Mowe

Like many Oregonians, I have been bothered by the supposed grassroots movement to move Oregon’s border west. Bothered in part because the corollary of Greater Idaho is Lesser Oregon, and in part because the shape of Greater Idaho looks like a giant middle finger.

In reviewing the Greater Idaho literature and having witnessed the proliferation of signage on a recent trip to Eastern Oregon, it is apparent that the grassroots are being liberally watered by money from somewhere. The message is deceptively simple: Give us our freedom to join a state which shares our values.

States have proprietary rights and obligations. The entire state, not local communities, built and owns Eastern Oregon’s highways, bridges, maintenance facilities, gravel and cinder pits, heavy equipment, fish hatcheries, state airports, reservoirs, state parks, state offices, and countless other assets. Are they to be given away? Will Idaho pay for them? The Department of State Lands also owns hundreds of thousands of acres and mineral rights in Eastern Oregon, all held in trust for all citizens of Oregon, not just local residents.

The argument by Greater Idaho appears to be that Oregon state ownership is only about 3% of total land mass in Eastern Oregon, and that any ownership issues can somehow be negotiated between Oregon and Idaho. This argument glosses over the complexity and uniqueness of Oregon’s ownership. Two examples immediately come to mind. Oregon owns and operates two institutions of higher learning within the proposed Greater Idaho boundary, Eastern Oregon University and the Oregon Institute of Technology. Both serve local students, but also students from throughout the state. Why would it be in Oregon’s interest to give up these institutions or try to operate them in another jurisdiction? Similarly, Oregon operates state prisons and correctional facilities in Madras, Pendleton, Umatilla, Ontario, Baker, and Burns. Why would any Corrections Department choose to voluntarily surrender jurisdiction over its own prisons?

Oregon state ownership is not limited to the property discussed above. Rather, when Oregon became a state, it acquired title to all meandered lakes and up to the high water line of all navigable rivers within and abutting the state. Title is held as trustee for all people of Oregon under what is referred to as the Public Trust Doctrine. Thus, not only is Wallowa Lake State Park owned for the use and enjoyment of all Oregon citizens, but so is the lake itself. Similarly beds and banks of all navigable rivers and banks of the Columbia and Snake are held in public trust, as are nearly all natural lakes in the state. Oregon has a fiduciary obligation to preserve and protect public trust rights of all Oregonians. This obligation cannot be met by giving away our rivers and lakes, particularly to a state which has limited the scope of the public trust.

Just as all Oregonians share the state’s natural resources, we also share a proud history which should not be lightly discarded. There is a reason they don’t call it The Idaho Trail. Political trends are transient; history is not. The Willamette Valley is not a leftist monolith. Indeed, even Portland now has a law-and-order City Council. There are good-hearted people on both sides of the Cascades. Traditional values have an important role in moderating progressive values, and extremism benefits neither state. Rather than continually fanning flames of anger and setting neighbor against neighbor in what is surely a futile attempt at secession, money and energy could be better spent narrowing rather than expanding our differences.

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