The Congressional Globe, Volume 13, Part 1: Twenty-Eighth Congress, First Session Page: 371
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CONGRESSIONAL GLOBfi.
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•should our proceedings be a second time arrested,
that the consequence would be similar results? This
is not the way to treat with England. She does not
expect any such concessions from us. If we desire
to have justice from her, or any nation, we must as-
sert our rights in a proper manner. If we do that,
little will she be encouraged to make further delay; if
we do not, judging from the results of the former ne-
gotiation, little will she be inclined to settle the ques-
tion at all. She has now got from us in the northeast,
by treaty, our native highland boundary, for which
our fathers fought. Our native highland boundary
is converted into a military high road, between her
colonies and Cluebec, the city of her empire in the
northeast of this continent. She is in the pos-
session of these higland passes, through which
she can pour her troop." into the United States; and
we know the importance of this possession to her
for a 'line of military posts, from the report of the
board of British officers, and the opi nion of the Duke
of Wellington on the subject. She has got all that;
and what is worse than all that,—no, he would not
say she could be disgraced before the world—but
he would say that, from the British Parliament it-
self, it had been proclaimed to all mankind, by the
British minister, that, at the very time Lord Ash-
burton obtained this highland territory by negotia-
tion, he had in his pocket the evidence that he had
no claim to it; evidence on the face of a British map,
taken from the library of George III, upon which
was marked, by the very hand of the sovereign him-
self, the very line of boundary always claimed by
the United States as the line agreed upon in the
treaty of 1783—a line showing conclusively that
England had no title whatever to a single foot of the
territory she demanded. Mr. B. here read extracts
from speeches of Sir Robert Peel, admitting this
fact; and also from speeches made by Lord Brough-
am on the same subject, both showing that George
III had traced in a broad red line on the map, with
his own hand, the boundary line pointed out to him
by Mr. Oswald as the line he had agreed upon in
the treaty of 1783; the King having written three or
four times over the line tthat it was the boundary
agreed upon by Mr. Oswald. In these speeches
it is also stated that Lord Askburton had this
very map in his pocket at the time of making
the treaty of Washington, and did not make it
known to Mr. Webster; admitting, also, that it de-
stroyed every British pretension to the territory,
and established most unequivocally the right of the
United States to all they had claimed.
Mr. B., commenting upon these disclosures, said
he had too much respect for himself, too much re-
spect for Lord Ashburton, and too much respect for
the British government, to make use of the only ep-
ithets that could properly express the character of
that transaction. But, he asked, could anything
prove more strongly that the government of England
was ready to go to war?—that the torch was ready
to be applied to the cannon in mortal conflict with
this country, at the very time that she had the most
conclusive and unequivocal evidence in her posses-
sion that she was not entitled to one foot of the ter-
ritory for which she was going to fight?
If, after all this—if again, on the arrival of an-
other British minister, (and not a spccial minister
either, as had been reported)—we ground our arms,
arrest all proceedings in Congress, and wait an in-
definite time for the settlement, of this question, it
never will be settled. But, says the senator from
Massachusetts. "It might give offence! It would
be disrespectful to the' British government to give
this notice, on the arrival of the British minister!"
Disrespectful tji> give the notice which the existing
treaty authorizes us to give—a notice according' to
the very letter and spirit of the treaty? For bis
life, he (Mr. B.) could not imagine how the British
government could, or how it ever would, consider
That acting ill obedience to the stipulations of the
treaty could be disrespectful.
Giving this notice was not entering into hasty
measures. There would still be a year left for
negotiation. They must have ail extreme opin-
ion of the sensitiveness of the British government,
who suppose that acting in conformity with the
treaty would, by any possibility, give offence. And,
if it does if that covernment should be so unrea-
sonaole as to take offence, when none is intended, at
our action in pursuance of the stipulation pointed
out in the treaty, in heaven's name, let the British
government be ollVnded! It will not be our ..ault.
