The Oregon Constitutional Convention in 1857 drafted the Oregon Constitution in preparation for the Oregon Territory to become a U.S. state. Held from mid-August through September, 60 men met in Salem, Oregon, and created the foundation for Oregon's law. The proposal passed with a vote of 35 for adoption to 10 against. Oregon then became the 33rd state of the Union on February 14, 1859.[1]
In June 1846 the Oregon Question was decided with the United States gaining sole possession of all disputed land south of the 49th degree of latitude.[1][2] Afterward, on August 14, 1848, the United States government created the Oregon Territory, and in 1853 the northern and eastern sections of the territory became the Washington Territory.[3] In 1854 and 1855 bills in the Territorial Legislature pressing for statehood for the territory were defeated.[2]
Finally on December 12, 1856, the legislature passed a bill authorizing a convention to establish a constitution.[4] On June 1, 1857, the voters in the territory approved the resolution and elected delegates to a constitutional convention.[4] The vote was 7,209 in favor of holding a convention to 1,616 against the proposal.[5]
On August 17, 1857, 60 delegates selected by the voters met in Salem to write a state constitution in preparation of statehood.[2] The convention assembled at the Salem Courthouse, with Asa Lovejoy named president pro tem of the gathering.[6] On the following day Judge Matthew Deady was elected the permanent president of the convention.[6]
The delegates selected officers, set up rules for the meeting (a total of 45 in all), and divided into committees on various subjects such as military, judicial, legislative, and elections.[4] At the convention, Chester N. Terry was elected as the secretary of the group, while several people served at different times as the chairperson including Lovejoy, William W. Bristow, Delazon Smith, and La Fayette Grover.[4] The group also settled the debate over a disputed seat at the convention in favor of Perry B. Marple over F. G. Lockhart to represent Coos County.[4]
Thirty-four of the delegates were farmers, while 18 were lawyers, including the three justices of the Oregon Supreme Court.[5] Two of the delegates were newspaper editors, five were miners, and another was a civil engineer.[7]
The main debates concerning a constitution revolved around slavery and the exclusion of Blacks, liquor laws, and what would be the boundaries of the new state.[2] After meeting for 31 days, the convention ended on September 18, when the delegates voted to approve the document as the constitution.[8] The final tally was 35 votes for passage and 10 against; 15 members of the convention were absent and did not vote.[2]
Draft Constitution
The document approved by the convention was modeled after Indiana's 1851 Constitution and included a provision that denied the right to vote to "negro, Chinaman or mulatto" citizens in the state to be, and though female suffrage was discussed, women were also denied the right to vote, as was typical of the era.[7]
Provision was made for the ability of the legislature to regulate the immigration into the state of "persons not qualified to become citizens of the United States," thereby allowing legislative restriction of the number of free blacks coming into the state in the event that an outright ban did not achieve majority approval.[9] Another section forbade any "Chinaman" who immigrated into the state after adoption of the constitution from ever owning real estate or working a mining claim, expressly giving the legislature power to enforce this provision.[10]
Even as far back as the 1880s such racial measures were regarded as socially retrograde, with historian Hubert Howe Bancroft remarking:
These proscriptive clauses, however they may appear in later times, were in accordance with the popular sentiment on the Pacific coast and throughout a large portion of the United States ... However that may be, the founders of the state government in Oregon were fully determined to indulge themselves in their prejudices against color, and the qualities which accompany the black and yellow skinned races.[11]
The final draft submitted to the populace contained a total of 18 articles.[4] Over half of the document's content was derived in part from the Indiana constitution.[12]
Members
Of the 60 delegates in the convention, exactly half were farmers and an additional 19 were lawyers.[13] All members of the convention and what county they represented:[14]
On November 9, 1857, the voters approved the document to serve as a state constitution upon statehood.[2] At this same vote, measures to allow slavery and to allow free Blacks to live in the state were defeated[15] after they had been submitted as separate items to vote on by the convention.[2][4] The vote to approve the constitution by the citizens of Oregon was 7,195 for the constitution and 3,215 against the document.[5] The vote on slavery was 2,645 to allow slavery and 7,727 to make it illegal, and the vote to make it illegal for Blacks to live in the state was 8,640 to ban them and 1,081 to allow them to live in the state.[5] All white men over the age of 21 were allowed to vote, and after the passage a delegation was sent east to Washington, D.C. to press for statehood.[8]
Oregon then waited on the United States Congress to accept the constitution and approve Oregon for statehood.[2] Due to the ongoing debate over slavery in the country as the nation approached the American Civil War, the U.S. Senate did not pass legislation to bring Oregon into the Union until 1859, when Oregon became the 33rd state on February 14.[2] The Oregon Constitution was not altered until 1902.[2]
The Territory of Oregon was an organized incorporated territory of the United States that existed from August 14, 1848, until February 14, 1859, when the southwestern portion of the territory was admitted to the Union as the State of Oregon. Originally claimed by several countries, Spanish "El Orejón" was part of the Territorio de Nutca (1789–1795), later in the 19th century, the region was divided between the British Empire and the US in 1846. When established, the territory encompassed an area that included the current states of Oregon, Washington, and Idaho, as well as parts of Wyoming and Montana. The capital of the territory was first Oregon City, then Salem, followed briefly by Corvallis, then back to Salem, which became the state capital upon Oregon's admission to the Union.
