Admission Day, what the heck. We could admit stuff. Until about 15 year's ago, Admission Day was a holiday in California. There at the end it was just a government and bank holiday, but a holiday none the less.

Letting California in as a free state and letting other places in as slave states was part of the deal that put off the Civil War a bit longer. Admission Day used to be a real holiday in California.

When Thoreau wrote "Civil Disobedience," he was writing about his response to the way California became United States territory. By a dirty little war, the Mexican War, take the land because you can.