"We might regret that such would be the effect; hut
wc would have occasion to regret still more, if we
v>'ere to arrest all our proceedings on the advance of
the British minister, and do nothing. There never
would be a settlement of thi3 question, if things were
to go on in this way. The British government did
not want it better rettlcd than it is. They possess
the territory for all the purposes they desire; and
as long as we say we will neither go there, nor au-
thorize our people to go there, the question never
will be settled.
He might end here; and here, perhaps, it would
be proper for him to end his remarks on the present
occasion; because the discussion of the general sub-
ject would come up more appropriately on the bill
now upon the Senate table; but he could not help
feeling that the senator from Massachusetts had ad-
vanced some ideas 011 the question of the imme-
diate settlement of this difficulty, to which it was
necessary he should advert. And in doing so, he
would endeavor to state correctly what that senator
had said; should he, however, have mistaken him,
or misconceived his meaning, he begged the senator
would set him right. He thought, indeed, he could
not be mistaken m stating that, in the course of his
argument—for he took it down at the moment
with a good deal of care—he contended that
it was the part of wisdom to continue the joint
occupation of the territory, as it now exists;
that in the mean time our population might
prudently and silently enter the territory, until
we should peacefully find our population in
possession of it; but if we should interpose by legis-
lative action, the Hudson Bay company might take
offence. By quiet and silent emigration, the territo-
ry, in a few years, would be ours; the Hudson Bay
company, like Ossian's ghosts, moving off to the
north as our people increased. He (Mr. Choate)
said further that England had had no notion what-
ever of colonizing Oregon. Mr. B. eulogized the
poetical language of the senator from Massachusetts,
in which he had so eloquently clothed his ideas 011
these points, (the substance of which is only here
given;) but he characterized the whole as poetry
only. It was like the ostrich policy, which de-
ceived nobody but the simple bird itself; much less
was it calculated to deceive that monopoly the
Hudson Bay company. Steal into Oregon' Take
possession'of it quietly—silently? The Hudson Bay
company will not become offended? That is, if you
settle the country with your population, advancing
with the ploughshare and pruning hook, destroying
all the game and trade in furs with which the coun-
try abounds, and for which it is so desirable to the
Hudson Bay company,—that company will not be
offended. They will let you commence agricultural
pursuits as soon as you please there—let you chase
the game from it to make it an agricultural coun-
try—destroying their harvest of furs—starving out
the sustenance of their vast monopoly,—and they
themselves will quietly retire to their kindred regions
of the north! All this is to be, notwithstanding the
fact that, for the interference of our citizens with the
fur trade, five hundred of them have been murdered
by this blood-stained monopoly; and yet they will
not be offended if our citizens go into the territory,
and by turning it into an agricultural region, render
it impossible for the game and the furs to be found
there, for which it is so valuable to that company.
These unfortunate men who lost their lives in Oregon,
went there to divide the game; but it was at the peril
and forfeit of their lives that they attempted to share
m that trade. Yet we are told that if others of our
citizens go there, and convert the country from a
region of game and furs, into an agricultural region,
(the tendency of which is to destroy and annihilate
the game,) it will give no offence to the company
whose monopoly consists of the riches derived from
the game and furs. It will be very magnanimous,
no doubt, of this company not to be onendeu at
this. The senator from Mossachusctts assumes
the idea that, at the approach of our agricultural
population, this company is to make lis bow and
retire. This was really the most marvellous argu-
ment he had ever heard coming from so respectable
a quarter. But while all this is coining to pass,
how will the honorable senator in the mean time pre-
serve the peace of the country? The British haic a
government of their own there, and we have none. Our
citizens are there not only without our protection,
but without our jurisdiction. Vv hen the bill for or-
ganizing the government of the territory was before
the Senate last session, the senator from Massachu-
setts expressed no other objection to it but that we
had not given the notice of discontinuing the treaty.
