had secured peace and prosperity among the people. During its existence it had constructed public roads, bridges and ferries; it had organized counties; it had regulated and defined the extent of land claims; it had established postoffices; it had authorized the coinage of money, and regulated the value thereof; it had levied war and concluded peace; it had made treaties with Indian tribes, and, in fact, had done nearly all acts and things that an independent State may of right do. All these things the Provisional Government of Oregon had done by its own unaided power, and without any expense whatever to the Nationol Government. It fulfilled its own legend-Alis volat propriis. And on the 3d day of March, 1849, Governor Abernethy, after an honest and faithful administration, turned over its records and archives to Governor Lane, and the Provisional Government of Oregon ceased to be

Is it any wonder then that the early pioneers look back upon the government which they had organized with feelings of pride and affectionate regard?

have stated that Judge Thornton, while in Washington, in 1848, had prepared a bill which had been presented to the House of Representatives, granting donations of the public lands to the settlers in Oregon. The bill failed to become a law at that session of Congress, not from any opposition to its merits, but simply for want of time to enact it. Indeed, it seems to have been always conceded by members of Congress, from the time Senator Linn introduced his bills for that purpose down to the time the law was enacted, that the settlers who did so much towards securing our title to the country, should be entitled to donations of the land, which, by their settlements, they had earned.

When the Provisional Government was organized, on the 5th day of July, 1843, it provided that any person taking a land claim, should be allowed to hold a tract of 640 acres, in a square or oblong form according to the natural situation of the premises." By this law the claim could be taken without the boundaries running north and south, east and west. When the organic law was remodeled, in 1845, it provided that thereafter the boundary lines of all land claims should conform, as near as may be, to the cardinal points. So, when looking upon the maps, we see a square or oblong donation land claim containing 640 acres, with boundaries which do not run according to the cardinal points, but as the claimant chose to establish them, we know that such claim was taken before July 5, 1845. The claims so located mark the homes of the earliest pioneers.

Hon. Samuel R. Thurston was the first delegate to Congress, elected after the Territorial government law was passed, and procured the passage of that just and beneficent act, known as the "Oregon donation land law," which was approved on the 27th day of September, 1850.

xistence i

ounties; it

bed poste thereof; an tribes,

tate may ad done

Nationol

the 3d dminis

e Pro

nment

pre

rant

be

rits,

ays

his

ers

ed

It recognized the settlements made under the law of the Provisional Government, and permitted the boundaries of claims to remain just as were originally taken by the claimants.

One of the most equitable provisions of the Donation Law was, that Congress, in making grants of lands to settlers, made no distinction between husband and wife, man and woman, where such settlers were residents of Oregon, or should become such on or before the first of December, 1850. Many words of commendation have been spoken of the men who were pioneers of Oregon, but all too little has been said in praise of the pioneer women, who shared with their husbands, all the toils and hardships, all the privations and dangers, all the sufferings and sorrows, of that dreary two thousand miles' journey from their old homes to their new ones here. And when that journey was over at last, the hard life of the pioneer women had only begun. Living with their husbands and children, in their rude log cabins, far away from the society of kindred and friends, the poor women's daily toil went on for years, with but few of the necessaries and none of the comforts of civilized life. Surely the pioneer women were as much entitled to grants of land as their husbands were.

Mr. Thurston, our first delegate in Congress, the pioneer representative of Oregon, procured the passage of the Donation Land Law, so as to give to the husband and the wife an equal share in the land which they had jointly earned. It was the first law ever enacted by Congress, which placed both sexes on a perfect equality in this respect, and marked a new era in women's rights.

And it was in this same spirit of justice and equality that the pioneers of Oregon formed the Constitution of our State, seven years after the Donation Law was passed, when they declared:

"That the property and pecuniary rights of every married woman at the time of marriage, or afterwards acquired by gift, devise or inheritance, shall not be subject to the debts or contracts of the husband."

And in all subsequent legislation by the people of Oregon, the same perceptions of right and justice towards both sexes have prevailed in regard to their property. They have been maintained in the same spirit of equality as that in which the Donation Law was passed.

And in connection with this, it may not be amiss to refer briefly to an amend ment proposed to be made to the Constitution of Oregon. I mean the one to confer upon women the right of suffrage.

Whenever this right or privilege, whichever we may call it, was asserted by them it was treated with ridicule, and sometimes answered only by ribald jests.

But it has got beyond that now. Thoughtful men are seriously considering the effects it may have upon political and social affairs. In the end I believe women will obtain the right to vote at all elections. They are working with earnestness and zeal in the cause which they have at heart. They are pressing forward, not going back. Vestigia nulla retrorsum is their motto.