The Oregon Constitution is the governing document of the U.S. state of Oregon, originally enacted in 1857. As amended the current state constitution contains eighteen sections, beginning with a bill of rights. This contains most of the rights and privileges protected by the United States Bill of Rights and the main text of the United States Constitution. The remainder of the Oregon Constitution outlines the divisions of power within the state government, lists the times of elections, and defines the state boundaries and the capital as Salem.
The State of Deseret was a proposed state of the United States, promoted by leaders of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints who had founded settlements in what is today the state of Utah. A provisional state government operated for nearly two years in 1849–50, but was never recognized by the United States government. The name Deseret derives from the word for "honeybee" in the Book of Mormon.
The Peace Conference of 1861 was a meeting of 131 leading American politicians in February 1861, at the Willard Hotel in Washington, D.C., on the eve of the American Civil War. The conference's purpose was to avoid, if possible, the secession of the eight slave states from the upper and border South that had not done so as of that date. The seven states that had already seceded did not attend.
The Constitution of the State of Minnesota was initially approved by the residents of Minnesota Territory in a special election held on October 13, 1857, and was ratified by the United States Senate on May 11, 1858, marking the admittance of Minnesota to the Union. Nearly 120 amendments have been approved, with perhaps the most significant being a reorganization in 1974 to simplify the document, making it easier for modern readers to comprehend and reducing the extensive verbiage. It is believed that the constitution was amended twice prior to ratification.
The Oregon Republican Party is the state affiliate of the United States Republican Party in Oregon, headquartered in Salem. The party was established in the Oregon Territory in February 1857 as the "Free State Republican Party of Oregon" and held its first state convention on April 1, 1859, after Oregon achieved statehood.
The Constitution of the State of Washington is the document that describes the structure and function of the government of the U.S. State of Washington. The constitution was adopted as part of Washington Territory's path to statehood in 1889. An earlier constitution was drafted and ratified in 1878, but it was never officially adopted.
The Kansas Legislature is the state legislature of the U.S. state of Kansas. It is a bicameral assembly, composed of the lower Kansas House of Representatives, with 125 state representatives, and the upper Kansas Senate, with 40 state senators. Representatives are elected for two-year terms, senators for four-year terms.
The Constitution of the State of Wisconsin is the governing document of the U.S. State of Wisconsin. It establishes the structure and function of state government, describes the state boundaries, and declares the rights of state citizens. The Wisconsin Constitution was written at a constitutional convention held in Madison, Wisconsin, in December 1847 and approved by the citizens of Wisconsin Territory in a referendum held in March 1848. Wisconsin was admitted to the United States on May 29, 1848. Although it has been amended over a hundred times, the original constitution ratified in 1848 is still in use. This makes the Wisconsin Constitution the oldest U.S. state constitution outside New England; only Massachusetts, Maine, New Hampshire, and Vermont use older constitutions.
The Constitution of Indiana is the highest body of state law in the U.S. state of Indiana. It establishes the structure and function of the state and is based on the principles of federalism and Jacksonian democracy. Indiana's constitution is subordinate only to the U.S. Constitution and federal law. Prior to the enactment of Indiana's first state constitution and achievement of statehood in 1816, the Indiana Territory was governed by territorial law. The state's first constitution was created in 1816, after the U.S. Congress had agreed to grant statehood to the former Indiana Territory. The present-day document, which went into effect on November 1, 1851, is the state's second constitution. It supersedes Indiana's 1816 constitution and has had numerous amendments since its initial adoption.
