Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly vol. 1.djvu/153

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Our Public Land System.

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of judicial proceedings according to the course of common law. All persons should be bailable, except for capital offenses, the proof of which was evident, or the presumption great. All fines should be moderate, and no cruel or unusual punishments inflicted. No man should be deprived of his liberty but by the judgment of his peers, or the law of the land. No man's property should be taken for the public service without full compensation. Religion, morality and knowledge, being necessary to good government, and the public happiness, schools and the means of education should be forever encouraged. The utmost good faith should always be observed towards the Indians. Their lands and property should never be taken away from them without their consent, nor their rights and liberty invaded except in lawful war, but laws for their protection should be enacted. There should be neither slavery nor involuntary servitude in the territory, otherwise than for the punishment of crimes whereof the person should have been duly convicted.^[1]

Comparing this noble framework of the new state with the laws and the restrictions imposed upon the colonies from their beginning, our admiration cannot be withheld. But it is to its effect in furnishing the means of education to the whole people that attention is here directed. Schools and education were "forever to be encouraged." It is true that under the colonial system a few colleges had been established. Six years after the settlement of Massachusetts, Harvard College was

↑ The Constitution of the Provisional Government of Oregon was formed on the ordinance of 1787, and the above extract is taken, somewhat abbreviated, from Articles I, II, III and IV of that document. When the organic act of Oregon Territory was framed by congress, it was agreed that the laws already in operation in Oregon should be recognized as the laws of the territory. The adoption of the ordinance of 1787 as their Constitution by the pioneers of the state, was due to the statesmanship of Jesse Applegate, one of the "men of 1843." Its author was Nathan Dane, LL. D., of Massachusetts, member of congress in 1787.

[1] The Constitution of the Provisional Government of Oregon was formed on the ordinance of 1787, and the above extract is taken, somewhat abbreviated, from Articles I, II, III and IV of that document. When the organic act of Oregon Territory was framed by congress, it was agreed that the laws already in operation in Oregon should be recognized as the laws of the territory. The adoption of the ordinance of 1787 as their Constitution by the pioneers of the state, was due to the statesmanship of Jesse Applegate, one of the "men of 1843." Its author was Nathan Dane, LL. D., of Massachusetts, member of congress in 1787.

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