Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly vol. 19.djvu/343

FEDERAL RELATIONS OF OREGON 325 "The only possible reason I can see for accepting 1 the Depart- ment, should it be be offered, as far as duty is concerned, is limited to the pending negotiations relating to Texas and Oregon. They are both, I admit, of vast importance ; especially to the West and South." Two months earlier he had written Thomas W. Gilmer that Texas must be annexed to the United States, otherwise it would become a bone of contention be- tween the United States and Great Britain. His stand as taken in the Senate and in public addresses left no question as to his views. Since Calhoun entertained these views it is not surprising that he was unwilling that a Northerner opposed to Texas should head the ticket of the Democratic party. Since it was obvious that he would be defeated by the Whig candi- date if the convention should select him, the problem was to eliminate Van Buren and secure the nomination of a "safe" man. One of "two seceders from the Polk ranks" explained in a letter published in the New York Tribune in August how the plot to get rid of Van Buren was arranged. 24 . . . "Mr. Van Buren foresaw his inevitable defeat in the Convention as early as February last; and he accord- ingly prepared himself and his immiedate friends for the event. . . . (He had been informed that delegates from twenty-two of the twenty-six States had been in- structed for him.) Mr. Calhoun, sustained by President Tyler, determined that Mr. Van Buren should not receive the support of the southern and southwestern states, and therefore introduced that firebrand, the Texas question, with a knowledge of Mr. Van Buren's decided hostility to the measure of immediate annexation. . . . Mr. Van Buren determined that the trapsetters should fall into their own trap. He accordingly dispatched a confi- dential and faithful friend to the west, and the latter met at Cincinnati a distinguished member of the press, who immediately convened a meeting of the friends of Mr. Van Buren, on the 29th of March, and a letter was ad- dressed to Mr. Polk requesting his views regarding the annexation of Texas and Oregon. This friend took with him a copy of that letter . . . went to Mr. Polk, and 24 Quoted in Miles' Register, 26 Oct., 1844.