USA > Oklahoma > A standard history of Oklahoma; an authentic narrative of its development from the date of the first European exploration down to the present time, including accounts of the Indian tribes, both civilized and wild, of the cattle range, of the land openings and the achievements of the most recent period, Vol. II > Part 20
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Three days after the election (August 8tli), representative elect, C. M. Burke, of Edmond, died, and the next day representative elect, Milton W. Reynolds died.3 The two vacancies thus created
3 Milton W. Reynolds was born in Chemung, County, New York, May 23, 1833. Most of his earlier life was spent in Michigan, whither his parents moved when he was but three years old. He was educated at the University of Michigan. In 1857 he moved farther west, settling at Omaha, Nebraska. He farmed, edited a newspaper and took an active part in politics, serving two terms in the Nebraska Legislative Assembly. He frequently had occa- sion to do special correspondence for eastern newspapers and it was on such a mission that he had occasion to visit the peace council at Fort Smith, Arkansas, in September, 1865, and also the peace councils with the wild tribes which were held on the Medicine Lodge
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necessitated the calling of a new election and led to a postponement of the date for the convening of the Legislative Assembly until August 27th, the new elections being scheduled for the 25th. Al- though the republicans had a working majority in the House of Representatives and a minority barely less than half the member- ship in the Council, there was no apparent effort on their part to avail themselves of any partisan advantage in consequence. On the contrary, the issues involved in the organization of the two houses of the Legislative Assembly were wholly local and party lines seemed to be forgotten, for the time being, at least. In consequence of this condition, and of the protracted "milling" and caucussing, two days were consumed in the organization of each house, so it was not until the 29th of August that the Legislative Assembly was organized and ready for business. . As the farmers' alliance mem- bers seemed to hold the balance of power between the contending factions, it was not strange that the speaker of the House (Arthur N. Daniels, of Canadian County) and the president of the Council (George W. Gardenhire, of Payne County) were both chosen from the weakest of the three political parties.
The real question at issue, which had thus obscured party differ- ences, was that of the location of the territorial capital and other public institutions, and, in its essence, one of rivalry between the
River in the autumn of 1867. His interest in the Oklahoma country thus dated from a comparatively early period. In 1865 he moved from Nebraska to Kansas, settling at Lawrence and, six years later, at Parsons, at both of which places he was engaged in the news- paper business. He represented Labette County in the Kansas Legislature and also served one term as a regent of the University of Kansas. His interest in the Indian Territory was always active ; as early as 1872, in a magazine article entitled "The Indian State," he outlined the future development of what is now the State of Oklahoma with remarkably prophetic vision. He was said to have written more on the Oklahoma question prior to its final opening to homestead settlement than any other one writer, especially in his work as a member of the staff of the Kansas City Times, much of his writing appearing over the nom-de-plume of "Kicking Bird." (He assumed that pen name out of compliment to his friend, the Kiowa chieftain of that name, with whom he became acquainted during the council at Medicine Lodge.) He came to Guthrie, April 22, 1889, where he aided in the publication of the Daily State Herald for a few weeks. In July following, he established the Edmond Sun and, a few weeks later, he selected a homestead near Edmond. He took an active part in the affairs of the new territory, was elected a representative August 5, 1890, and died four days later. He was buried at Edmond.
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two largest towns in the territory-Guthrie and Oklahoma City. Fortune seemed to have favored Guthrie from the beginning. It was named as the seat of one of the two Government land offices, which gave it a measure of prestige on the day of the opening of the country to settlement. Then, in the Organic Act, it was named as the temporary seat of the territorial government. Although both -towns were on the same line of railway, it was evident that, as be- tween the two, Guthrie had the advantage of moral and political support and backing of the railway company (Santa Fe) which was reputed to be a power in such matters. Indeed, railroad influence may have been potent in the choice of a location for the land office and also in the determination of the location of the temporary seat of the territorial government. Even nature seemed to have done more for Guthrie than for Oklahoma City, its site being more ele- vated and better drained. On the other hand, Oklahoma City had some advantages in spite of the handicap which it felt on account of the favoritism shown to its rival. It was surrounded by one of the most promising agricultural districts in the territory and it was much nearer the geographic center of the old Indian Territory (which many people believed would some day be made into a state by reuniting the two territories) than Guthrie was. At any rate, it was known that the people of Oklahoma City were not satisfied to have all of the favors shown to Guthrie and the people of the last mentioned place realized intuitively that, sooner or later, they would have to strive to hold what advantages they had. The pos- session of the capital of the territory and of a Government land office had been of tremendous value to Guthrie on account of the advertising the town had received.
