# Oregon Historical Quarterly/Volume 21/Oregon-Its Meaning, Origin and Application

OREGON—ITS MEANING, ORIGIN AND APPLICATION
By John E. Rees.
It may appear presumptuous for me to imagine that I can elucidate the above caption. Ever since the word "Oregon" came into use people have endeavored to ascertain its meaning and origin and notwithstanding that considerable study and research have been devoted to this subject, the history of the word is still a mystery and bids fair, perhaps, to remain so. For years the solution of this question has baffled many investigators and especially those who had a splendid opportunity to know the facts by reason of their having lived nearer the time when this event occurred. Therefore, the seeming audacity of myself, without such opportunities, to now attempt to explain the derivation of this word. I would not make such endeavor were it not for the fact that so many remarkable efforts, written by previous authors, to interpret the genesis of this word, have invariably ended with the expression or its equivalent, "I don't know."
My presentation of this subject is suggestive and not to be considered exact history. It is the result of almost a half a century's acquaintance with the history, manners and customs ​of Western Indian Tribes, especially the Shoshonis. While suggestive and not entirely correct, perhaps, yet the theory pre- sented herein appears quite plausible, at least, more so than any previous contribution to this intricate investigation and is possessed with sufficient reasonableness to take the inquiry out of the realm of conjecture and place it in the field of probable historical data.
This word is of Indian origin and therefore its history is regarded as miraculous by many investigators. The meaning of many Indian names now current in American history and geography is grossly perverted because of the shallowness of sentimental inquirers. The inability of many writers to solve the meaning and fully understand the application of Indian words is due to their ignorance of the language and especially the nature of the American Indian. If so disposed we could take the poetical thunder out of many American names, the visionary meanings of which are so ancient that "the memory of man runneth not to the contrary". But "truth is always stranger than fiction". For example, the word "Mississippi" is of Indian origin and is said to mean Father of Waters, an eloquent thought that conveys a certain knowledge which the red man did not possess. The Indian had no fixed names for natural objects; when speaking of them he used descriptive terms, only. Eight-tenths of Indian geographical names were coined on the spot from some particular attribute which was most striking to his mind at the time he bestowed it. There- fore, when asked by the white man, the red man's name of a certain stream or mountain, he designated it by some peculiar characteristic which came to his mind when asked. When the early trapper inquired his name for the Boise river he called it "Wihinast", meaning boiling rapidly, from the chief peculiarity in view at that moment which was an eddy or whirlpool in the river; or while near a mountain peak during a storm as the thunder was making itself manifest, he called it "Tome-up Yaggi", meaning the clouds are crying; in other words "Thunder," giving us the geographical "Thunder Mountain". ​OREGON MEANING, ORIGIN AND APPLICATION 319
The Canadian Indians knew that Fathers Allouez, Hennepin, La Salle and Marquette had made tremendous efforts to find and did find and traveled with boats upon the Mississippi river, so when the Chippewas were asked by the French their name for this river replied, as corrupted into French, "Mee- shee See-pee", meaning "Mee-shee", Father, and "See-pee", water, or Father's Water, referring to the Jesuit Fathers and not to the then unknown fact of its being the largest river in the world. 2
The word "Oregon" is derived from a Shoshoni Indian ex- pression meaning, The River of the West, originating from the two Shoshoni words "Ogwa," River and "Pe-on," West, or "Ogwa Pe-on." The Sioux pronounced this word in the more euphonious manner in which we now hear it, a characteristic in which their tongue excels and the Shoshoni "Gwa" under- went, etymologically, a variation in the new language and became changed to "r," thus giving the sonorous word which Jonathan Carver, who first published the name to the English world, heard spoken by them during his visit with the Sioux nation. 3
In the word "Ogwa" the syllable "Og" means undulations and is the basis of such words as "river," "snake," "salmon," or anything having a wavy motion. The sound "Pah" means water. Therefore, a river is undulating water. "Pe-on" is contracted from the two syllables, "Pe-ah," big and "Pah," water or Big Water meaning the Pacific Ocean. Some strik- ing natural phenomenon determined the cardinal points for the Shoshonis. Thus, "Coona-nah," derived from "Coona," fire and "Nah," in the direction of, means North, referring to the Northern Lights; or "To-yah-nah" from "To-yah," mountain the East as the sun, in rising, comes from over the mountains ; or "You-aw-nah" from "You-ant" meaning warm, the South the direction of warmth especially of warm winds ; and "Pe-on-nah," West, the direction of the big water or ocean. Captain Clark stated that the Shoshonis of the Salmon River country when asked about their river said it flowed into
