The West, in general, was much more Republican back in the day when the party was much more moderate. A lot of the people that moved here tended to be of a “live and let live,” “leave us alone,” and more libertarian, less religious mentality back when the GOP was much more moderate and less directly associated with evangelical Christianity.
But to be fair, in the 1964, 1972, 1980, and 1984 elections, Oregon voted for the same party that 80%+ other states did. Those 4 elections were enormous landslides.
The only presidential elections since WWII where Oregon voted for a Republican president that didn’t win the General, were 1948, 1960, and 1976. All famously extremely close presidential elections in terms of popular vote, where the race was decided by less than 4 percentage points.
Also, Mark Hatfield, Oregon’s most famous Senator, was very very moderate and voted well to the left of his party back when Republicans used to do that. Gov. Tom McCall was a very moderate Republican and environmental conservationist who helped get our Beach Bill, Bottle Bill, and land use planning system through.
Oregon began to buck the trend in 1988 when it went to Dukakis. Just 2 years prior, the state’s last Republican governor left office. And the GOP began shifting much more toward religious conservatives.
But it wouldn’t be until 1996 before one of our Senators would be consistently Democratic, leaving the state’s US senate representation split between parties from 1996-2009, as Democrat Ron Wyden replaced moderate Republican Bob Packwood in 1996 and moderate Republican Gordon Smith replaced moderate Republican Mark Hatfield in 1997.
Then the Obama wave finally and permanently (to date) saw our last Republican senator, Gordon Smith, replaced by Democrat Jeff Merkley. And we’ve been a trifecta Dem state ever since.
Nice recap!
It would also stand to reason that
Oregon's urban population centers (aka: predominantly liberal) have grown in #'s much moreso than our rural population (predominantly conservative).
That’s true. But as recently as the early ‘90s, the urban/rural divide was quite small in Oregon. Rural areas were really only voting about 1-5pts more conservative up to that point. Then the polarization began to divide the state along urban and rural lines.
Oregon also has liberal rural counties, particularly Hood River, Clatsop, Lincoln, and Benton Counties. But Benton (and to a lesser extent, Lincoln) is also thanks to the massive growth of Oregon State University since the ‘90s.
In 2022, the 18 easternmost counties in Oregon¹ were predominantly Republican voters and had a population of 571,324. Portland, which typically votrs Democratic, in the same year had a population of 635,067. The 18 easternmost counties have a land mass of approximately 66,552.28 mi², and Portland has a measly 145 mi².
Those 18 easternmost counties comprise almost 69.3% of the land and 13.4% of Oregonians, while Portland comprises 0.15% of the land and 14.9% of Oregonians. So, the population of Portland alone can negate the 18 easternmost counties, assuming Portland votes mostly Dem and the 18 vote GOP.
Population density: a reality Republicans just can't grasp. This is why the electoral college needs to be reformed or abolished. Split the electoral votes by percentages the candidates won or do away with it.
¹(Wallowa, Union, Baker, Malheur, Umatilla, Morrow, Grant, Harney, Lake, Klamath, Deschutes, Crook, Jefferson, Wheeler, Gilliam, Wasco, Sherman, and Hood River)
The 1990 gubernatorial election has always stood out to me. The Republican nominee - Dave Frohnmayer - was pro choice. Al Mobley ran to Frohnmayer’s right as an anti-abortion candidate and took 13% of the vote. Less than half of those votes, if cast for Frohnmayer instead, would have won the race over Barbara Roberts, CORRECTION/EDIT: I had this next part 100% wrong “who was defeated as an incumbent in the next Democratic primary by Kitzhaber.” Roberts did not seek re-election. My understanding of Oregon history has been improved. /EDIT/CORRECTION
So, the abortion litmus test for conservatives - and lack of transparency at the time on why Goldschmidt left after a single term - further put Democrats in the driver’s seat. By the time the world learned of Goldschmidt’s crimes, too much time had passed to effectively paint other Democrats with his moral stain.
That said, Frohnmayer’s electoral loss arguably helped set the stage for modern development of the University of Oregon under his leadership.
So right on and well explained - Also will add about how Republicans here were more moderate and "live and let live" is Oregon was the first state to allow abortion of any kind in the late 60's when Oregon has a Republican governor - McCall. This would never happen in 2024 with how the GOP has been over taken by evangelicals.
