Chapter 41: Continuing the Debates

 

To Mac’s surprise, Hastings proposed that the California Constitution abolish the death penalty for crimes.

“The time is fast approaching,” Hastings asserted, “when a prohibition on the punishment of death shall be engrafted into the laws of all the states of this great nation. No individual has the right to take human life, except in self-defense. And this principle applies equally to the government.”

The argument caused Mac to think. He’d taken lives during his time in the West, starting when he defended Jenny in Missouri, again when men had attacked his claim, and probably during the fight with the Indians after Murderer’s Bar. He pondered the matter in his journal:

 

September 16, 1849. I have always assumed that “an eye for an eye” is the punishment God desires our justice system to mete out. But the debate this week has caused me to question my assumption. I acted to defend myself and others, except on the ill-fated posse. Still, the deaths sit uneasily on my conscience.

 

Ultimately, the delegates rejected Hastings’s motion. Through his cigar smoke that evening, Hastings told Mac mournfully, “The nation isn’t ready.”

The convention delegates also discussed the establishment of banks. Mac’s father had firmly believed state-chartered banks improved the development of commerce. But many delegates argued that banks—indeed all corporate associations—were evil institutions they should ban.

After heated discussion, the majority agreed to permit associations for the deposit of silver and gold. But they refused to permit those associations to issue any notes or paper that would circulate as money.

When Mac wrote in his journal, he thought of the difficulty he’d had sending funds to Jenny in Oregon. The proposed limitations would not make transferring assets in the West any easier.

 

September 17, 1849. I suppose there is merit to the argument that banking fosters speculation, and I suppose it makes sense to limit the creation of specie to the government. But without easy transfer of funds from one source to another, how will commerce grow? And how will men in the West care for families they have left behind?

Mac received another invitation from the Frémonts, this time for a supper on September 18.

“Miss Abbott seems to have taken a shine to you,” Shannon remarked with a grin. “Do you fancy her?”

Susan Abbott was the type of woman his mother would want him to marry. Attractive, educated, able to mingle in society—Mother would not be able to find fault with Miss Abbott. “She probably doesn’t know many people here, and I am a friend of her grandfather’s. Mrs. Frémont is simply being kind to invite me.”

“Well, if Miss Abbott didn’t like you, she could certainly tell Mrs. Frémont not to include you. Be careful the young lady doesn’t think more of your attentions than you intend.”

Mac kept Shannon’s caution in mind, but enjoyed the evening thoroughly.

“Why don’t you call me ‘Susan’?” she said as they talked in the parlor after the meal. “You’re such a good friend of Grandfather’s.”

“Then you must call me ‘Mac,’” he said with a smile.

“Oh, that’s so informal. Might I call you ‘Caleb’?”

“Only my mother calls me that,” Mac replied, remembering Jenny’s lips pursing as she pronounced his name, “Mac.” Now he bowed to Susan, “But as you wish.”

Another debate concerned which men in California should have the right to vote. The delegates presumed Negroes would not vote, and the discussion centered on men of Mexican descent.

Hastings rose to declare, “The Treaty of Hildalgo ended our war with Mexico. It demands we recognize the property and rights of the former citizens of Mexico, regardless of their color. If we violate the stipulations of this treaty, we violate the Constitution of the United States. Every man who was a citizen of Mexico is a citizen now of California.”

“Just because a man is a citizen doesn’t mean California has to permit him to vote,” a delegate from Monterey stated.

The plenary sessions and committee meetings, on issue after issue, lasted from morning until late in the evenings. Mac had to decline the next invitation he received from the Frémonts. The evening sessions were conducted over dinner, followed by drinks and cigars. Mac limited his intake of whiskey when he was required to take notes. But a good cigar was a pleasant end to a busy day.

The Negro issue was complicated by boundary questions. How much of the territory east of the Sierra Nevada should be included in the new state? Should California claim the Salt Lake region where the Mormons had settled? Should California be split into a northern free state and a southern slave state?

Hastings was appointed to the committee to determine the boundaries, and William Shannon was also influential on that issue. Shannon proposed that California encompass most of the Sierra Nevada range, but not the Mormon territory, and the delegates ultimately adopted his suggestion.

In the end, the committee created a large single state from north to south, with no expectation that any portion of California would permit the ownership of slaves. If this proposal were adopted, California would be the first state south of the latitude 3630’ to prohibit slavery—a line held inviolate since the Missouri Compromise of 1820.

Even after the question of slavery was resolved, arguments about admitting Negroes to California continued through September. Most delegates from the mining districts adamantly opposed permitting Negroes—free or slave—into their territory. On the other side of the issue, the representatives from San Francisco and San Jose supported citizenship for all men, regardless of color.

“We cannot tolerate the enslavement of those of darker skin,” Shannon fumed to Mac one evening. “And it is equally repugnant to ban them from our state.”

“I’m not the man you need to convince,” Mac said, thinking of the Tanners. They’d left Oregon because they weren’t wanted—would they now be forced out of California?

Shannon sipped his cognac, then continued his tirade. “It’s nonsense to assume Southern plantation owners would dump their slaves in California, as some delegates say.”

Mac laughed. “I’m not arguing with you. Save your breath for the debate.”

But the next day in another heated session, a delegate representing Stockton argued, “Even in the absence of slavery, I cast my vote in favor of prohibiting the Negro race from coming amongst us. The Almighty created the Negro to serve the white race, as the instinctive feeling of the Negro is obedience to the white man. If we wish all mankind to be free, then we must not bring the lowest in contact with the highest, or one will rule and the other must serve.”

“He’s a doctor from Ohio,” Shannon whispered to Mac. “But he has spent his adult life in Louisiana—a Southerner by sympathy.” Then Shannon stood to argue the points he’d made to Mac the evening before.

One faction of delegates wanted to defer the question to the future legislature. The man who had earlier attempted to amend Shannon’s proposal against slavery, Morton McCarver, threw down another gauntlet. “Let us resolve,” he said, “that the first legislature elected after this Constitution is adopted must pass laws to prohibit the immigration and settling of Negroes into this state and further prohibit owners of slaves from bringing them into California for the purpose of freeing them.”

“There’s the rub,” Hastings murmured to Mac as they listened to the debate. “No one wants newly freed slaves in the state. They have no skills or resources with which to prosper and will be a drain on the public coffers.”

“Many Negroes are quite skilled,” Mac said, thinking again of Tanner.

In the end, McCarver’s proposal was successful, and the question of admitting Negroes into California was left for the future legislature. The delegates’ cavalier abdication of their responsibility appalled Mac. He wrote late one night:

 

September 25, 1849. If these men of supposedly great education and experience can’t—or won’t—make difficult decisions, why did they volunteer to serve as delegates?