2 Upham's Minnesota Geographic Names, 4.
3 Boaz, Handbook of American Indian Languages, 875. ​
320 JOHN E. REES
a great lake of water and pointed toward the setting sun. 4 That direction was their West, and if any of the tribe are asked to-day about "Oregon" they point to the west and say, "Pe-on-nah." This is undoubtedly the etymology of the word "Oregon" and its Shoshoni origin and meaning, The River of the West.
The Snake River valley, in Idaho, was the principal habitat of the Shoshonis at the time the white man came in contact with them. However, they ranged from the Colorado to the Columbia rivers and their language was understood by all the tribes from the Rocky Mountains to California and by a few in other tribes outside of these limits. While at no time, is it known, that any of this tribe inhabited the Columbia River section, yet they dwelt upon the Snake and Salmon rivers, streams which are tributary to that river. They were well acquainted with the physiography of that stream, yet if either they or any other tribe had a name for the Columbia River, I have been unable, so far, to ascertain what it was. However, it is said that the Chinooks, who inhabited the coast near the mouth of the river, had a descriptive term which they applied to it. 5
The oldest tradition among the Shoshonis is to the effect that their original home was just east of the Rocky Mountains in Montana, Wyoming and Colorado and that the Plains Tribes drove them into the mountains. They were great weavers of grass and twigs, making their lodges of such products, and called themselves "Shawnt", meaning plenty, and "Shaw-nip", grass, or the more euphonious name "Shoshoni", which, broadly speaking, means Weavers of Grass Lodges, and they always aimed to live near plenty of grass. Occasionally, they re-crossed the mountains and hunted buffalo on the Yellowstone and Platte rivers and often drifted down the Missouri River, where they came in contact with other tribes, sometimes in a friendly and at other times in a hostile manner. That they came in contact with the Plains Tribes is evident from the fact that the Arapahos, Blackfeet, Cheyennes, Crows,
4 Thwaites, Lewis and Clark, II, 380.
5 Bancroft's History of Oregon, I, 18. ​
OREGON MEANING, ORIGIN AND APPLICATION 321
Hidatsa and Sioux possessed, in their vocabularies, names for the Shoshonis which mean Grass Lodge People. 6
When visiting- with the Plains Tribes the Shoshonis talked about their own country. This is a natural supposition. No tribe could explain better, or as well as they, the great Rocky Mountain system, extending from Mexico northward for hun- dreds of miles, dividing the waters flowing east from those flowing west. They and their kinsmen occupied this region and lived all their lives in those mountains and could describe their rocky and crystalline natures better than any one. They knew better than others that the highest land west of the Mis- sissippi River was in those mountains and that there was a place within them that was the source of three very large streams, the Missouri, Columbia and Colorado, all taking their rise within a few miles of each other, and within the Yellow- stone National Park region where no Indian tribe ever dwelt, except the Tukurikas, a family of the Shoshonis. 7 That one of these rivers was a Ogwa pe-on", or the River of the West, undoubtedly meaning the "Columbia", the one flowing into the ocean, toward the setting sun. The other rivers were men- tioned, perhaps, but the "Columbia" appealed to the Shoshonis as it furnished him "Og-gi", or salmon, his principal food. They talked of the stream as the river out west or toward the west, at no time intending to give it a distinctive appellation. Had they wished to give it a name, the descriptive part of the word would have been placed first, as in the case of Snake River which, after immigration had formed the Oregon Trail, the Indian called "Po-ogwa" or Road River. As their rela- tives, the Moquis, lived adjacent to the Spaniards, the Sho- shonis had greater opportunities to know the Mexicans and became the first western tribe to possess horses which they procured from the Spaniard. They knew that the Mexican tribes possessed ornaments and utensils of gold, but such did not appeal to the Shoshoni as did bear claws and elk teeth. He knew where in these mountains this gold could be obtained, proven by the fact that he guided the white man to some of