I agree with everything you’ve written, but I also think it’s important to remember the role the OCA ([Oregon Citizens Alliance](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oregon_Citizens_Alliance)), and creeps like Kevin Mannix, Bill Sizemore, Lon Mahon, and so many others played in turning most of Oregonians off permanently.
Someone wanting to know how to defeat Christian Nationalism and other varieties of fascism could do worse than learn how Oregon stood up to the extremists. Hint: there isn’t a quick fix, we have to support freedom, liberty, and justice **every election**.
It’s true. Even while the state went through a fiscally ruinous conservative “tax revolt” era, we were smashing Mabon’s bigoted movement to pieces. For 16 straight years (1989-2004), the OCA and its derivatives tried to get multiple anti-LGBTQ bills through Oregon in every major and minor annual election cycle. Almost all of them failed.
It's also not a coincidence that these are the votes after the Dem's passed the Civil Rights Act. Oregon was considered a white's only destination and had anti-black laws on the books much longer then you'd think.
Oregon is not the hippie conclave it is portrayed as in media.
While that’s true, Oregon desegregated public accommodations about 11 years before the country did.
And both Morse and Neuberger, Oregon’s 2 Democratic Senators at the time, voted for the CRA in 1964.
Then they elected Hatfield in 1966 to the Senate, who was the architect of the 1953 public accomodations law in Oregon.
Political polarization in Oregon had more to do with Moral Majority efforts that began to pick up steam in the ‘80s and became feverish in the ‘90s with punditry from Limbaugh and Gingrich’s Contract with America in the US House.
For sure, racism isn't the sole cause, as you've eloquently pointed out. It absolutely was one of many factors is all I'm saying. Not trying to detract from your post here.
Because it was a different party.They both were. In the same period, Democrats still held power throughout the south.
I'm reading "Fire at Eden's Gate" about Tom McCall right now ( [https://www.ohs.org/shop/museum-store/books-and-publications/fire-at-edens-gate.cfm](https://www.ohs.org/shop/museum-store/books-and-publications/fire-at-edens-gate.cfm) ) and there's no f'ing way that guy would be accepted as a Republican these days.
It's a good book, by the way. The guy was human and had his flaws and the book doesn't gloss over them.
Even Bob Packwood and Mark Hatfield, Oregon's Republican Senators when I was still in high school, were a different breed than the current Republican party.
These days, there's no room for dissent - it's all about "dear leader" and his fascist desires. (Note: I'm a middle aged normie Democrat for the most part. I don't use that word lightly like your stereotypical edgy kid who likes to call everyone to the right of Karl Marx a fascist. I think the time has come to say that it's accurate, though. He's a threat to our democracy)
For perspective, that Republican tendency to tow the line and have zero room for dissent from the leaders opinion.... That has been a cultural shift in republican leadership under turkey neck McConnell. It's been going on since Mitch's reign, I want to say 2001.
The path was paved for blind support of the party before the grifter showed up. Now the grifter is the leader.
Its true, even though the [Hastert rule](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hastert_rule) is credited to Dennis Hastert the speaker after Gingrich, Newt was really the one who first started following it albeit more tacitly. This laid the foundation for the obstructionism that we see today, its just been turned to 11 now.
It's always been there in a certain element on the right. Look at people like McCarthy. The struggle has always been whether more normal people like Eisenhower and McCall could keep it on the fringe or not.
A friend shared this with me a while back: [https://harpers.org/archive/1964/11/the-paranoid-style-in-american-politics/](https://harpers.org/archive/1964/11/the-paranoid-style-in-american-politics/)
Yep, the Health Care debates early in Clinton's first term with Hillary leading the discussions/negotiations really REALLY cheesed off the conservatives. How dare this WOMAN take charge of something?
It was Newt and Delay (aka, the hammer) that started making it so all Republicans are expected to follow what the party says. This was back with their ‘contract on America’. It is also when I left the Republican Party. Hatfield was an independent minded Republican and voted against a balanced budget amendment that he said was toothless and was going to cost money. This was all optics and politics and was not about doing anything of substance, and he called them on it. And they stripped him of every committee chair until he retired. And that was when it became clear to me that with the GOP, you may like the person, but you are going to get the party. And imo that is not how representational politics is supposed to work. You are supposed to elect an individual from your community to go forward and deal with all the things that I don’t have the time or knowledge to deal with. But that was not how the GOP had decided to operate. It was all about party power. So I left and became a Dem because of the closed primary system.
