FEDERAL RELATIONS OF OREGON 125 no intention of passing it. 2 ? In the meager discussion, while Benton was the chief proponent, Barbour of Virginia spoke in its favor since the measure had been referred to his com- mittee, that on Military Affairs, although, as he said!, he had no particular interest in it. The only active opposition came from Dickerson of New Jersey who believed it improper for Congress to act before the expiration of the Convention of 1818 since Great Britain had done nothing to contravene that agreement. Furthermore, thought he, the region was so far off that it would never become a member of the Union, and the cost of the whole proposition would be out of proportion to the benefits which might be obtained. 28 Senator Benton, when the matter was up again at the very close of the session, thought that the measure had been un- fairly treated by the policy of neglect, and took occasion to go at length into the reasons why the United States had a valid claim to Oregon. He seemed to support the claim as advanced by Floyd's committee; that is, to 53, although he made no definite assertion on the point. Perhaps the most interesting point in the Senate's relation to the matter is Senator Benton's view of the future of the territory; he believed the bill would serve to "plant the germ of a powerful and independent Power beyond the Rockies," for those moun- tains would be the boundary between the east and the west. Although this feeling was by no means that entertained alone by Benton, it was one he departed from later on and con- sequently he did not emphasize it in his Thirty Years' View. The whole matter in the Senate was ended for this Congress by tabling the bill on a vote of 25 to 14, with no roll call. In his first annual message, in 1825, President Adams was able to continue the policy which he had urged previously as Secretary of State by renewing the recommendations of his predecessor in regard to the Northwest. 2 * While much fre- 27 The bill was before the Senate on 25 and 26 Feb., and i Mar. Debates, I, 684, 687-95, 698-713. 28 Harbour's attitude does not seem as indicated in Bancroft, Oregon, I, 364. 29 His Inaugural touched the same note. Richardson, Messages, ft, 298, 305,