6 Hodge's Handbook of American Indians, II, 556.
7 Ibid., 835. ​
322 JOHN E. REES
the greatest finds in the mountains. No tribe had the oppor- tunity to know these things as did the Shoshonis, which knowl- edge they imparted to other tribes with which they came in contact.
Bancroft, the historian, wrote, "Although living lives of easy poverty, the wild tribes of America everywhere possessed dor- mant wealth enough to tempt the cupidity alike of the fierce Spaniard, the blithe Frenchman and the sombre Englishman. Under a burning tropical sun, where neither animal food nor clothing was essential to comfort, the land yielded gold, while in hyperborean forests where no precious metals were discov- ered, the richest peltries abounded ; so that no savage in all this northern continent was found so poor that grasping civilization could find nothing of which to rob him." 8
In the settlement of North America the French occupied the northern, the Spanish the southern and the English the central parts. In 1754, the contest between England and France for supremacy on this continent began, the bone of contention being the Indian fur trade along the Ohio River, which struggle was designated the "French and Indian War". This war ended by the Treaty of Paris in 1763, which divested France of all her possessions in America, the English thenceforth assuming con- trol. 9 Jonathan Carver, a captain in the conquering English army, made an exploring expedition toward the interior of this newly acquired territory during the years 1766-7-8, for the purpose of securing some information and knowledge for the English people. He traveled by the way of the Great Lakes toward the head waters of the Mississippi and ascended the Minnesota River two hundred miles above its mouth, his object being to study the character of the country, the customs of the inhabitants and to endeavor to ascertain the size of the continent by traversing it. The information which he gained was published in a book entitled, "Travels Through the Interior Parts of North America"
Some extracts from Carver's writings say, "That range of mountains, of which the Shining Mountains are a part, begins
8 Bancroft's History of Central America, I, 63,
9 Ridpath's History of the World, VI, 669. ​
OREGON MEANING, ORIGIN AND APPLICATION 323
at Mexico, and continuing northward, on the back or to the east of California, separate the waters of those numerous rivers that fall either into the Gulf of Mexico, or the Gulf of
California Some of the nations who inhabit those
parts that lie to the west of the Shining Mountains have gold so plenty among them that they make their most common
utensils of it Among these mountains, those that
lie to the west .... are called the Shining Mountains, from an infinite number of chrystal stones, of an amazing size, with which they are covered, and which, when the sun shines full upon them, sparkle so as to be seen at a very great dis- tance. This extraordinary range of mountains is calculated to be more than three thousand miles in length, without any very considerable intervals, which I believe surpasses anything of the kind in the other quarters of the globe. Probably in future ages they may be found to contain more riches in their bowels, than those of Indostan and Malabar, or that are pro- duced on the golden coast of Guinea ; nor will I except even the Peruvian mines. To the west of these mountains, when ex- plored .... may be found other lakes, rivers, and countries, full fraught with all the necessaries or luxuries of life; and where future generations may find an asylum . . . . there is little doubt but their expectations will be fully gratified in these rich and unexhausted climes". 10
Extracting further he says, "From the intelligence I gained from the Naudowessie 11 Indians, among whom I arrived on the 7th of December, and whose language I perfectly acquired during a residence of five months ; and also from the accounts I afterwards obtained from the Assinipoils, 12 who speak the same tongue, being a revolted band of the Naudowessie ; and from the Killistinoes, 13 neighbors of the Assinipoils, who speak the Chipeway language, and inhabit the head of the River Bourbon; 14 I say from these nations, together with my own observations, I have learned that the four most capital rivers on the continent of North America, viz., the St. Lawrence, the Mississippi, the River of Bourbon, and the Oregon or the
