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Show 308 HISTORY OF PUBLIC LAND LAW DEVELOPMENT Not only did southern Congressmen dislike Minnesota's anti-slavery convictions but also its generous welcome to aliens arriving in the territory who were permitted to become naturalized citizens. But Congress was weary of territory- and state-making for it had devoted many long hours to the question for years, hours filled with emotion and at times hatred, first on California, then on Kansas, and now on Minnesota. There were other pressing issues such as the tariff, the government deficit, the demand for free lands, the need for a transcontinental railroad, and farmers' demands for the creation of a department of agriculture to be concerned about their problems. By an Act of May 11, 1858, Minnesota was made a state.70 Oregon Oregon with little more than half the requisite population to entitle it to admission and with a growth rate far below that of Kansas and Minnesota found a welcome in Washington that the representatives of the latter two did not enjoy. The reasons for this difference seem clear: although Oregon did not wish to be a slave state, neither did it wish to admit free Negroes, mulattoes, and Chinese. This put it in the same position as most southern states; furthermore, it was Democratic and pro-slavery Democratic at that. It elected as its delegate, and later as its first Senator, Joseph Lane, who has been characterized by Allan Nevins as "an able secessionist orator of North Carolina birth, unscrupulous and imperious" and essential to maintaining Democratic control in the Upper House. Appropriately, it was Alexander H. Stephens of Georgia who made the major speech in behalf of the admission of Oregon on May 19, 1858. Stephens built his argument around four points: the regularity of the proceedings in Oregon in contrast to those in Kansas; the republican form of the 70 11 Stat. 285; Cong. Globe, 35th Cong.; 1st sess., Feb. 25, pp. 861 ff. constitution (presumably the exclusion of Negroes assured its republican form, for otherwise it was not in essence any different from that of Kansas); the large growth of taxable property; and finally the great increase of population. He declared that the territory's population had increased to 43,772 as shown by a special census of 1855, or a growth of more than 400 percent since 1850 and held that it had since increased "in nearly that ratio," which might bring it to some 160,000. His appeal to the numbers game aroused opponents who knew better; the Census of 1860 showed only 52,465 people in Oregon. Republican members of Congress had little reason to oppose the admission of Oregon, though they may not have been altogether pleased to see Joseph Lane with his pro-slavery views coming from a territory so far north. They did make much of the fact that the slavery representatives had denied admission to Kansas until it had the required population, which all evidence suggested it already had, while favoring the admission of Oregon which clearly did not have the required numbers.71 Congress submitted the same propositions to Oregon that it submitted to Kansas and Minnesota with the same disclaimer clause. Small adjustments were to be made later.72 Nevada, Colorado, and Nebraska In 1863 and 1864, Republican leadership in Congress, troubled by divisions in the ranks of their party and the revived strength of the Democrats, were deeply worried about 71 Cong. Globe, 35th Cong., 1st sess., May 19, 1858, p. 2209 ff.; ibid., 35th Cong., 2d sess., Feb. 10, 1859, p. 943 ff.; House Reports, 35th Cong., 2d sess. (Serial No. 1018), No. 123, for two minority reports of the Committee on Territories, opposing Oregon's admission until it had the required population. See also Lester Burrell Shippee, "The Federal Relations of Oregon," Oregon Historical Society Quarterly, 20 (December 1919), pp. 370 ff. 72 Act of Feb. 14, 1859, 11 Stat. 383. |