Establishment of Nevada Territory (1935)

[From James G. Scrugham, Nevada: The Narrative of the Conquest of a Frontier Land (1935), vol. I]

The initial development of the Comstock Lode and the Indian war focused popular attention upon this section of the West. Thus claims of the people of Western Utah were emphasized during the consideration of the bills before Congress for dividing up the western country into territories. Each and all of these bills were considered not only on their real merits, but as they would affect the slavery controversy. In the House of Representatives elected in 1858 the proslavery men for the first time were in the minority. After the Thirty-sixth Congress assembled in December, 1859, the House spent nearly two months in a deadlock over organization. In the meantime Senator Gwin, of California, on January 9, 1860, introduced a bill to form "Nevada Territory" from the western part of Utah. Another bill had been introduced for the organization of Arizona Territory, but neither was reported back to the Senate.[1] On May 11 a new type of territory was proposed by Representative Thayer of Massachusetts, who in the introduction of territorial bills, proposed the division of all the territory south of the 42nd parallel and west of the 25th meridian to California, and north of New Mexico, into "two land districts," the first that of "Jefferson," and the second that of "Nevada," the dividing line between the two being the Salt Lake, Jordan River and Utah Lake. Such a proposal, of course, involved the repeal of the act creating Utah Territory. Only one official was provided for in the administration of each of these land districts, that of surveyor general. At the same time chairman Grow said that the House Committee on Territories had decided to report in favor of the organization of five territories.[2] "Out of the western portion of Utah we propose to organize a territory under the name of Nevada." Nevada was to be composed of that portion of Utah west of the 114th meridian and that portion of Washington Territory between the 42nd and 43d parallels from Oregon to the Green River, and so much of New Mexico as lies between the Virgin River and California. It was estimated that the territory would comprise about 150,000 square miles, with a population of some ten or twelve thousand, and "rapidly increasing by reason of the silver discoveries along the base of the Sierra Nevadas." This bill for Nevada Territory by a vote of ninety-two to seventy-three was laid on the table. Many pages of the Congressional Record of that date are covered with the debates over these territorial issues, constantly entangled with the slavery controversy. Each of the bills had contained an anti-slavery proviso.

On February 26, 1861,[3] just after the Senate had concurred in the House amendment to the Colorado bill, the Nevada bill was taken up. This bill, said Senator Green of Missouri, was exactly similar to the other (Colorado) without a single word of change, except for the boundaries. Similar eliminations were made as to slavery, and Senator Douglas again offered the same substitute which he had made for the Colorado bill, but it was lost by a vote of 4 to 31. The bill was then read a third time and passed. In the House[4], Chairman Grow began the consideration of the Nevada bill March 1, 1861. In reply to a question as to whether the bill contained the Wilmot Proviso, he said "there is nothing

President Lincoln appointed James W. Nye as the governor of Nevada Territory.[5] Several months elapsed before the governor

Whereas, the following named officers have been duly appointed and commissioned under said act as officers of said Government, viz : James W. Nye, Governor of said Territory, Commander in Chief of the Militia thereof, and Superintendent of Indian affairs therein ; Orion Clemens, Secretary of said Territory ; George Turner, Chief Justice, and Horatio M. Jones and Gordon N. Mott, Associate Justices of the Supreme Court of said Territory, and to act as Judges of the District Court for said Territory; Benjamin B. Bunker, Attorney of the United States for said territory ; D. Bates, Marshal of the United States for said Territory ; and John W. North, Surveyor-General for said Territory ; and the said Governor and other officers having assumed the duties of their said offices, according to law, said Territorial government is hereby declared to be organized and established, and all persons are enjoined to conform to, respect, and obey the laws thereof accordingly.[6]

son Valley from a point ten miles below Nevada City to the Sink of the Carson, 569 ; polling places at Buckland's Station, one mile below Fort Churchill, and Ragtown.[7]

Twelfth District. The Valley of Walker River and all of the territory south and east of it, 3,286; the polling places at Rissue's Bridge, Marsh's Ranch, Aurora and Monoville.[8]