10 Carver's Travels, 76-7-8. Walpole, N. H. 1813 edition.
11 Sioux.
12 Assiniboines.
14 Named in honor of the Royal Bourbon family of France. Now known as the Saskatchewan-Nelson River System. ​
324 JOHN E. REES
River of the West (as I hinted in my introduction) have their sources in the same neighborhood. The waters of the three former are within thirty miles of each other; the latter, how- ever, is rather further west." Bancroft says, "Substitute for the St. Lawrence the Colorado, which makes the observation all the more striking, and the statement is essentially correct." 15 "This shews that these parts are the highest lands in North America; and it is an instance not to be paralleled on the other three quarters of the globe, that four rivers of such magnitude should take their rise together, and each, after run- ning separate courses, discharge their waters into different oceans at the distance of two thousand miles from their sources". 16
Such was some of the information which Captain Carver obtained concerning the West which we find is so manifest as to be substantially correct. It was given to him by the Sioux who, no doubt, acquired it from the Shoshonis. Some authors have endeavored to discredit the captain's writings while others have designated them a paraphrase upon the efforts of others 17 but the information which he imparts concerning this western country indicates that it came from some one who knew from experience of which he spoke. It may be that others helped to put his manuscript into readable book form as his papers were prepared for the press by a bookseller, 18 but the captain un- questionably furnished the historical data which the Indians had imparted to him. After returning from his travels he proceeded to London where he proposed to the parliament of the British government the plan of ascending the Missouri and descending the Columbia and building posts along the route to facilitate the Indian fur trade and colonial settlements, 19 but England, in neglecting support of Captain Carver's scheme, overlooked her supreme opportunity to entirely dominate the North American continent as did France, a century before, lose her undoubted future prestige by her shameful treatment of Pierre Radisson.
Captain Carver was the first white person known to use the
15 Bancroft's Northwest Coast, I, 608.
16 Carver's Travels, 54-5.
17 Eleventh Edition, Encyclopaedia Britannica, V. 437.
18 Carver's Travels, 22.
19 Ibid., 18 and 280. ​
OREGON MEANING, ORIGIN AND APPLICATION 325
word "Oregon", which he did in his book published in 1778, using it four different times and each time he said, "Oregon or the river of West," showing that he understood the word to mean, The River of the West. While Captain Carver was the first white person to use the word "Oregon", others before him spoke of a western river. In 1673, when Father Mar- quette and Joliet passed down the Mississippi, which they called the "Conception River", 20 they supposed that they would float into the South Sea, later known as the Pacific Ocean; but when they reached the Missouri it was evident to themi from so vast a stream, that it must have come a long distance and drained a large section of country. The Indians informed them that such was the case and that beyond the source of the Missouri was another "large river that flowed westward". 21 In 1683, when Baron Lahontan was exploring the Des Moines River he was told, by the Indians, "of a great western river running to the ocean", 22 and Charlevoix, in 1721, while along the upper Mississippi, "learned of the Indians of a western river leading to the ocean", 23 all of which indicated that the Indians of the Mississippi Valley knew of a western river which flowed into the Pacific ocean; in fact, one of their number, Moncacht-Ape, of the Yazoo tribe, told the French that he had, in 1700, traveled up the Missouri, crossed the mountains and descended a stream, which he called the "Beau- tiful River", to the ocean, making the first known transcon- tinental expedition. 24 Such reports of a western river became a tradition among the Spanish navigators who first explored the Northwest Coast so that in 1543, Ferrelo and his crew, "imagined they saw signs of the inevitable great river" 25 and in 1603, Aguilar sailing along the coast north of Cape Blanco "and near it found a very copious and soundable river, on the banks of which were very large ashes, willows, brambles and other trees of Castile; and wishing to enter it the current would not permit", 26 from which incident the stream was called Rio de Aguilar, which was supposed to be and denoted on some maps as the Columbia River.
