LAST STEP IN PROVISIONAL GOVERNMENT 321
himself aloof from participation in a government that had been founded by men anxious to secure their titles to land and to prevent mutual encroachment on each other's holdings. He had been troubled with squatters on his land and a rival claim- ant, notably the Reverend Mr. Waller, whom he had bought off in April, 1844, by a payment of $500 and transfer of some of the lots at Oregon City. Dr. McLoughlin had also just paid five thousand five hundred dollars to the Methodist mis- sion for the lots claimed by that organization at Oregon City because as he says he could not "produce a legal test of pro- prietorship" and this ground was needed to "complete his Establishment." (Last Letter, p. 122.) He felt that there was serious danger of losing this property should the boundary settlement be favorable to the United States before he had secured a title the validity of which was at least as good as that of other settlers in the valley. True, the Legislative Com- mittee had, in 1844, repealed the clause in the land law of 1843 which had been directly intended to deprive him of this claim, but he had been made to feel in many trivial ways the hostility of the government. The legislature had even gone so far as to refuse him the privilege of constructing and operating a ferry across the Willamette. So long as he had no part in the government he could expect no favors at its hands.
Furthermore, there is evidence that McLoughlin had some ambition to assume a leadership over the people of the whole Oregon country and a confidence in his ability to win the respect and support of the American element. In short, he was moved by political ambition and a love for the power and influence that the governorship of the new state might give. In a letter written to Sir J. H. Pelly, November 15, 1844, Dr. McLoughlin predicts that if the boundary question is not settled by the two governments, Great Britain and the United States, the settlers in Oregon territory will declare an inde- pendent state "of which I might be elected head were I to retire among them." (Copy of letter in possession of Pro- fessor Schafer.) It would thus seem that McLoughlin was