Oregon's Territorial Legislature was a bicameral legislative body created by the United States Congress in 1848 as the legislative branch of the government of the Oregon Territory. The upper chamber Council and lower chamber House of Representatives first met in July 1849; they served as the region's legislative body until Oregon became a state in February 1859, when they were replaced by the bicameral Oregon State Legislature.
The Organic Laws of Oregon were two sets of legislation passed in the 1840s by a group of primarily American settlers based in the Willamette Valley. These laws were drafted after the Champoeg Meetings and created the structure of a government in the Oregon Country. At the last Champoeg Meeting in May 1843, the majority voted to create what became the Provisional Government of Oregon. Laws were drafted by the committee and accepted by a popular vote in July. These laws were reformed by a second version in 1845.
The RestoredGovernment of Virginia was the Unionist government of Virginia during the American Civil War (1861–1865) in opposition to the government which had approved Virginia's seceding from the United States and joining the new Confederate States of America. Each state government regarded the other as illegitimate. The Restored Government attempted to assume de facto control of the Commonwealth's northwest with the help of the Union Army but was only partly successful. It raised Union regiments from local volunteers but depended upon recruits from Pennsylvania and Ohio to fulfill its commitments. It administered this territory until, with its approval, the area became part of West Virginia in mid-1863.
David Logan was an American attorney and politician in the territory of and later state of Oregon. A native of Illinois, he moved to Oregon in 1850 where he served in the Oregon Territorial Legislature and in the Oregon Constitutional Convention. A founder of the Oregon Republican Party, he also served as mayor of Portland.
Robert Crouch Kinney was an American businessman and politician in what became the state of Oregon. A native of Illinois, he helped found Muscatine, Iowa, before crossing the Oregon Trail and settling in what became Oregon. In Oregon he was a prominent businessman in the milling business and served in the Oregon Territorial Legislature before being a member of the Oregon Constitutional Convention.
Frederick Waymire was an American farmer and politician in what became the state of Oregon. A native of Ohio, he served in the Oregon Territorial Legislature and was a member of the Oregon Constitutional Convention. He also helped start the La Creole Academy in Polk County and represented that county in the Oregon House of Representatives after Oregon became a state.
The California Constitutional Conventions were two separate constitutional conventions that took place in California during the nineteenth century which led to the creation of the modern Constitution of California. The first, known as the 1849 Constitutional Convention of Monterey, held in September and October 1849 in advance of California attaining U.S. statehood the following year, adopted the state's original constitution. This document maintains jurisdiction along with the current constitution which was ratified on May 7, 1879, following the 1879 Constitutional Convention of Sacramento. Article 3 Section 2 of the current Constitution references the original boundaries as stated in the 1849 Constitution at Article 12. The result of Progressive mistrust of elected officials, this later constitution took a full year to finalize and has been described as "the perfect example of what a constitution ought not to be". Multiple calls for a third state constitutional convention have been raised during the past quarter-century, but none has thus far gained widespread political momentum.
The Oregon black exclusion laws were attempts to prevent black people from settling within the borders of the settlement and eventual U.S. state of Oregon. The first such law took effect in 1844, when the Provisional Government of Oregon voted to exclude black settlers from Oregon's borders. The law authorized a punishment for any black settler remaining in the territory to be whipped with "not less than twenty nor more than thirty-nine stripes" for every six months they remained. Additional laws aimed at African Americans entering Oregon were ratified in 1849 and 1857. The last of these laws was repealed in 1926. The laws, born of anti-slavery and anti-black beliefs, were often justified as a reaction to fears of black people instigating Native American uprisings.
Under U.S. law, a state requires a constitution. A main order of business for Territorial Kansas was the creation of a constitution, under which Kansas would become a state. Whether it would be a slave state or a free state, allowing or prohibiting slavery, was a national issue, because it would affect voting in the polarized U.S. Senate. Because of tensions over slavery, four quite different constitutions of Kansas were drafted.
Nathaniel Holly Gates, also known as Colonel Gates for most of his life, (1811–1889) was an American pioneer lawyer and Oregon state legislator. He was an active Democrat throughout his life. He served four terms in Oregon's territorial legislature. This included one term as Speaker of the Oregon House of Representatives during the 1858 legislative session. After Oregon became a state in 1859, he served one two-year term in the Oregon House of Representatives and one four-year term in the Oregon State Senate. Before immigrating to Oregon, Gates lived and worked as a lawyer in Ohio and Iowa. After moving to Oregon, he settled in The Dalles and opened a law practice there. He helped develop that community and served as the city's mayor five times in non-consecutive terms.
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