20 American Historical Review, XXV No. 4, 676.
21 Bancroft's Northwest Coast, I, 587.
22 U S Geol. Sur. Memoirs of Explorations, Surveys, Voyages and Dtscovertes, 491.
23 Ibid., 492.
24 Davis, Journey of Mon'cacht-A^e.
25 Bancroft's History of California, I, 79.
26 Bancroft's Northwest Coast, I, 146. ​
326 JOHN E. REES
In fact the reports by the Indians of a large river flowing from the continental divide of the Rocky Mountains into the Pacific Ocean caused some cartographers to represent on their maps, by dotted lines, a River of the West, after which it became the primary object and the goal of navigators of all nations to seek for and find this Indian stream to whose tra- ditional account were added many by the white man until 1792, when Captain Robert Gray solved the aboriginal legend and entered, for the first time, the channel of this river of many names, notwithstanding which he gave it another, "Columbia", after his vessel, and by which name the river has usually been known since. 27
The next notable use of the word "Oregon", in literature, after its first application by Captain Carver in 1778, was by William Cullen Bryant in his poem, Thanatopsis, in 1812. "Thanatopsis" is a Greek word meaning a contemplation of death. It was said of the poet Bryant that if he was ever a child and thought as a child no one knew when it was. The widespread beauty of nature, her silent movements, her cease- less changes, the endless mass of humanity drifting ever toward the chasm of death, these were familiar themes over which he contemplated in his boyhood days and it was as a boy of eighteen years he wrote Thanatopsis. The splendid thought expressed in this poem comes as "a voice out of the wilder- ness" lifting one above the weary avocations of life to a purer faith in a life beyond. The warm human sympathy of the master poet is here overpowering. As proofs of his stately thoughts on the gravity and universality of death he appeals to the solemnity of the forest and the wilderness, for the dark forests of the western coast of America were quite as familiar to the average reader then, as was the wilderness in the Libyan Desert on the African Coast and it was that idea rather than for "meter" that the word "Oregon" was used by him. He said, "Take the wings of the morning, pierce the Barcan wilderness, or lose thyself in the continuous woods where rolls the Oregon, and hears no sound save his own dashings, yet
27 Lyman's Columbia River, Chap. 3. ​
OREGON MEANING, ORIGIN AND APPLICATION 327
the dead are there! And millions in those solitudes, since first the flight of years began, have laid them down in their last sleep the dead reign there alone!" This poem was published first, in 1817, and at once the boyhood effort, portraying the boundless majesty of nature, was stamped upon the minds and emotions of others and the word "Oregon" thereby became fixed and perpetual in the English language. 28
President Jefferson, in his efforts to develop the resources of the nation west of the Missisippi, adopted the plan outlined by Captain Carver of carrying on a trade up the Missouri across the Rockies and down the Columbia to the Pacific, and in 1803, sent Captains Lewis and Clark on an exploring expe- dition across the continent with instructions, among which were, "The object of your mission is to explore the Missouri River, and such principal streams of it, as by its course and communication with the waters of the Pacific Ocean, may offer the most direct and practicable water communication across the continent, for the purpose of commerce". And "Should you reach the Pacific Ocean, inform yourself of the circum- stances which may decide whether the furs of those parts may not be collected as advantageously at the head of the Missouri (convenient as is supposed to be the waters of the Colorado and Oregon or Columbia) as at Nootka sound, or any other point of that coast; and that trade may be consequently con- ducted through the Missouri and the United States more beneficially than by the circumnavigation now practiced." 29
Lewis and Clark completed their mission in 1806 and when nearing home on their return journey met many parties ascend- ing the Missouri on their way to the wilderness to participate in the fur trade with the aborigines,3 for as above quoted, no native tribe was so poor, even if it inhabited hyperborean forests, that it did not excite the cupidity of the white man. John Jacob Astor, a practical person, conceived the idea of putting into operation Captain Carver's plan and after form- ing the Pacific Fur Company, in 1810, laid a scheme to erect trading posts across the continent, the first one established
