ated air of lobbies and committee
rooms. Fast as his reputation grew, his actual importance in legislation
grew faster still. At the beginning of his second term he was appointed
chairman of the House Committee on Territories, and so was charged in
an especial way with the affairs of the remoter West. In the course of
that service, he framed many laws which have affected very notably the
development of our younger commonwealths. He was particularly opposed to
the policy of massing the Indians in reservations west of the
Mississippi, fearing that the new Northwest, the Oregon country, over
which we were still in controversy with Great Britain, would thus be
isolated. To prevent this, he introduced during his first term a bill to
organize into a territory that part of the Louisiana Purchase which lay
north and west of Missouri. As yet, however, there were scarcely any
white settlers in the region, and no interest could be enlisted in
support of the bill. But he renewed his motion year after year until
finally, as we shall see, he made it the most celebrated measure of his
time.

His advocacy of the internal improvements needed for the development of
the West brought him in opposition to a powerful element in his own
party. Adams, writing in his diary under date of April 17, 1844, says:
"The Western harbor bill was taken up, and the previous question was
withdrawn for the _homunculus_ Douglas to poke out a speech in favor of
the constitutionality of appropriations for the improvement of Western
rivers and harbors. The debate was continued between the conflicting
absurdities of the Southern Democracy, which is slavery, and the Western
Democracy, which is knavery." Under the leadership of Jackson and other
Southerners, the Democrats, notwithstanding their long ascendency, had
adhered to their position on internal improvements more consistently,
perhaps, than to any other of the contentions which they had made before
they came into power. Douglas did not, indeed, commit himself to that
interpretation of the Constitution which justified appropriations for
any enterprise which could be considered a contribution to the "general
welfare," and he protested against various items in river and harbor
bills. But as a rule he voted for the bills.

He was particularly interested in the scheme for building a railroad
which should run north and south the entire length of Illinois, and
favored a grant of public lands to aid the State in t