Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 28.djvu/229

 Or./.iitized AmniHi, 1862. -JJ:'.

This acquired te'rritory has since been divided into several Stairs and Territories, to- wit: California, Nevada, Utah and New Mexico, was subsequently divided, and by this subsequent partition comes the interesting history of the Territory of Arizona.

A CONFEDERATE TERRITORY.

A Territory named Arizona was first laid out and organized by the Confederate States of America. On the ist of March. 1861, the Territory was laken in charge by Lieutenant-Colonel John R. Baylor, who was in command of the Confederate Army force in the Territory, and possession was held on behalf of the Confederate States of America. The new Territory was to be included " in all that portion of New Mexico lying south of the 34th parallel of north latitude," and a proclamation was issued, "declaring said Territory temporarily organized as a military government until such time as Congress might otherwise provide." Officers were appointed for the govern- ment of the Territory. In the next year, 1862, the Congress of the Confederate States passed "an act to organize the Territory of Arizona." The first section of the act prescribed as follows:

"The Congress of the Confederate States of America do enact, That all that part of the present Territory of New Mexico, included within the following limits, to-wit: Beginning on the Colorado river at the parallel of north latitude 34 degrees, thence with said parallel to the eastern boundary of New Mexico; thence with said boundary until it intersects the line of Texas, and thence with said line to the Rio Grande, and so on to the line of Mexico, on said river, as fixed by the treaty of 1854; thence with the boundary line established by said treaty between the late United States and Mexico to the Colorado river, thence up the Colorado river to the place of beginning, be, and the same is hereby created into a temporary government, by the name of the Territory of Arizona; and nothing in this act shall be so construed as to inhibit the government of the Confederate States from dividing said Territory into two or more Territories as Congress shall deem convenient and proper, or from attaching any portion of said Territory to any other State or Territory of the Confederate States, and the institution of slavery in said Territory shall receive all necessary protection, both from the Territorial Legislature and the Congress of the Confederate States; provided, also, that nothing in this act contained shall be construed to impair the rights of per- sons or property now pertaining to the Pimos and Maricopas Indians