The tacit support of John McLoughlin given in the name of humanity, undoubtedly decided the fate of Oregon in favor of the American settlers.

We now reach the point where the Americans in Oregon were compelled to act. To retreat, they could not. To go forward and establish a government l-or mutual protection was the only alternative of common sense and brave men. And when we stop and take a look at the surroundings of this handful of Americans, away out here two thousand miles from any friendly encouragement, and wholly neglected and ignored by the American president and congress, without arms or means of defense, without money or funds of any kind to maintain an organization, their resolution to organize a government and found an American state seems absurd and chimerical to reason. And yet to sentiment and patriotism, it is the grandest chapter in the history of civilization. The region to be claimed and governed for their native land was as large as a dozen states they had left behind them. They were confronted and opposed on one hand by