Babcock never held any courts. A small "tempest in a teapot" was raised over the office of governor. Mr. Gray, in his history, reports that there were four candidates for the office of governor; Rev. David Leslie, Rev. Gustavus Hines, and Doctors Babcock and Bailey. Hines was the prominent candidate, and the first to enter the field. The office of governor was the leading ques- tion. Bailey could not be trusted, and Hines could not be elected. Bailey nominated himself and disgusted the meeting; and then, by common con- sent, the office of governor was discarded. And so this first effort at lawmaking failed because of personal and selfish interests and ambitions. There were no lawyers in the country and no law books, although the settlers' meeting had in- structed their doctor, Judge Babcock, to administer law according to the statutes of the state of New York.
As might easily be concluded from this brief statement, the attempt to form a government in 1841 failed. The next attempt to organize a bona fide govern- ment with laws and officials to enforce its authority, took place at Champoeg on the east bank of the Willamette river, twenty miles or so above Oregon City. Here the settlers met in pursuance of previous notice, and after organizing the meeting of 102 men, they took a vote by dividing ofi^ into two lines, to decide whether they would organize a government or not. Organization was opposed by the Catholics and the employes of the Hudson's Bay Company under the lead of the Rev. F. N. Blanchet, and favored by the Methodist missionaries and American settlers and a few members of the Catholic church. On the final vote the proposition to organize was carried by the close vote of only two majority; the vote for organization being 52, and against organization 50. The details of the organization of this provisional government is given fully in chapter VII of this book, to which the reader is referred.
The first judge under the provisional government was A. E. Wilson selected to act as supreme judge of Oregon. Mr. Wilson was not a lawyer, but was an intelligent business man who did not seek the high office. He came to this distant region from Boston, Massachusetts, on the ship Chenamus with Capt. John H. Couch in the year 1842, and was left here by Captain Couch to sell out a stock of merchandise brought out by that ship ; and he was at Oregon City repre- senting the Boston owners of the goods when he was appointed supreme judge in 1843. But whether Judge Wilson ever performed any judicial service or held a court, is not mentioned in the record.
In May, 1844, Dr. Judge Babcock comes to the front again as a candidate before the people at a general election for officers in that year, for the office of supreme judge; and in the contest before the three or four hundred voters, de- feated J. W. Nesmith, Peter H. Burnett, P. G. Stewart, Osborn Russell and O. Johnson for the office. Babcock must have been quite a "vote getter" to have defeated Nesmith and Burnett. There were no political parties, direct primaries, conventions or assemblies in those days, and Babcock may have won on the tactics of "divide and conquer." He, however, did not wear his judicial robes very long, for in six months after his election he resigned the office and J. W. Nesmith was appointed. Nesmith held the first term of his court at Oregon City, in April, 1875; which was probably the first formal term of a court held west of the Rocky mountains. From this day on the courts of the provisional government were regularly held, and judicial functions regularly and duly exer- cised with aU due solemnities of the law.
James W. Nesmith, although not a lawyer, may properly be considered the first judge actually exercising judicial functions in all the regions west of the Rocky mountains, and north of old Mexico. Other men were called judges be- fore the date of his first term at Oregon City, but there is no evidence that any of them tried or decided any cases or exercised the ordinary functions of a court of record. There were justices of the peace at that time who disposed of all the disputes or offences coming within the purview of petty courts ; but even of their proceedings there is now no record to show v/hat they did.