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Realizing that the people of Oklahoma City would be almost certain to make an effort to have the capital of the territory located at that place, the people of Guthrie planned a combination for the control of the Legislative Assembly for the purpose of preventing such action. In this combination, Logan and Kingfisher counties took the lead in a plan whereby it was to be provided that the capital was to remain at Guthrie, the penitentiary was to be located at Kingfisher and other territorial institutions were to be scattered among the other counties, but none were to be located in Oklahoma or Payne counties. This combination did not have votes sufficient to win, but it was hoped to persuade the Payne County delegation to come to its support without offering a state institution in return. When this was attempted, the members from Payne County de- manded that the Agricultural College be located in that county. When this demand was refused, the delegation from Payne went to
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the Oklahoma City people and a new combination was formed, thus giving Oklahoma City interests full control in the organization of both houses of the Assembly and placing men of the minority party in positions of commanding influence as presiding officers of the same.
The message of Governor Steele was not an extended one. He briefly reviewed the conditions of the territory and its people. He called attention to the necessity of legislation for the organization of the public school system of the territory. In this connection he took occasion to "recommend that provisions be made for four schools in each township, where practicable, * * and that the settlers should provide their own school houses on sections 8, 11, 26 and 29, centrally located." (To this suggestion many of the people took decided exception for the reason that a schoolhouse thus centrally located, would of necessity be in the center of a sec- tion and, therefore, half a mile from the public road.) The message called attention to the fact that the chapters contained in statute laws of Nebraska which had been specifically enumerated by the Organic Act as being adopted for the territory (until such time as the same should be changed or modified by the Legislative As- sembly) did not include any highway law. Its longest paragraph was devoted to the subject of taxation. Recommendation was made that appropriations be provided for the erection of public build- ings, aside from the capitol. In the matter of the location of the seat of the territorial government, it was suggested no action be taken until other matters "of a great deal more importance are provided for." The enactment of a herd law and provision for adequate live stock quarantine regulations was urged. In the mat- ter of controlling the liquor traffic, he recommended the adoption of the Nebraska liquor law (which provided for a measure of local option), adding a gratuitous expression of personal opinion to the effect that it would "give us better protection from the evils of intemperance than that enjoyed by states attempting a prohibition law." Other recommendations included : the location and establish- ment of an agricultural experiment station ; provision for an exhibit from the territory at the Columbian Exposition at Chicago, in 1892; the enactment of a law for the organization of the militia; pro- visions for an election law, for the reorganization of the county governments, for the necessary territorial officers, for fixing the legal rate of interest and for regulating fees and salaries.4
4 Journal of the First Session of the Legislative Assembly of Oklahoma Territory, pp. 15-20.
CHAPTER LXVII
THE CONTEST OVER THE CAPITAL LOCATION
When both houses of the Legislative Assembly were finally organized after all this preliminary jockeying and maneuvering, there was manifest a feeling of tension that boded no good for other work of the session. On the 2d of September, James L. Brown, member of the Council from Oklahoma City, introduced the following bill, which was designated as Council Bill No. 7:
"AN ACT to locate and establish the seat of government of the Territory of Oklahoma.
"Be it enacted by the Council and House of Representatives of the Legislative Assembly of the Territory of Oklahoma:
"SECTION 1. That the seat of government of the Territory of Oklahoma be and the same is hereby located and established at Oklahoma City, in the said Territory of Oklahoma.
