FEDERAL RELATIONS OF OREGON 301 proach to the matter was not proper, especially since every- one knew of the bill at the moment before the Senate. When the Senate bill was before the House Reynolds, chairman of the select Committee on Oregon, moved its refer- ence to the Committee of the Whole House ; Pendleton moved that it be referred to the Committee on Military Affairs, and Everett preferred the Committee on Foreign Affairs. The Committee on Foreign Affairs got the bill. John Quincy Adams was chairman of this committee and it is to his Memoirs that we turn to ascertain the fate of the measure, for there was the knowledge in the House that if Adams received the bill there was little hope for it. "There is the end of that," said Andrew Kennedy, of Indiana, when the reference was announced. The Oregonians made one more attempt, however, to prevent the death of their measure; Adams de- scribes it. 29 "10th. (Feb.) Several members moved resolutions of reconsideration of votes taken yesterday. Among them was one referring to the committee of the whole on the state of the Union a bill surreptitiously smuggled into the House by Reynolds, of Illinois, being the same bill which Dr. Linn, of Missouri, has been worming through the senate for the benefit of Tom Benton. The Senate bill had, after a double tug, been referred to the Committee on Foreign Affairs. Everett now moved to reconsider the reference of Reynolds' bill to the committee of the whole on the state of the Union, and that it be referred to the Committee on Foreign Affairs ; which was carried without a division." Both bills, that which had come from the Senate and Rey- nolds' which was identical, were taken up by the committee, with all members but Everett present. Without any discus- sion an informal vote showed that five members were against both bills, one for the Senate bill and one for the same bill with amendments. Adams moved to be instructed, in the event of the House's refusing to accept the recommendation of the committee, to move an amendment that there should be neither involuntary servitude nor slavery, in the Territory. ag Memoirs, XI, 314, 318, 321.