That, as well as he (Mr. B.) recollected, was the
tenor of his objeciion. The notice wss necessary,
he suwpsed, for the preservation of our good
faith First give the notice, sSid he, and then I am
agreed to send our civil government to Oregon for
the protection of our citizens there. Well, then,
we now propose giving that notice; and the senator
starts a new objection—that it is better not to dp it;
for, in twenty years, it will be unnecessary—the
territory will be ours quietly and silently! Never
had Great Britain, in the whole course of her event-
ful history, manifested more determination to keep
possession of any territory than she has manifested
to continue the occupation of the Oregon Territory.
Look at her arrangements; her occupation of the
soil by her subjects; their agricultural enlargements;
their contracts for beef, pork, flour; their saw mills,
trade in lumber, &c., &c. Does she not already
affect to consider the northern bank of the Colum-
bia river her right? She allows \is the southern
bank; but she keens the northern bank as hers.
One bank is called the British side of the river, and
the other the American side. Let any of our citi-
zens go to the northern side and attempt the joint
occupancy there, and it would soon be seen that
she would treat it as an intrusion; who could say
what would be the result? He (Mr. B.) believed
there was not an American citizen settlea north of
the Columbia, except a small Roman Catholic set-
tlement, which nobody would think of disturbing.
Now to think that, with all these arrangements and
indications of permanent possession, Great Britain
will retire as our citizens increase; that she will wil-
lingly abandon all her privileges, her provision and
lumber trade with the Pacific islands, and her fur
trade with China; give up the advantages of her
great monopoly in one of the finest countries in the
world; that she will abandon all, and fly to the north,
before American citizens who go to the territory,
but whose government are unwilling or afraid to
protect them under the American flag,—is to sup-
pose what amounts to almost an absolute impossi-
bility. From the time that Sir Alexander McKen-
zie first explored the northwest territory, her pro~
ceedings had been the same, involving an uncondi-
tional claim to the country, accompanied by declara-
tions that she never would abandon it. To think*
then, that she would recede at the sight of squatters
going there without laws, government, or protec-
tion, or anything to confirm them in their rights, was
preposterous in the extreme.
England has, more than once, declared she never
would abandon her claims; and yet we are called
on, by the senator from Massachusetts, to believfi
that if we act quiescently, and let our citizens pro-
ceed to the Oregon, without laws—without a gov-
ernment to protect them—without anything to con-
firm them in their rights—the present posses-
sors will, without a snow of resistance, quietly
abandon to the new comers their homes and im-
provements, and rapidly retreat still further north.
From the negotiations preparatory to the treaty of
1818, up to the present day, England has never
abandoned her claims. On the contrary, as years
advance, those claims have become stronger. Pre-
vious to that treaty, she was offered from149° north
latitude; but her answer was, she would not accept
it. Previous to the treaty of 1824, that offer was
repeated; but was refused in stronger terms than
before. Great Britain proposed, about this time,
to take from 49° to where it strikes the Columbia
in a northeasterly direction, and thence dpwn
to the mouth of the river; but, this extravagant de-
mand being objected to, on the part of this country t
by Mr. Rush, the negotiators on the other side de-
clared that Great Britain could not be expected to
depart from the demand she had made. Before this,
when Mr. Ru^h requested them to specify who t
line would satisfy them, they gave no decisive an-
swer, but intimated that, the river would be the best,
but would not even then agree to holding the mouth
of the river in common with 11s. In the negotia-
tions which preceded the treaty of 1827, when the
offer from 49° north latitude was again lenewed on
our side, and again refused, the language of Great
Britain was still stronger. Her negotiators then de-
clared her determination to stand by her claim,
founded 011 the possession and industry of her peo-
ple settled in the Oregon, whose rights she would
never abandon. She told us that she claimed those
ri"hts by the settlement of her people, and the im-
provements they had effected; and she taunted tis
that we had no such claim to set up.
After the refusal of 1827, our minister declared
that this government was from thenceforward not
bound by the proposal made to England, giving to
her from 49°, and a counter protest was made on the
protocol by Great Britain, which, at least, had one good
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United States. Congress. The Congressional Globe, Volume 13, Part 1: Twenty-Eighth Congress, First Session, book, 1844; Washington D.C.. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth2367/m1/395/: accessed April 28, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting UNT Libraries Government Documents Department.