much impeded by Indian hostilities, and the high prices of labor consequent on gold discoveries. Upon the petition of the Oregon legislature, congress had extended the surveying laws to the country east of the Cascades, and preparations were making to extend the base line across the mountains east from the Willamette meridian, with a view to operations in the county of Wasco and the settlements of Umatilla, Walla Walla, John Day, and Des Chutes valleys.[1] But congress failed to make an appropriation for the purpose, contracts already taken were annulled, and little progress was made for two years, during which the squatter kept in advance of the surveys upon the most valuable lands. During the year ending June 30, 1860, the service was prosecuted along the Columbia River in the neighborhood of The Dalles, in the Umatilla Valley, and also in the Klamath country, near the California boundary, which was not yet established.
An act was passed by congress June 25, 1860, for the survey of the forty-sixth parallel so far as it constituted a boundary between Oregon and Washington, which work was not accomplished until 1864, although the length of the line was only about 100 miles, from the bend of the Columbia near Fort Walla Walla to Snake River near the mouth of the Grand Rond River.[2] There was much delay in procuring the ser-
- ↑ Land Off. Rept, 1858, 29-30.
- ↑ While this matter was under consideration in congress, it was proposed in the senate that a committee should inquire into the expediency of reuniting Washington to Oregon. Sen. Misc. Doc., 11, 36th cong. 2d sess., a proposition which, so far as the Walla Walla Valley was concerned, would have been received with great favor by the state, the natural boundary of which is indicated by the Columbia and Snake rivers. This was the boundary fixed in the constitution of Oregon, from which congress had departed. A motion was made in the legislature to annex at several different times. See Or. Jour. House, 1865, 50-73; Memorial of Or. leg. in 1870. in U. S. H. Misc. Doc., 23, i., 41st cong. 3d sess.; Or. Laws, 1870, 212-13; Or. Jour. Sen., 1868; U. S. Sen. Misc. Doc., 27, 42d cong. 3d sess.; Salem Statesman, Feb. 14, 1871; Salem Mercury, March 18, 1871. As late as 1873 Senator Kelly introduced a bill to annex Walla Walla county to Oregon, so as to conform the boundary to that named in the constitutional convention. On the other hand, the people of Washington would have been unwilling to resign this choice region. The matter was revived in 1875-6, when a committee of the U. S. house rep.