"SECTION 2. That the offices of the executive officers of said Territory of Oklahoma shall be removed from Guthrie to Okla- homa City, and the seat of government there located and estab- lished between the first and fifteenth days of February, A. D. 1891, until which time they shall be and remain at Guthrie, in said Territory.
"SECTION 3. That the first session of the Legislative Assembly of the Territory of Oklahoma convened after February first, 1891, shall assemble at Oklahoma City, at such time as may be provided by law.
"SECTION 4. If the Supreme Court of the Territory of Okla- homa be, on February first, 1891, holding a term, that term shall be completed at Guthrie, and when adjourned, its offices shall be removed to Oklahoma City, and all future sessions of that court shall be held at Oklahoma City. If the said court is not in session on February first, 1891, its offices shall be removed at the same time the executive offices are removed. All matters pending be- fore that court shall be transferred to Oklahoma City, and there proceeded with, with like force and effect as though the seat of government of said Territory had remained at Guthrie.
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"SECTION 5. If from any cause the removal of said offices be delayed beyond February eighth, 1891, they shall be transferred as soon as the cause of the delay is removed.
"SECTION 6. On January fifth, 1891, or within five days there- after, the Governor shall issue and publish his proclamation giving notice that the seat of government shall be so removed, of which all persons shall take due notice.
"SECTION 7. This act shall be in force from and after the adjournment of the present term of this Legislative Assembly."
President Gardenhire, of the Council, who represented a Payne County constituency, introduced a bill (Council Bill No. 32) locat- ing the proposed Territorial Agricultural College in that county. All interest in anything other than the capital location measure seemed to be lacking however and two weeks passed with little or nothing in the way of legislative achievement. On the 16th of September, the capital location bill came up for consideration in the Council and, after debate, was passed by a vote of seven to six. Thence the measure went to the House of Representatives, where it was referred to a committee. The bill slept in the committee's hands for two weeks, during which time there was much caucussing and counselling on the part of both factions. On the 1st of Octo- ber, it was called up, amended, and passed by a vote of fourteen to twelve. The Council concurred in the House amendment the next day and then the bill went to the governor.
Governor Steele had ten days in which to consider the matter before approving or disapproving the measure, and he availed himself of the full time thus allowed. The events which occurred in legislative circles during that interval were not at all creditable to either the supporters or the opponents of the capital removal measure. Schemes, plots, counter-plots and intrigues, many of which were of the most despicable and disgraceful character, fol- lowed one another in rapid succession. Governor Steele listened to the arguments and representations of both sides but did not commit himself in a message to the Legislative Assembly until the time allowed by law for executive consideration had nearly ex- pired. As time wore on, interest in the probable attitude and action of the governor developed into a feeling of feverish anxiety. Although both houses of the Legislative Assembly were nominally in session, they each ceased to make even a pretense of transacting any business. The lobbies were crowded with an eager, expectant throng of people, waiting in almost breathless silence for the words of the governor's message-words which, in the over-wrought imag-
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ination of the hour, were supposed to be freighted with fate for the two aspiring rival communities, aye, words which, by many on both sides, were supposed to be filled with the promise of certain prosperity and greatness to the favored town, while the same words were supposed to be equally prophetic of the doom and decadence of the defeated town, so short-sighted is human judgment in the heat of passionate conflict !
It was in the middle of the afternoon of the 13th of October, when the following message from the governor of the territory was received and read in the Legislative Assembly : 1
"TERRITORY OF OKLAHOMA, EXECUTIVE OFFICE, "GUTHRIE, OCTOBER 13, 1890.
