But from the outset it was apparent that those who adhered to the 54 deg.

40' policy, on which Mr.Polk had been elected, were in a small minority.

That minority was led by General Cass; but its most brilliant advocate in debate was Edward A.Hannegan, Democratic senator from Indiana, who angrily reproached his party for playing false to the pledges on which it had won a victory over the greatest political leader of the country.
He measured the situation accurately, read with discrimination the motives which underlay the change of policy on the part of the administration and its Southern supporters, and stated the whole case in a quick and curt reply to an interruption from a pro-slavery senator,--"If Oregon were good for the production of sugar and cotton, it would not have encountered this opposition.

Its possession would have been at once secured." The change in the Democratic position was greatly aided by the attitude of the Whig senators, who almost unanimously opposed the resolution of notice to Great Britain, as passed by the House.

Mr.Webster, for the first if not the only time in his senatorial career, read a carefully prepared speech, in which he did not argue the question of rightful boundary, but urged that a settlement on the line of the 49th parallel would be honorable to both countries, would avert hostile feeling, and restore amity and harmony.