Though a Webster might lose himself in adoration of the Federal Union and an Everett offer up his mother a living sacrifice to preserve it, it is to the credit of human nature that human rights, human interests, human convictions and affections stand nearer and dearer to the people than any mere machinery of human government. The abolitionists believed the Constitution of the United States was a covenant with Death and a league with Hell, and they protested with all their soul and strength; to those Southerners reared to believe in the divinity of slavery, the Constitution was a worthless rag, for it did not protect them in their supposed rights. To the men of earnest convictions on both sides we owe our present disenthrallment. The foregoing apparent digression has been indulged for the reason that the Oregon people were severely criticised and denounced in connection with our Indian wars, spoilation claims, and the votes cast in favor of slavery upon the adoption of our free constitution; and also for the reason that the aspect of character has a sociological bearing. Advanced evolutionists include with their scientific shibboleth, "the survival of the fittest," an ethical element, when applied to civilized society. The early settlements here were singularly free from transgressors. There was no criminal code and no courts of law up to the time of the provisional government. Every man was a law unto himself, and it is said there was no offense against person or property of sufficient importance to require them. These were halcyon days, often referred to by old Oregonians, who say that crime and criminals were unknown until society was put under the tantalizing reign of law. I have heard not a few, in referring to the good old times, express the opinion that mankind are governed too much by statute and thereby released, in a great degree, from moral restraint. There is occasionally an old settler so impressed with pioneer equality, fraternity, and purity, that he lays all subsequent social disturbance to the provoking interference of legal machinery with natural rights, and he longs "for a lodge in some vast wilderness" where he can end his days in peace, away from penalties and penal institutions and the temptations which civil government offers to the predatory instincts of men. Such logical metonomy is not mentioned here except to show that the pioneers were lovers of peace and good order, and fully subject to enlightened moral restraint. As before mentioned, they were peculiar in one respect, that is, in the possession of a large share of the executive or heroic qualities.