The property of women is taxed to support the government the same as the property of men, and they can claim with justice that they ought to have a voice in choosing those who impose the burden of taxation upon them.

As I said before, I believe they will succeed in the end in obtaining the right to vote at elections, and I hope they may. Surely the votes of intelligent women will not have a tendency to corrupt and degrade the right of suffrage, but to purify and exalt it rather.

I return from this digression to the subject I was considering, to the donation land law of Oregon.

Just and generous as that law was to the people of Oregon, yet there was one blot upon it. I refer to the provision contained in the 11th section of the act by which the donation claim of Dr. John McLoughlin, known as the Oregon City claim, was taken from him and placed at the disposal of the Legislative Assembly to be sold and the proceeds applied to the endowment of a university. It was an act of injustice to one of the best friends and greatest benefactors which the early immigrants ever had. I do not propose to speak of the many estimable and noble qualities of Dr. McLoughlin here. They have been dwelt upon by others who have heretofore addressed the Pioneer Association, and especially by Mr. Rees in 1879. I concur in everything he said in praise of Dr. McLoughlin.

It was my good fortune to know him well during the last six years of his life, years which were embittered by what he considered an act of ingratitude after he had done so many acts of personal kindness to the early immigrants in their time of need. That Dr. McLoughlin was unjustly treated in this matter, few, if any, will deny. And I am very sure that a large majority of the people, in Oregon, at that time, condemned the act which took away his property, and tended to becloud his fame. And yet no act was ever done by the Territorial Government to assert its right to the Oregon City claim during the life of Dr. McLoughlin; and in 1862, five years after his death, the State of Oregon confirmed the title to his devises upon the payment of the merely nominal consideration of $1,000 into the university fund.

And so five years after he was laid in his grave an act of tardy justice was done at last to the memory of the grand old pioneer.

nsidering the nd I believ orking wit

are pressing

me as the to have 1

the right telligent

suffrage,

onation

Mr. President, many of us have seen Oregon grow up from a wilderness inhabitated by a feeble band of missionaries and adventurous trappers, without any laws for their protection, to be a prosperous State with all the comforts of civilized life. This prosperous commonwealth whose foundations were laid by the pioneers amid sore trials and dangers, will soon be known no more to us forever. Since the last meeting of this Association many connected with it, have dropped by the wayside never to unite with us again. Year by year our ranks are thinned, and the gray hairs and stooping forms of those who remain tell us all too plainly that our days are far spent, and that we are on the sunset declivity of life. To our children and to our children's children, we will soon leave the heritage secured to them by their fathers; and our hope is that when we go hence the names and the memory of the pioneers may not be wholly forgotten by those who come after them.

as one

he act

regon lative

'sity.

tors

any

elt

nd

Dr.

OCCASIONAL ADDRESS.

BY HON. F. A. CHENOWETH.

After a recess of one hour, Mrs. Duniway appeared and read the Occasional Address on the emigration of 1849, prepared by Judge F. A. Chenoweth, of Corvallis, Judge Chenoweth being confined to his home by sickness:

The year 1849 was eventful as a period of intense excitement, on account of the rich discoveries of gold in California. It is true the rich deposits of gold in some parts of the State had been discovered in 1848, and the latter part of 1847; but communication at that time was slow, and little was known of California-to what country it belonged; whether its natives were hostile, or of the means of reaching that distant and unknown land-or whether the remarkable and astounding reports of the gold discoveries were true.

At first these reports were listened to like the reports of the discovery of perpetual motion, or angels' visits, or the elixir fountain. But by and by a solitary traveler from the Eldorado returned, bearing specimens of the shining ore, or samples of the gold-bearing quartz. At that time a man who had met, face to face, a live Californian, was a distinguished character; and the man whose eyes were permitted to fasten and feast upon the glittering sand, "was privileged above the common walks of life." Large prices were paid for small pinches of the glittering sand, or a peck of the auriferous rock-to be had and held a veritable messenger from the heavenly land.

All this consumed time, and it was not until late in 1848 that the richness of the gold deposits became fully and satisfactorily confirmed.

A month to six weeks was then the shortest possible time to hear from that country; as then, neither the rattling stage, the pony express, the iron horse, or the tamed, obedient lightning, were known, or believed to be among the possibilities, for communication across this desert land. The richness and extent of the gold deposits being established and confirmed, the excitement became intense throughout the United States and Canada. Then, how to reach the land of hope became the all-absorbing question. Those of the Atlantic who were