, 1855-01-27


Sir From this extreme Northwestern
portion Of the Union, | beg leave to call
your attention to the situation of several
thousand Of your countrymcn-American
citizens--cut off by your inattention and
neglect, from the common benefits Of inter
communication with their families, friends
and commercial relations in the different
parts of the United States.
Why is it that for eight long consecutive
,caks we have had no mails from the States ?
Should the mail but fail single hour in
the cities what hubbub would be raised ?
And yet, here are men who are carrying
their country's institutions to the extremes
of her boundaries have braved every
priEation and every danger, left to pine in
dreariness and isolation through neglect
on your part, little less than criminal.
What is your excuse, Sir? 1 presume
you will say-the Department have not the
means to pay perhaps fifty or hundred
thousand dollars to establish steamer to
bring our mails direct from San Francisco.
But if you have not the means, Congress
has the power and the will to supply them,
if you had taken the trouble to ask its as
sistance and lay before it the condition of
Of your suffering fellow citizens, occupying
an immense, remote and deeply important
section Of country, lying on the most mag
ni6cent sheet of water in the whole world,
and Immediately contiguous to the British
possessions.
The President in his inaugural address,
spoke words be6tting an American Presi-
dent, which found an echo in every pa
triotic breast, and promising the aid Of
the whole national strength to vindicate
the slightest wrong inflicted on an Ameri-
can citizen by a foreign government. Are
wrongs inflicted by our own government to
go unredressed y Martin Kosta was de-
Tended by the power, arms and money Of
the nation-Greytown was demolished in
defence of American rights. Hundreds Of
thousands are freely spent to defend the
rights Of a single southern STAKEHOLDER
against abolition wrongs. IA
These are all right, and we commend the
exercise Of the power and the expenditure
Of the treasure for each asd al Of such OBJ
jects.. But have we no rights have we
not claim TO the protection and care Of
our governmentl are we criminals, placed
here IN exile to be treated as aliens from
the common sympathy of our people? No,
sir I'VE are not and we here express our
deep indignation at the want Of sympathy
shown for us.
We admit that the commerce and mail
matter of the Sound and vicinity will not
repay into the treasury the necessary out
lay for steamer to ply between here and
San Francisco. But how can money be
better expended than in fostering our in
fancy which our age will amply repay
Assuredly our country is kept from pro-
gress by the difficulties of communication,
and it Is not too much to say that the ia
eihties we ask, If granted, would occasion
our population to double itself in one year.
Besides II It is not, it should be an Ameri-
can axiom that at whatever cost intercom-
munication should be kept up between eve
ry part Of the Union. How else are re-
mote parts to be Influenced by, and act
with the more central parts OF the Union
and thus be united in common purpose
Hence it is that Congress does not regard
the post Office Department as a selfsustain-
ing establishment any more than it does
that Of the army or navy. If the positions
taken are correct, and you will have the
goodness to consult the map and the to-
pograbhy Of this part Of the Union, you
viii see that the route you have designated
for our mails to come to us, does not fulfill
the intentions Of speedy and safe transmits
sion. Our mails from the States come
across the dangerous bar Of the Columbia
river, ascend that river to the mouth of the
Cowlitz, and thence by canoe conducted
by Indians, reach landing thirty miles
from its mouth, and is packed seventy-ive
miles to the Sound, over rivers and roads
which are in winter flooded and impossible
for weeks.
1t is reported lately, that your intention
is to have q steamer meet the mails for this
Territory at Astoria, on the Columbia.
We respectfully protest against this
measure for the following reasons
Birst-Because it would compel our
mails, passengers and freight to cross and
re-cross that terror to mariners, the bar Of