Page:The History of Oregon Bancroft 1888.djvu/120

102 having become impaired, he left Oregon, returned to Indiana, resigned, and soon after died. Associate Justice Burnett, being in California, and very lucratively employed at the time that he learned of his appointment, declined it; and as their successors, Thomas Nelson and William Strong, were not soon appointed, and came ultimately to their field of duty around Cape Horn, Judge Pratt was left unaided nearly two years in the judicial labors of the territory.

By act of congress, March 3, 1859, it was provided, in the absence of United States courts in California, violations of the revenue laws might be prosecuted before the judges of the supreme court of Oregon. Under this statute, Judge Pratt went to San Francisco, by request of the secretary of the treasury, in 1849, and assisted in the adjustment of several important admiralty cases. Also, about the same time, in his own district, at Portland, Oregon, as district judge of the United States for the territory of Oregon, he held the first court of admiralty jurisdiction within the limits of the region now covered by the states of Oregon and California.

Another evil to the peace and quiet of the community, and to the security of property, arose soon after the advent of the new justices—Strong, in August