Page:The Presidents of the United States, 1789-1914, v. II.djvu/105

JOHN TYLER 77 the house of representatives gave place to a Demo cratic majority of sixty-one. On the remaining question of National Repub lican policy, that of internal improvements, the most noteworthy action of President Tyler was early in 1844, when two river-and-harbor bills were passed by congress, the one relating to the eastern, the other to the western states. Mr. Tyler vetoed the former, but signed the latter, on the ground that the Mississippi river as a great common high way for the commerce of the whole country was the legitimate concern of the national government in a sense that was not true of any other American river. An unsuccessful attempt was made to pass the other bill over the veto. The rest of Mr. Tyler s administration was taken up with the Ashburton treaty with Great Britain, the Oregon question, and the annexation of Texas. Texas had won its independence from Mexico in 1836, and its gov ernor, as well as the majority of its inhabitants, were citizens of the United States. From a broad national standpoint it was in every way desirable that Texas, as well as Oregon, should belong to our Federal Union. In the eastern states there was certainly a failure to appreciate the value of Oregon, which was nevertheless claimed as indis putably our property. On the other hand, it was felt, by a certain element in South Carolina, that if the northern states were to have ample room for