Page:The History of Oregon Bancroft 1888.djvu/182

164 place named, which was laid on the table. Finally, on the 9th, a committee from both houses to draft a memorial to congress was appointed, consisting of Curry, Anderson, and Avery, on the part of the representatives, and Garrison, Waymire, and Humphrey, on the part of the council.

Pratt's opinion in the matter was then asked, which sustained the legislature as against the judges. Hector was then ordered to bring the territorial library from Oregon City to Salem on or before the first day of January 1852, which was not permitted by the federal officers.

The legislators then passed an act re-arranging the judicial districts, and taking the counties of Linn, Marion, and Lane from the first and attaching them to the second district. This action was justified by the Statesman, on the ground that Judge Nelson had proclaimed that he should decree all the legislation of the session held at Salem null. On the other hand the people of the three counties mentioned, excepting a small minority, held them to be valid; and it was better that Pratt should administer the laws peacefully than that Nelson should, by declaring them void, create disorder, and cause dissatisfaction. The latter was, therefore, left but one county, Clackamas, in which to administer justice. But the nullifiers, as the whig officials came now to be called, were not