A short time after Governor Nye had arrived and assumed his official prerogatives, the overland stage coach brought in from the East two worn and dusty travelers. One of them was Orion Clemens, the secretary of the territory. Accompanying him as private secretary was his brother. As one historian[9] has discriminatingly declared, the most important member of the territorial government, "Samuel Langhorne Clemens, was the private secretary of the territorial secretary. The overland journey of Mark Twain with his brother, Orion Clemens, to this new post in the summer of 1861, has become a classic jaunt immortalized in Roughing It. The mining camp which occasioned their trip would have justified itself, if it had done no more than bring to this new type of frontier its greatest artist." Mark Twain before going to Nevada had been through a number of experiences, including an apprenticeship as a printer, and for some time had been earning $250 a month as a Mississippi River pilot. In his Autobiography he states that he had saved $800, and it was this money, all in silver coin, with which he defrayed the traveling expenses of himself and his brother. Orion Clemens was, according to his brother's account, a talented man when working for others, but a flat failure when on his own. In Roughing It, Mark Twain has drawn unforgettable pictures of the overland stage route and the scenes and people along the way. While the noted stage driver of the Sierras, Hank Monk, did not pilot the Clemens brothers over any portion of their route, Roughing It immortalizes Monk as the driver of the coach in which Horace Greeley in 1859 went over the Sierras.

The organic act and the 'instructions' from the State Department commanded that a Legislature should be elected at such and such a time, and its sittings inaugurated at such and such a date. It was easy to get legislators, even at three dollars a day, although board was $4.50, for distinction has its charm in Nevada as well as elsewhere ; and there were plenty of patriotic souls out of employment; but to get a legislative hall for them to meet in was another matter altogether." In this emergency "Abe Curry," of the Gould and Curry mines, came forward and offered rent free a large stone building just outside the capital limits, and even furnished it with pine benches and chairs, with a canvas partition through the center to make quarters for the Council and House of Representatives.[10]

[1] Congressional Globe, Thirty-sixth Congress, First Session.

[2] Congressional Globe, May 11, 1860.

[3] Congressional Record for that date, page 1206.

[4] Congressional Globe, page 1334.

[5] James Warren Nye was born in Madison County, New York, June 10, 1814, and was at a hale and hearty middle age when he came West. He had been admitted to the bar and had practiced law in New York and had been an anti-slavery candidate for Congress. After his term as territorial governor he was elected one of the United States Senators from Nevada, was reelected in 1867, and was in the Senate from December 16, 1864, to March 3, 1873. Senator Nye died at White Plains, New York, December 25, 1876. Mark Twain in his autobiography says that "Governor Nye was an old and seasoned politician from New York—politician, not statesman. . . . His eyes could out-talk his tongue, and this is saying a good deal, for he was a very remarkable talker, both in private and on the stump. . . . He had been a stage driver in his early days in New York or New England," and to this fact Mark Twain imputed his facility in remembering names and faces.

[6] In signing this proclamation the governor did not indicate the place where it was signed, but in a proclamation six days later, July 17, for defining the judicial district, the place was given as "at Carson City," a formality which assigns the exact date from which Carson City has been the capital of the Territory and State of Nevada.

[7] The First Precinct of this district was defined as follows: Embracing all of that portion of Carson Valley and adjacent country lying between an east and west line ten miles below Nevada City, and a like line passing by and including Williams' Old Station, nine miles below Fort Churchill. The population in this precinct, amounting to 483, is classed and distributed as follows: Living along the Immigrant Road and the Carson River, 61; miners in the Indian District, east of Fort Churchill, 23; at Fort Churchill, 182 soldiers, 6 officers, officers' families, composed of 7 persons, with 8 laundrywomen and children, making a total at this post, of 203; party cutting wood on contract for the fort, 16; employes of the Overland Mail and Telegraph companies, and the Pony Express, 180.

[8] The source of this material is in the Journal of the First Legislative Assembly of the Territory, appendix.

[9] F. L. Paxson, History of the American Frontier, 450.

[10] In Roughing It the territorial secretary's bills for money advanced by him for necessary expenses under his "instructions" were not allowed by the Government, but in his autobiography Mark Twain says that his brother made a good deal of money from the fees for recording mining claims and other legal papers, so much so that he built a $12,000 house in Carson City. According to the same account, through a sudden whim of modesty, Orion Clemens failed to push his candidacy when Nevada became a state, and was accordingly not nominated for the office of Secretary of State. A little later he sold his house for about $3,000, went East and, according to Mark Twain, lived on the bounty of his brother. For many years he lived at Keokuk, Iowa, where he had a commodious home in spite of his reported lack of thrift in business enterprise. He died there about 1898.

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