Oroville daily Butte record., 1857-02-05
Communicated.

resentatives, December Oath 1856, is before
me, and regret that on the first page there
is not inserted after the Hon. =. I Her bert,
" the murderer of an Irish waiter, recently
and formerlya notorious gambler" If that
had been inserted in conspicuous place,
the public would have some idea of the char
acter of the speech, without the trouble OF
reading 1t; rs it is, they have to read 1T to
fin out what should have been placed on
the title page.
The Hon. gentleman commences his speech
with a bitter TRADE against his colleague,
the only man who has truly represented
and served the interests of his constituents
on the subject of land claims in this State,
q man Mt whose shrine posterity will bow
and do him homage for the discharge OF his
duty to his constituents inso able and fifth
full munner, and that too, unsolicited and
unbought, when the gladiator soul of p. I.
Herbert will be writhing in hell, and beg
ging across that impassable gulf which sep
arates the bad from the good of those Laza-
ruses, drop Of water to cool his parched
tongue, whom in this life, his bill or its in
fuence, (if it had any had stripped of their
last remaining rags, TO furnish more sumpt
uousy the over fed and pampered rich mans
table.
The first part Of the Hon. gentlemans
speech which / shall notice, is n section of
the treaty of Guadalupe Ilidalgo, which
reads as follows "In the said territories
property of every description now belonging
to Mexcans not established there, shall be
nviolably respected,' &c. The Hon. gen.
tleman draws from this clause and it's ad.
junct, the conclusion that all claims, not
titles, to land in California, must be confirm
cd at one fell swoop, and compel the party
who is located on one Of these grants, how
ever fraudulent or void, to litigate against
what why nothing but patent from the
United States. Now what is the plain mean
ing of that treaty stipulation out of which
such stupendous conclusions rs the gentle
man and many others draw, arise? Why
simply, that the property of Mexicans.
whether real or personal, land or stock, who
did not reside in the territory, should be
protected and held sacred, inserted evident
ly for the sole purpose of protecting non
residents in the rights of property, and
nothing else. This simple treaty stipulation
is tortured into the meaning, that the United
States agreed to confirm all these Mexican
grants, whether under the Mexican govern
ment they would have been good or not.
Such a conclusion is so ridiculous that it
needs no comment. He says "previous to
the arbitrary and unprecedented policy
which the Attorney General has seen fit to
pursue in regGrd to the private land claims
in California, the State fiourished, prosper
ed and improved, with rapidity unequalled
by any country on the globe. But how
stands the case now That confidence in
these titles which gave life. energy and pros
perity to the country has been destroyed.
In nine cases out of ten, these lands can be
bought for less than government price"
Now SIR, assert, tnat IN Inc same numUer
of words, no man ever strung together a
greater number of untruths, and whether
they arc out and. out lies, depends on wheth-
er they were maliciously and knowingly ut
tered or not and that leave for the Hon.
gentleman and his maker to settle, and can
only say, as would of every other criminal,
" God have mercy on your soul"
SO far are the gentlcman's assertions from
the truth, that the unprecedented prosperity
which he describes, arose from exactly the
converse of what he alleges. So long as men
relied upon former rulings of courts, and
all precedents on the subject, the whole pol
icy of the general government on the sub
ject of lands, being granted in small guam
titles to actual settlers, and believed the
general government would hold-or rather
the federal courts-the grantees to a strict
compliance with the conditions of their
grants, and not place the claimants in an
entirely better position than the Mexican
government would have done, the country
fourished as the gentleman describes. But
since the recent rulings of the federal courts,
and the base and unholy action of one of
our repr esentatives in Congress, the effect
has spread over our entire State like pail,
and the blight and ruin which the gentle
,hnS. ha g. ms inn