The Governor’s Printing Office Grab

After publishing the proclamation, the governor has undertaken to appoint a public printer for the territory. We are at a loss to find any authority in the laws of Washington Territory for such an exercise of power while the Legislative Assembly is in session. What law gives the governor authority to fill an office which is by law to be filled by the Assembly, while that body is in session? The act of April 18, 1854, confers no such power. The Assembly has the right, in joint convention, to elect a territorial printer. Section 4 of the law of Washington Territory, page 74, acts of 1854, only authorizes that officer to fill vacancies occurring during the recess of the Legislature. How did he learn that the body was unable to elect a printer because the Council had rejected a resolution to go into joint convention? By what rule could he be delegated? We mean no personal disrespect, but we cannot see how the governor can be justified in treating the election as void.

It will be seen that when the time arrived, George Gallagher was elected public printer by the Assembly. He afterward resigned, and the governor placed the office in the hands of a member who had opposed him before the election. Gallagher denies that he resigned as part of a political bargain. He says his resignation was written between ten and eleven o’clock A.M., January 21, 1861, in the room of Hon. A. A. Denny, Washington Hall. No person was present when he wrote it. He had never spoken to anyone of his intention to resign. In his letter to Governor Gholson and the Speaker he states that he cannot comply with his duty and qualify as public printer. The joint convention which elected him had a right to expect him to serve. The matter has caused much ill feeling, and the public are left to judge between the governor’s claim of authority and the Assembly’s clear right to elect its own printer.