Walking through the aisles at gift shops, students may become overwhelmed with cards containing pictures of hearts and messages of love. However, students won’t find Hallmark cards depicting working settlers sweating over fields, Native Americans being forced into reservations or freed slaves being banned from Oregon on the front of cards, as Feb. 14 celebrates another important holiday: Oregon’s admission into the union.
From 1850-60, Oregon’s population exploded by 40,000 people. The 2,000-mile long Oregon trail attracted farmers and settlers from the eastern United States. Each man who made the journey received 320 acres of free land, and if his wife accompanied him, they were granted twice the amount of land.
“The people that came west were Americans, and they were coming as Americans with the idea that they would bring their old lifestyle but settle in a new land,” said Patrick McCune, visitor information advisor at the End of the Oregon Trail Interpretive Center in Oregon City.
Oregon was admitted as the country’s 33rd state on Feb. 14, 1859, two years after it drafted its constitution and controversially declared itself a slavery-free state.
At the time of Oregon’s admission, slavery was America’s main point of contention. The publication of Uncle Tom’s Cabin and the Dred Scott Decision of 1857 confirmed the deep seeded divisions on what should be done about the expansion of slavery.
However, Oregon’s decision to ban slavery was not out of social activism or disdain for the practice.
“Oregon didn’t want slavery, but not from an abolitionist perspective,” McCune said. “Settlers wanted an exclusionary policy. That way, they could completely prevent the controversy from creeping into the state.”
As if the state’s decision to ban slavery was not controversial enough among southern Democrats, the drafters of the Oregon Constitution also found themselves amidst controversy when they chose to not allow freed slaves to live in the state. This decision almost prevented Oregon’s admission to the union because the Republicans in Congress thought Oregon’s admission as a state would compromise their party policy of promoting abolition. Eventually, 15 Republicans crossed party lines and voted to annex Oregon as the country’s 33rd state.
One the most pressing issues on Oregon’s home front was how settlers could live peacefully with the native people. The rapid rise of settlers to the Oregon Territory dramatically affected the status of minorities in the territory.
“There had been violent outbreaks resulting in several native-settler conflicts, but eventually the government gave up the fight and made an executive decision to move natives onto the Western Oregon Reservations in 1960,” said Layne Sawyer, manager of Oregon’s reference archives system.
Looking back at the racial politics surrounding the state’s early years leads politicians such as Lane County Commissioner Rob Handy to recognize minorities, and honor the way they contributed to Oregon’s success as a state throughout the years. Handy will host an Oregon birthday celebration Sunday at 3:30 p.m. at Eugene Public Library, and David Lewis of the Confederated Tribes of the Grande Ronde will speak. Mayor Kitty Piercy also plans to attend.
“It is important to take a look at the remarkable stories that are often forgotten in Oregon,” Handy said. “We have come so far, but we have to remember the railroads that were built on the back of Chinese laborers, the women that fought for their right to vote, or the Latinos who built up our economy.”
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