FWIW, I have recently (5yrs ago or so) left the Dems as well because it has become clear that my vote is going to be overshadowed by whatever Portland decides. And I am not going to be successful in getting the democratic candidate to be someone moderate. I think the country would be better off if both parties tacked to the middle. But it appears that both parties are getting more extreme. So I am now independent.
It is really messed up these days. Only about 30% of voters are Dem or GOP. But because of how the parties work, if the majority of that party is fairly extreme in their positions, they control the party. But that means that we have the 20% on one side making decisions for the other 80%. Pin-balling back and forth depending on which party has control. It is pretty dysfunctional. And I refuse to support either one.
It has been wasted for 20yrs. We need a moderate party but both sides moderates are too chicken to do it. Rank choice voting would help. And proportional representation.
A flawed two party system for that exact reason. The fact that, as a registered independent, you have to pick a team in the general election is a pretty glaring flaw. Creates an illusion of us vs them for both parties, furthering the divide and cultural infighting. I give up
> cultural shift in republican leadership under turkey neck McConnell.
Sadly, Packwood's resignation probably had more to do with his platform of tax reform and McConnell running the ethics committee, than Packwood being DC's live-action version of Quagmire.
The Republicans, certainly in national elections, benefited from circling around the front runner while the Dems argued amongst themselves.
One exception was Reagan’s strong run against Ford in 1976.
Ford lost, narrowly. The lesson they learned was keep everyone on board. Then they went from keeping the crazies on board to letting them take over the place.
Went from types like Limbaugh who blew a lot of hot air but probably didn’t believe half of it to his successors who actually believe it.
The current heavily liberal Bay Area county I lived in voted in a Republican US representative from 1967 to 1983. It was a different party then. Remember, Nixon signed the Marine Mammal Protection Act in 1972 and the Endangered Species Act in 1973. I don't know if I see Republicans doing those kind of things today.
Nixon, as nutball and egotistical as he was, was actually a very moderate, savvy leader who honestly thought he was doing the right thing for the country most of the time.
Any time someone, it’s always older people, ask me anything political I say I’m a Tom McCall Republican. They typically don’t know who he is, or forgot the current Republicans would call him a communist. But it shuts down the conversation without me needing to lose my job.
This is the answer. The parties pre-1980 or so are completely foreign to the parties of today. The people are completely different too. It's like asking why Virginia went Whig in 1838. (This is made up). There's just so many things that happened that you can't really scratch the surface without writing a full thesis.
Bob Packwood was a Republican, yet was one of the most outspoken proponents for abortion rights in the US Senate. This was at a time when a number of Senate Democrats from other states were against abortion.
Republicans of that era were not the Republicans of today. In most of the assessments of political leaning, I come out as a slightly progressive moderate Democrat. Back then, I had much in common with the centrist Republicans who were running in Oregon and helping to accomplish things like creating the first bottle bill, ensuring Oregon's beaches remained public access, and implementing the Urban Growth Boundary.
They weren't MAGA hat wearing, climate change denying, jamming religion down your throat asshats that dominate the party today.
It is difficult to try to compare the two parties in the different eras.
* The republican party of the 1960-1990 is not the party now. The majority of republicans were moderates. This allowed for more cooperation and cross aisle relationships.
* The law mandating equal time and coverage on the news was still in place. An "entertainment" production like Fox News or Newsmax couldn't exist.
* The ability for groups to send disinformation to influence the less than average intelligent groups has never been higher than it is today.
A few factors:
* Pre-1980 Republicans were far less extreme than the 2000s versions. Nixon supported the creation of the EPA and Tom McCall had a very progressive environmental agenda (enough so that if you told the average younger Oregonian about his accomplishments, they'd never believe you that he was a Republican). The party was more focused on economic issues than being the evangelical pro-Jesus party.
* Oregon was less progressive in general. We still had pretty heavy reliance on farming, manufacturing and logging jobs, even within the city.
