The mirror., 1922-01-26

volve heavy expense, it suggested the pru
dent compromiser, who could not believe
in an irrepressible conflict"
Natural as it was for the farmer and
the planter to desire rail connection with
the Pacific, inevitable as were the real
estate speculations and the dreams of gold
galore, the military side was never out of
mind. All our leading men of 1910 and
some of decade and half later remem-
bered the war of 1912 in which Buchanan
and Benton had served. They were in
no danger of forgetting that British
army had moved fast enough to burn
Washington, the British squadrons had
menaced us on three lakes, that Indians,
encouraged by Spaniards, had threatened
our southern border. While in the Mexi-
can war we did the invading had Mexico
been assisted by France or Great Britain
there might have been terrible havoc
along the Gulf. All this kept before the
mind the need of a Western railroad in
order to protect our outlying settlements.
lanes Buchanan, when a candidate for
the Presidency, wrote to the chairman OF
the Democratic State Central committee of
California: 81 am decidedly favorable to
the construction of the Pacific railroad,
and derive the authority to do this from
the constitutional power to declare war
and the constitutional duty to repel in
vasion. In my judgment, Congress pos
sesses the same power to make appropria-
tions for the construction of this road,
strictly for the purpose of national defense
that it has to erect Notifications at the
mouth of the harbor of San Francisco. In
deed the necessity, with view to repel
foreign invasion from California is as
great in the one case as in the other"
Buchanan meant every word of this.
He was not merely seeking votes. He
was, as his inaugural address shows, SER
iously alarmed lest the settlers on the Pac-
ifc Coast might grow indifferent to a
government which did not guard them
against invading powers With rail-
road, troops could soon be sent to their
aid; without railroad every house be-
yond the Rockies might be set on fire. In
Lincoln's time Minnesota proved that the
red man on the war path was the same
merciess being he had been when the Six
Nations were at their zenith.
We now think of 1860 as the year OF
Lincoln's first election, and scarcely believe
that there was anything contemporaneous'
but that was the time of Josiah Perham
and his Peoples Pacific Railroad Com
pany which contemplated road to be
constructed with the proceeds OF land
grant and popular subscriptions of stock,
thus avoiding bonded Indebtedness. For
gotten as this company is now, it was
talked about everywhere in 1861, ana
throughout that year the road was before
the national legislature.
On July, 1862, Abraham Lincoln signed
the famous act creating the Union Pacihc
Railroad Company, composed OF lsS per-
sons named in the act together with hve
commissioners to be appointed by the
Secretary of the Interior and all persons
who shall or may be associated with
them, and their successors" Of the lsS
persons the distribution was as follows:
New York "a, California IS, Pennsylvania
13. Wisconsin 9, Iowa, 8, Ohio, Michigan,
Illinois, Indiana, Minnesota and Kansas
each, Missouri, Massachusetts and Nebras-
ka each; Rhode Island, Connecticut