"To the Honorable President of the Council, Territorial Legislature: "I have the honor to return herewith Council bill number seven, presented to me for my concurrence, and shall not stop to decide which of these two sections 1st or 2d, really is intended to locate the capital; nor call particular attention to section four, which, it seems to me, takes broad ground in dealing with the Supreme Court; nor to remark the oversight in not amending section five to make it conform to section one; neither shall I take time to remark on the enacting clause, or as to whether the bill before me is the bill which passed the House; for, with reference to the first proposi- tion, the very industrious and able Councilor from Oklahoma has presented authorities which to my mind support the legality of the enacting clause. On the second proposition, it is clear to my mind that the bill was duly compared by as many members of the en- rolling committee as are usually present when bills are compared, and that the enrolled copy, known as the 'Daniels Bill,' was duly compared with the bill which passed both houses, was properly engrossed, found to be correct, and was taken to the House by a member of said committee, and a verbal report made the Speaker, who signed the bill, passed it to the clerk of the House for signa- ture, who also certified to its correctness and handed it back to the Speaker; then came the unusual proceeding of the Speaker handing the bill back to the member of the enrolling committee before mentioned, who hastily proceeded to the Council chamber, and found Council had adjourned. Upon reflection, I suppose it was concluded that the House adjourned or was adjourning when the Speaker signed the bill; that a motion was pending making a
1 Journal of the First Legislative Assembly of Oklahoma Terri- tory, pp. 291-3.
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reconsideration of the vote and passage of the bill, and that the bill was not regularly out of the committee on enrolled bills, be- cause no report had been prepared as rules required.
"However, the bill went from the member of the House com- mittee on enrolled bills (who had reported it as correct to Speaker Daniels) to a member of the Council committee on enrolled bills ; and if adjournment had not been unusually early on that day and he had made a verbal report to the Council the same as had been made to the House, and the president had affixed his signature thereto, it is not likely the legality of the proceeding would have been questioned by the friends of the bill.
"The following morning, however, upon an announcement by Speaker Daniels that he had inadvertently signed the bill, and requesting its return, the House passed a resolution requesting the Council to return the bill, with a view to permitting him to erase his signature therefrom, which resolution was not acted upon by the Council. The chief clerk of that honorable body directed the enrolling clerk to make a new copy, which was done, and the joint committee on enrolled bills reported it favorably to the respective houses as being a correct copy of the engrossed bill, and said bill was permitted to go through both houses without serious opposi- tion, and my opinion it is not defective in that particular.
"It is claimed by able Councillors and Representatives that the Governor should do some affirmative act in the matter of locating or re-locating the capital, but have presented no authorities to sus- tain this view, nor have I been able to learn if there has ever been a decision directly bearing on the question; for in the Dakota case presented by the honorable Councilor from Oklahoma, the Gov- ernor had approved a bill providing for the delegation of the authority possessed by the Governor to the legislative assembly, or to a commission; but there is no question in my mind as to the legality of a location where a bill is passed in regular order and concurred in.
"It is not my province to hearken to the reports of there having been formed a combination at the opening of your session by which certain officers were elected in the consideration of votes being influenced favorably to the proposed site, yet, could I be certain the editorial in the Norman Advance emanated from the honorable Councilor, its reputed editor, there would seem to be ground for the rumor.
"It may not be improper for me to recur to my special commu- nication to your honorable body on September 17th, transmitting
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a copy of the law in reference to the agricultural college, urging that in locating the various necessary institutions, opportunity be given by competition to localities desiring them; donations and other advantages peculiar to the institution should be considered, and the tax-payers of communities receiving no direct benefit correspondingly relieved.
"Section fifteen of the organic act declares that 'the Legislative Assembly of the Territory of Oklahoma shall hold its first session. at Guthrie, in said Territory, at such time as the Governor shall appoint and direct ; and at said first session, or as soon thereafter as they shall deem expedient, the Governor and Legislative As- sembly shall proceed to locate and establish the seat of government of said Territory at such place as they may deem eligible, which place, however, shall thereafter be subject to change by the said Governor and Legislative Assembly.'
"I need not say to the honorable Councilors and Members that 'locate and establish' in the foregoing section is to adopt or form a fixed residence, to make steadfast, to settle firmly, to fix.
"The bill does not, it seems to me, pretend to establish a per- manent location for the capital by either donations of money or land, as has been done in every instance so far as I have been able to learn where capitals have been 'located and established.'
