In 1839 John Sutter, a Swiss immigrant of German origin, settled in Alta California and began building a fortified settlement on a land grant of 48,827 acres (197.60 km2) at the confluence of the Sacramento and American rivers.
"[7] White American Lansford Warren Hastings wrote "the natives...in California...are in a state of absolute vassalage, even more degrading, and more oppressive than that of our slaves in the south.
"[9] In late June or early July, several Spanish-speaking men met with friendly Konkow Maidu Indians about sixty miles north of Sutter's Fort near present-day Chico.
Sutter reported that Antonio Armijo, Robert Smith, and John Eggar were the slavers who had massacred said Indians, and the men were then arrested by the U.S. Army.
[18] In 1856, a San Francisco Bulletin editorial stated, "Extermination is the quickest and cheapest remedy, and effectually prevents all other difficulties when an outbreak [of Indian violence] occurs.
A Sacramento Daily Union article of the time accused high-pressure lobbyists interested in profiting off enslaved Indians of pushing the law through, gave examples of how wealthy individuals had abused the law to acquire Indian slaves from the reservations, and stated, "The Act authorizes as complete a system of slavery, without any of the checks and wholesome restraints of slavery, as ever was devised.