28 Bryant's Poetical Works.
29 Thwaites, Lewis and Clark, VII, 248, 251.
30 Chittenden's American Fur Trade. ​
328 JOHN E. REES
being Fort Astoria at the mouth of the Columbia in 1811, which proved to be the first permanent settlement on the Northwest Coast, after which subordinate posts were estab- lished on the Okanogan, Spokane and Willamette rivers. During the war with England, the British, in 1813, took Fort Astoria and the subordinate posts. 31 But the United States was vic- torious in this war and was able to stipulate in the Treaty of Ghent, which ended this war in 1814, that "All territory, places; and possessions whatsoever, taken by either party from the other during the war .... shall be restored without delay", 32 but England was loath to surrender back this fur trading post just as she refused, for years after the Revolu- tionary War, to give possession, to the United States, of the frontier fur posts to which America was entitled by treaty rights. From England's refusal to restore Fort Astoria to the United States arose the Northwest Boundary dispute which agitated both nations henceforth until 1846, when it was ad- justed by placing the boundary at the 49th parallel. 33
Lewis and Clark's Journal was published in 1814, giving a glowing description of the country over which they had tra- versed, including the "Great Columbia Valley", which report made a deep and lasting impression upon all who read it. But this country, while legally belonging to the United States, under the Treaty of Ghent, was still in the hands of the British. As the British had failed to give up Astoria, Secretary Monroe, in 1815, six months after the treaty had been signed, made a demand on the English Minister to restore, to the United States, this post, to which request the English gave no heed. From this date began the agitation for the American posses- sion and occupation of the Northwest Coast, Hall J. Kelley, of Boston, being the first party to call popular attention to this subject. Until this time, this region was called the "Columbia River Country"; the "Shores of the Pacific"; the "Country Across the Rocky Mountains" ; the Northwest Coast" ; the "Western Coast of America"; or the "Country Westward of the Stony Mountains", but Kelley, being a school teacher and
31 Irving's Astoria.
32 Malloy's Treaties, Conventions, Etc., I. 613.
33 Von Hoist's Constitutional History, III, Chap 2. ​
OREGON MEANING, ORIGIN AND APPLICATION 329
familiar with Carver's Travels and Bryant's Thanatopsis, des- ignated the district the "Oregon Country", it being the first instance in which is found the name "Oregon" applied to the Columbia River Valley. Kelley became an enthusiast over the subject, making it the principal topic of his private con- versations as well as in public lectures, writing many newspaper articles and later, pamphlets on the obsessed theme and, in 1817, began to memorialize Congress on the American claim and occupation of the Oregon Country, calling the nation's attention to this desired object. 34
In 1817, Secretary Adams made a second request for the surrender of Fort Astoria, which the British had re-named Fort George, and in doing so displayed sufficient force, by dispatch- ing the U. S. sloop of war, Ontario, to the Columbia, to re-take the place if necessary. England gave up this post in 1818; however, she still maintained a string to the prize in the way of the "Joint Occupancy Treaty", whereby all lands west of the Rocky Mountains were to be "free and open" for ten years to the subjects of both nations' 35 which practically left the country still in the hands of the British subjects.
In the Sixteenth Congress, which met in December, 1820, was a member from Virginia, Dr. John Floyd, whose ancestors had been pioneer settlers, he having been born on the frontier of Kentucky. He knew well both Lewis and Clark, his cousin, Charles Floyd, having been a member of their expedition. At the same hotel in which he took quarters for the winter were Crooks and Farnham, men who had worked for Astor in estab- lishing Astoria. All being western men naturally became well acquainted and often exchanged ideas on the upbuilding of the West and with Senator Thomas H. Benton, of Missouri, often proposed and discussed the virtues of the Columbia River Country. As the result of such knowledge, Dr. Floyd was able to get a bill before Congress, "To authorize the occupa- tion of the Columbia river, and to regulate trade and inter- course with the Indian Tribes thereon", which bill, however, failed to become a law. In 1822, he introduced another bill