"It is not urged that the proposed location is more healthful or nearer the center of population.
"In this bill no arrangement is made for offices for the various officers of the Territory, nor halls for the Legislature, nor is any one designated or authorized to do so.
"It is my sincere hope and belief that large areas of territory will be added to what we now have before the date fixed in the bill for removal, in consequence of which the center of population may be materially changed, and thereby furnish better reasons than it seems to me are now presented for changing the present temporary site.
"In consequence of all which I must return Council bill number seven without my approval.
"GEO. W. STEELE, Governor."
Although it dealt with a question of what seemed to be momen- tous interest to many of the inhabitants of the young common- wealth, Governor Steele's veto message can scarcely be rated as a great state paper. A temporary political sojourner in the territory himself, the tone of contentiousness was so manifest in his message
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as to more than neutralize any effort to appear impartial. Yet it may well be doubted if it could have been otherwise if the capital location measure had received his official sanction and approval, for no matter how sincere in his convictions or how disinterested in his action, he was bound to incur the displeasure if not the enmity of a large part of the people of Oklahoma, no matter which horn of the dilemma he might choose. Indeed, fate would doubt- less have been equally unkind to any man who happened to be filling the office of governor of the Territory of Oklahoma just at that time.
Brief as was the period between the convening of the Legislative Assembly and the passage of the measure for the location of the capital, it was long enough for the Oklahoma City-Payne County combination to break. When President Gardenhire, of the Council, wanted to make his bill for the location of the Agricultural College a special order for the 1st of October, and the Oklahoma City con- tingent refused, he repudiated the agreement and voted against the Council concurrence with the House amendment to the capital location bill. Fortunately for the Oklahoma City leaders, they were enabled to induce one of the opposition members of the Coun- cil (C. F. Grimmer, of Beaver County) to come to their aid and thus save the bill. . Nor was the Guthrie-Kingfisher combination any more stable or enduring.
There was a great deal of parliamentary "horse-play" in the sessions of the Legislative Assembly, much time being wasted on trivial motions and unnecessary roll calls. The following minutes of the proceedings of the House of Representatives on the afternoon of October 15, 1890 (the fiftieth day of the session), serves to illustrate the manner in which time was wasted by such tactics : 2 "Roll call; all present except Colson and Long.
"By Robertson-House Bill No. 46. An act to provide for taking up domestic animals as strays. Read and referred to Committee on Agriculture.
"By Trosper-House Bill No. 47. A bill to prohibit the manu- facture and sale of alcoholic liquors in the Territory of Oklahoma, except for medical, scientific and mechanic purposes, and to regulate the manufacture and sale thereof for such purposes. Read and referred to the Committee on Liquor Traffic.
"By Waggoner-House Bill No. 48. An act regulating foreign
2 Journal of the First Session of the Legislative Assembly of Oklahoma Territory, Vol. I, pp. 307-9.
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insurance companies transacting business in the Territory of Okla- homa. Read and referred to the Committee on Insurance.
"By Mr. Campbell-House Resolution No. 17.
"Resolved, by the House of Representatives of the Legislative Assembly of the Territory of Oklahoma :
"Ist. That all action on questions involving county seats and county lines, the capital removal and the location of public institu- tions are hereby postponed until after the 15th day of November, A. D. 1890.
"2d. That the above order of the House can only be changed or rescinded by a vote of two-thirds of the members thereof.
"Mr. Campbell moved to adopt the resolution.
"Mr. Post moved to lay the motion on the table.
"Roll call being called, there were eleven ayes and thirteen nays. Those voting in the affirmative were: Farnsworth, Jones, Neal, Pack, Peery, Post, Stovall, Talbot, Terrill, Trosper, Waggoner. Those voting in the negative were: Adair, Barker, Campbell, Clark, Currin, Lewis, Mathews, Merten, Robertson, Smith, Tritt, Wim- berly, Mr. Speaker (Daniels). So the motion failed.
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