"If they desire the protection of our laws, let to us, and it will then be a matter of inquiry on I our state government." But he thought the would have no right to complain. The people esentatives composed the Convention were the nd the majority of the people of any state had a ke rules for the minority. As a matter of fact, ■f immigrants had reached California since deleelected to the Convention. They, too, had no on in that body, but as a minority they were bmit to the will of the majority. Would not e have as much right to complain as the

thought not. He did not see how the fact that

s were in the minority would prevent them g legitimate objections to being included within te. They could justly claim that they had no ing the constitution which that Convention was ut even if they should accept the work of the he did not think that they should be included, heir peculiar religious beliefs. And there was ection even more serious, said Hastings. The d already applied to Congress for a territorial

2

Suppose both applications should be brought ress at the same time-"we apply for a state and they for a territorial government”—both ning from the same territory. Would it be ates, 194–196.

possible for California to be admitted into the Union claiming the same territory at the same time that the Mormons were asking for a territorial government over it? Most assuredly not.1

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The Mormons and the Boundary

In the meantime the Mormons had not been idle. A convention was summoned in Utah early in 1849, and the inhabitants of that part of Upper California lying east of the Sierra Nevada were urged to send representatives.2 On the 4th of March the delegates assembled at Salt Lake City. A committee was appointed to draw up a constitution under which the people might govern themselves until Congress should provide a government for them" by admitting them into the Union." The name of the new state was to be Deseret, and its boundaries were to be as follows:

5

"Commencing at the 33rd degree of north latitude, where it crosses the 108th degree of longitude, west from Greenwich; thence running south and west to the northern boundary of Mexico; thence west to and down the main channel of the Gila river (on the northern line of Mexico), and on the northern boundary of Lower California to the Pacific ocean; thence along the coast northwesterly to 118° 30' of west longitude; thence north to where said line intersects the dividing 1 Browne, Debates, 173.

4 Journals of California Legislature, 1850, 1st sess., p. 443.

5

Ibid.

Sierra Nevada mountains; thence north along the ne Sierra Nevada mountains to the dividing range is that separate the waters flowing into the Cofrom the waters running into the Great Basin; erly along the dividing range of mountains that d waters flowing into the Columbia river on the the waters flowing into the Great Basin on the e summit of the Wind river chain of mountains; east and south by the dividing range of mounparate the waters flowing into the Gulf of Mexico

ters flowing into the Gulf of California, to the Inning, as set forth in the map drawn by Charles published by the order of the United States

1 of July, Almon Babbitt was elected delegate to 1 three days later a memorial asking for admis› Union as a state was adopted by both houses ature. On the 6th of September, by order of ylor, General John Wilson, United States Indian a consultation with Brigham Young, Heber llard Richards, and other Mormons to see if ements could be made for temporarily uniting the California territory under one government ose of keeping the slavery question out of Conhe beginning of 1851 the union was to be dis

California Legislature, 1850, 1st sess., 443-444. story of Utah, 444.

unt of this conversation see Young's letter given above,

solved and Deseret and California were to become separate states.1 As a result of the conference 2 John Wilson and Amasa Lyman were sent as delegates to California. On the 8th of January, 1850, they addressed a communication from San Francisco to Governor Burnett in which they informed him that they had been appointed by the people of the Great Salt Lake valley and basin, as representatives to any convention which might assemble in California, west of the Sierra Nevada, to form a constitution.3 "Our constituents will regret to learn that before their delegates did or could arrive here, the Convention had met, concluded their labors, and adjourned, thereby closing all opportunity, for the time, for their delegates to enter upon the discharge of their duty." They were communicating with the Governor, they said, and through him with the Legislature, to see if arrangements could be made for calling another convention in which the delegates of Eastern California might be admitted. The purpose of the second convention would be to form, for the present, a single state out of the territory of California, and at the same time to agree on boundary lines which should ultimately separate California and Deseret, when the latter had sufficient population to form a separate state.1

The people of Deseret, they continued, would insist on the "summit of the Sierra Nevada as a proper and natural

3 Journals of the California Legislature, 1850, 1st sess., 436.

4 Ibid., 440.

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as far as it went. Some complaint had been made extending their boundary to the Pacific, a large try had been included within the limits of Deseret e consent of the people living in that territory. s willing to leave this to a vote of the people the territory in question. If they should object nto the state of Deseret, then a compromise line, hose settlements, could be drawn. Deseret essired that the boundaries agreed upon should be icated in the constitution. Upon these terms, most earnest desire to settle all excitement in the to harmonize the interests of the people on both e Sierra Nevada, Deseret's representatives proe Legislature of California to ask the people to their election districts and vote for delegates to ention. They also added that in case the concalled they would cast their vote against slavery.1 ernor transmitted this communication to the Assembly the following February, accompanied ge to both Houses strongly recommending the the proposal. As a result, the Legislature took the matter. This ended the attempt to estaba boundaries for the two states.

the California Legislature, 1850, 1st sess., 441. 435, and Bancroft, History of Utah, 446-447.