How Did Oregon Enforce a White-Only Population Until 1926?

In the 1850s, Oregon voted to outlaw slavery in their state -- but also to outlaw free Black people from living there. Learn more in this episode of BrainStuff, based on this article: https://history.howstuffworks.com/historical-events/racial-history-oregon-was-whites-only-until-1926.htm

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to brain Stuff, a production of I Heart Radio,
Hey brain Stuff Lauren Vogelbaum here. In eighteen fifty seven,
approximately ten thousand residents of Oregon had the task of
voting for their new state constitution, and they were asked
three questions. The first, do you vote for the constitution?

(00:24):
A note that the new constitution stipulated that no black
person quote not residing in this state at the time
of the adoption of this constitution shall come reside or
be within this state, or hold any real estate, or
make any contracts, or maintain any suit Therein, overwhelmingly, voters
supported their constitution. Second question, do you vote for slavery

(00:49):
in Oregon? And the voters of Oregon rejected the institution
of slavery within their borders. Third question, do you vote
for free negroes in Oregon? In and the majority voted no.
This wasn't an act of cognitive dissonance. In the article

(01:09):
this episode was based on, How Stuff Works. Spoke via
email with David F. Walker, a writer and at junc
professor at Portland State University. He explained it was pretty simple.
Early settlers in Oregon didn't want black people here. It
wasn't so much that they were opposed to slavery as
they didn't like blacks. How Stuff Works also spoke via

(01:31):
email with Bolita and Marisha, a professor in the Black
Studies Department at Portland State University who travels around Oregon
facilitating programs on Oregan's racial history. She explained Oregon was
birthed at this intersection of being anti slavery and anti black,
but in no way was Oregon anti slavery because they
believed in racial justice. They were anti slavery because they

(01:54):
considered this to be white man's land and they came
to build a racist, white utopia. Their goal was to
keep out or push out all people of color. She continued.
That is why the first exclusionary law in eighteen forty
four outlawed slavery and also banned black people from living
here and including the lash law, said the black people

(02:17):
would be whipped publicly every six months up to thirty
nine lashes until they left the state. That is the
brutal mechanism Oregon set in place to further its conception
of this state as a white homeland. Oregon exemplifies what
was going on in the rest of the U S
at the time. Only, as Emeritia notes, the state was

(02:39):
bold enough to write it down, so how did it change?
Various laws eventually made these exclusionary laws illegal from state
constitutional amendments to the Civil Rights Act, but those didn't
necessarily fix the problem. A Walker offers more history to
understand the context of the time. He said it wasn't

(03:00):
until World War Two, when the Kaiser Shipyards needed people
working on the assembly line, that blacks were really allowed
in the state. In the early nineteen hundreds, members of
the ku Klux Klan were deputized officers of the law
in Portland. All of this still lingers in the air.
Emrisha cited a report released by the Portland Housing Bureau
in twenty fifteen. She said the report quote found that

(03:24):
if you are Black, if you are Latino, if you
are Indigenous, you cannot afford to live in Portland. So,
in essence, Portland is still a white homeland. It begs
the question, if the mechanisms are different but the outcome
is the same, how much of things really changed but
things are progressing in direct opposition to the stated goals

(03:46):
that founded the state of Oregon. Emaritia said, the very
fact that black communities exist in Oregon at all is
astounding because they were never meant to. Under the most
brutal and oppressive conditions, Black people and other people of
color have resisted, They've organized, they have built, and they
have struggled to make Oregon a better state for everyone.

(04:07):
Communities of color do not need saviors to tell us
how it's done. We need allies. Today's episode is based
on the article racial History Oregon was Whites only until
on how stuff works dot Com, written by Brian Young.
Brain Stuff is production of by Heart Radio in partnership

(04:29):
with how stuff Works dot Com and is produced by
Tyler Clang. Four more podcasts my Heart Radio, visit the
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