Page:The History of Oregon Bancroft 1888.djvu/370

352 that the seat of government was not removed from Salem to Corvallis by that act, nor would it be until such times as congress should take action. Nor could the governor pay out any part of the appropriation under instructions from the legislature, except under contracts already existing. The executive office, moreover, should not be removed from Salem before congress should have approved the relocation act. So said the comptroller; but the governor's office was already removed to Corvallis when the comptroller reached this decision. The Statesman, too, which did the public printing, had obeyed the legislative enactment, and moved its office to the new seat of government.

When the legislature met in the following December, Grover introduced a bill to relocate the capital at Salem, which became a law on the 12th of December, 1855. But this action was modified by the passage of an act to submit the question to the people at the next election. Before this was done, and perhaps in order that it might be done, the almost completed state house, with the library and furniture, was destroyed by fire, on the night of the 30th of December, which was the work of an incendiary. The whigs charged it upon the democrats, and the democrats charged it upon "some one interested in having the capital at Corvallis." However that may have been, it fixed the fate of Corvallis in this regard. Further than this, it settled definitely the location question by exhausting the patience of the people.