ted States over the whole
disputed area.[205] Conservatives in both parties deprecated such
action as both hasty and unwise, in view of negotiations then in
progress; but the Hotspurs would listen to no prudential
considerations. Sentiments such as those expressed by Morris of
Pennsylvania irritated them beyond measure. Why protect this wandering
population in Oregon? he asked. Let them take care of themselves; or
if they cannot protect themselves, let the government defend them
during the period of their infancy, and then let them form a republic
of their own. He did not wish to imperil the Union by crossing
barriers beyond which nature had intended that we should not go.

This frank, if not cynical, disregard of the claims of American
emigrants,--"wandering and unsettled" people, Morris had called
them,--brought Douglas to his feet. Memories of a lad who had himself
once been a wanderer from the home of his fathers, spurred him to
resent this thinly veiled contempt for Western emigrants and the part
which they were manfully playing in the development of the West. The
gentleman should say frankly, retorted Douglas, that he is desirous of
dissolving the Union. Consistency should force him to take the ground
that our Union must be dissolved and divided up into various, separate
republics by the Alleghanies, the Green and the White Mountains.
Besides, to cede the territory of Oregon to its inhabitants would be
tantamount to ceding it to Great Britain. He, for one, would never
yield an inch of Oregon either to Great Britain or any other
government. He looked forward to a time when Oregon would become a
considerable member of the great American family of States. Wait for
the issue of the negotiations now pending? When had negotiations not
been pending! Every man in his senses knew that there was no hope of
getting the country by negotiation. He was for erecting a government
on this side of the Rockies, extending our settlements under military
protection, and then establishing the territorial government of
Oregon. Facilitate the means of communication across the Rocky
Mountains, and let the people there know and feel that they are a part
of the government of the United States, and under its protection; that
was his policy.

As for Great Britain: she had already run her network of possessions
and fortifications around the United States. She was intriguing for
California, and for Texas, and she had her eye on Cuba; she was