34 Oregon Historical Quarterly, XVIII.
35 Malloy's Treaties, Conventions, etc., I, 632. ​
330 JOHN E. REES
to the effect "That all that portion of the territory of the United States north of the forty-second degree of latitude, and west of the Rocky Mountains, shall constitute the Terri- tory of Oregon", which was the first time in history in which the words "Territory of Oregon" were used. 36 By reason of these various agitations public attention was, at least, directed to our western coast, and in his Annual Message to Congress, in 1824, President Monroe submitted to the consideration of Congress "the propriety of establishing a military post at the mouth of the Columbia River." 37
The occupation of the Oregon Country, by the English, was by the Hudson's Bay Company, a single "trading association whose sole aim was the pursuit of material interests of a hand- ful of capitalists. England had not founded a colony in Oregon, but a few Englishmen had constructed there a machine for producing wealth, which was kept going by its employees and in which Indians and Sandwich Islanders were the main wheels. The Company did not aim at the development of the country, but its exploitation. In promoting civilization, it labored only so far as the preservation of its pecuniary inter- ests made this unavoidable. If the interests of civilization actually or apparently came in conflict with these interests, they were trodden under foot." 38
In 1834, an American settlement sprang up in the Willamette valley which built homes for their families, cleared lands, cul- tivated crops and hewed out a place for civilization to exist. This settlement changed conditions of affairs, for American citizens as well as the interests of the country, demanded pro- tection of the government. In 1838, Senator Linn of Mis- souri, introduced a bill in the U. S. Senate to organize Oregon as a territory and establish on the Columbia a fort and custom house. However, from and after 1840, the people began to solve this question by immigration to this new country and "Not only had they brought with them the republican spirit of independence, sucked in with their mother's milk, the habits of self-reliance and self-rule-habits which from infancy were
36Benton's Thirty Years View, I, 13.
37 Richardson's Messages and Papers of the Presidents.
38 Von Hoist's Constitutional History, III, 44. ​
OREGON MEANING, ORIGIN AND APPLICATION 331
part of their very being and their American patriotism, but they were convinced without much inquiry about Drake's voyages of discovery and England's old treaties with Spain that their feet stood, not on the soil of a stranger, but on that of home." 39
So, in 1843, at Champoeg, Oregon, was organized the first American civil government west of the Rocky Mountains which provisional government soon sought to extend its juris- diction north of the Columbia River, which attempt resulted in the democratic campaign slogan of 1844, of "fifty-four forty or fight". However, pending difficulties with England over this matter, the organization of the territory was deferred until the boundary line was settled.
In 1848, during the Thirteenth Congress, Oregon was finally organized into a territory from the anomalous "Territory of Oregon", with boundaries defined as, "All that part of the territory of the United States which lies west of the summit of the Rocky Mountains, north of the forty-second degree of north latitude, known as the Territory of Oregon, shall be or- ganized into and constitute a temporary government by the name of the Territory of Oregon", 40 which territory was reduced, in 1853, by the formation of Washington Territory.
The political destiny of Oregon became entangled, for awhile, with the slavery question and its original fundamental law prohibited slavery by putting into force the provisions of the Ordinance of 1787. When a convention met, in 1857, to draft a constitution for statehood, three parties existed in the State ; one in favor of slavery, a second opposed to it and a third opposed to negro immigration, which division of opinion re- sulted in an "anti-negro clause" in the constitution and pre- vented, for some time, its adoption and the admission of the State which, however, was accomplished in 1859, with her present boundaries and making the thirty-third State of the American Union. 41
39~Ibid., 45.
40 Gannett's Boundaries, 137.
41 Lalor's Ency. Political Science, III, 34.
* ↑ Delivered before the annual meeting of the Oregon Historical Society, Oct. 23, 1920.
* ↑ Bancroft's History of Oregon, I, 17.