mills on a dollar was levied to defray current expenses; and an act passed to regulate the practice of the courts; and an act appointing times for holding courts for the year 1858.[1] These laws were not to take effect until the state was admitted into the Union.
Four weeks of suspense passed by, and it became certain that Oregon had not been admitted. The war debt had made no advancement toward being paid. The records of congress showed no effort on the part of Lane to urge either of these measures, neither did he offer any explanation; and it began to be said that he was purposely delaying the admission of Oregon until the next session in order to draw mileage as both delegate and senator. It was also predicted that there would be difficulty in procuring the admission at the next session, as congress would then be disposed to insist on the rule recently established requiring a population of 93,000 to give the state a representative; but it was hinted that if the senators and representative elect should be on the ground at the convening of congress, there would still be hope.
- ↑ This was in reference to a law of congress passed in Aug. 1856, that the judges of the supreme court in each of the territories should fix the time and places of holding courts in their respective districts, and the duration thereof; providing, also, that the courts should not be held in more than three places in any one territory, and that they should adjourn whenever in the opinion of the judges their further continuance was unnecessary. This was repaying Oregon for her course toward the federal judges, and was held to work a hardship in several ways. Lane was censured for allowing the act to pass without a challenge. However, to adjust matters to the new rule, the legislature of 1856–7 passed an act rearranging the practice of the courts, and a plaintiff might bring an action in any court most convenient; witnesses not to be summoned to the district courts except in admiralty, divorce, and chancery, or special cases arising under laws of the U. S.; but the district courts should have cognizance of offences against the laws of the territory in bailable cases; and should constitute courts of appeal—the operation of the law being to place the principal judicial business of the territory in the county courts. Or. Laws, 1856–7, p. 17–23. Another act was passed requiring a single term of the supreme court to be held at Salem on the 6th of Aug., 1857, and on the first Monday in Aug. annually thereafter; and repealing all former acts appointing terms of the supreme court. The object of this act was to put off the meeting of the judges at the capital until after the admission of Oregon, thus rendering inoperative the law of congress—as Smith explained to the legislature at the time of its passage. But it happened that Oregon was not admitted in 1857, which failure left the U. S. courts in suspense as to how to proceed; hence the action of this legislature.
