WRITINGS OF 5AM HOUSTON, 1851
300
there; so in January, 1835, he landed at Velasco and made his way to the settlements on the Colorado. He finally settled at Bastrop (then called Mina), where he began the study of law in the office of Colonel D. C. Barrett. But a crisis was upon the country, and rumblings of the approaching 1·evolu- tion were plainly heard; it was a time for patriots to stand firm and pre- pare for the impending struggle. Pease soon became one of the most outspoken for revolution and was elected secretary of the Committee of Safety at Mina. In the following September when couriers from Gonzales brought an appeal for armed resistance,. he hurried to that place as a volunteer in the company of Colonel Robert M. Coleman, and had the privilege of firing a shot in the first skirmish of the Texas Revolution. In a few weeks he was granted a furlough on account of severe sickness, and in the latter part of November, 1835, went to San Felipe, where he was elected secretary of the Council of the Provisional Government, a position he retained until the Convention of March, 1836, that set up the cul interim government under David G. Burnet. Pease was not a delegat;(' to the Convention of March 1-18, 1836, but as secretary of the defunct Council of the Provisional Government, he attended all its meetings, and served as one of the secretaries of that body. Thus, he had a hand in the framing of the special ordinance that created the ad interim government, and the Constitution adopted by it. During the summer of 1836, he served as chief clerk, first in the navy, then, in the treasury department of the new republic; and for a short time, was acting secretary of the treasury after the death of Secretary Hardeman. In November, 1836, after Houston had assumed his duties as President of the Republic, Pease was appointed clerk of the Judicial Committee of the House of Representatives, and in that position drew up a large part of the laws that organized courts and created the offices and defined the duties of the county officials, as well as the fee bill and criminal code. See Gammel, Laws of Texas, I, 1090-1317. Upon the adjournment of the First Congress, Houston offered him the office of . Postmaster General, but he declined it to enter the law office of John A. Wharton, where he buried him- self for months in the study of law. He was admitted to the Texas bar in April, 1837. Again Houston offered him a public office-that of Comp- troller of Public Accounts. He accepted the position, but· resigned it in December, 1837, to return to Brazoria as a copartner with John A. Whar- ton in a law office. In January, 1838, John W. Harris, a cousini of Wharton, was taken into the office as a third partner. After the untimely death of Wharton, 1839, Harris and Pease remained partners, and for twenty years their firm was one of the most distinguished in Texas. During this period, Pease served for a time as district attorney, and after annexation, in 1846, was elected from Brazoria County to the House of Representatives of the First Texas Legislature, and was reelected to the Second Legisla- ture. During his service in the House, he helped draw up many of the Texas laws defining the jurisdiction of courts, and as chairman of the Judiciary Committee of the Second Legislature, he originated and pushed to enactment the probate laws of 1848 (see Gammel, Lciws of Texas, III, 129-132; also, Texas Stcite Ga-zette, August 5, and November 10, 1849).
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