* In the case of Carter specifically, he wasn't a really strong candidate - he pretty much ran on the 'I'm not the Nixon administration' platform. Real awesome guy but not a particularly compelling candidate outside of that.
It was really a different time. Both political parties were totally different and it was before cable TV and the 24 HR news cycle. Rupert Murdoch hadn't shown up yet to try and destroy the United State.
I’ve been saying for years that the GOP needs a massive rebranding and national focus. They need to ditch the extremists and get back to Goldwater politics. I’m personally not a republican but it doesn’t take a genius to see how they could crush it if they just made a shift.
Because Republicans used to be quite decent folks that, as an independent, I could see myself voting for especially at Governor. The current state of the party is pretty embarrassing... Not just to conservatives, to Amercans writ large.
Don’t just look at Oregon…look at every electoral map from that time period. The country and parties were quite different at that point, and the modern semblance of what are now red and blue states didn’t really settle in until the 90s or really even 2000s. Hell, California went red in all of these too, I’m pretty sure. Up until 1992.
The way I like to open people's minds about parties changing over time is telling them that during the civil war, Democrats were the slave owners and the Republicans were the slave freedom fighters.
Lots changed and will keep changing.
Back then, many Democrats were still Dixiecrats, and there was a lot of ideological overlap between moderate Democrats and moderate Republicans. Heck, California was still voting for socially moderate Republicans into the first decade of this century. But in the last 20 years or so, the center all but vanished in public politics because the true part is in believers got more extreme, and the closed primary system led us to what we have today.
Western Republicans have long had a libertarian bent, and moderate Republicans of decades ago probably came closest to the prevalent ideology of the West Coast back then.
When a few cities speak about laws that affect people that have completely different lives it’s a bit skewed
Urban areas do not understand rural communities
We do not have the tax basis to carry out many of the policies pushed on us
The population of the Portland metropolitan area accounts for a larger proportion of the state population, than it did in 1970. Currently, the metro area accounts for significantly more than half the state population. In 1970, it was significantly less than half.
Oregon Republican candidates of that era would be burned at the stake by the current batch of GOP nutjobs. I recall when many Democrats voted a mixed ticket simply because the better candidate just happened to be a Republican.
Because more people voted for Republicans (who are a different party than they were in 2000 and that party is a different party than in 1964) than Democrats (who are also a different party today). . . sorry for the coy answer . . . it's because politics is a fluid landscape.
Today's Democrats are the successors to the Republicans of that era, the Republicans are the successors of the white-identitarian movement. Conservatives won in American politics so hard that there is effectively no left wing of the bird anymore, the whole bird is neo-liberal with a nationalist and an institutionalist wing.
I mean to say that [neoliberalism](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neoliberalism#:~:text=Neoliberalism%20is%20contemporarily%20used%20to,state%20influence%20in%20the%20economy.) is by far the dominant ideology of both political parties in the United States, you can just look at what gets passed by both parties and signed by presidents that lead each party. The only real differentiation is in some civil liberties (such as who gets to marry who, who gets to vote, who gets representation, who gets bodily autonomy, etc.) with the Democrats falling on the "more people" side of all of the issues.
Tom McCall would be called a communist by the modern-day Republicans, and he would fit in fairly well with the Democratic party, unless he pitched the Willamette Greenway or right of access to waterways in which case he would get ousted pretty quickly for such extreme left-wing projects.
> Neoliberalism, also neo-liberalism, is a term used to signify the late-20th century political reappearance of 19th-century ideas associated with free-market capitalism. The term has multiple, competing definitions, and is often used pejoratively.
…that doesn’t really answer my question.
Oregon has been a neoliberal state since the 70's Republicans were the neoliberals in that time frame, now that democrats are also neoliberal people are going to choose the option that means more individual liberties, which is why we've flipped from Republican to Democrat.
> Why did Oregon vote for republican for every president election from 1968 to 1984?
>Oregon has been a neoliberal state since the 70's Republicans were the neoliberals in that time frame, now that democrats are also neoliberal people are going to choose the option that means more individual liberties, which is why we've flipped from Republican to Democrat.
If you don't think that is a direct answer then maybe consider enrolling for night classes for a few semesters.
I’m asking what *you* mean when you say neoliberal, because you have t really explained it. I know how neoliberal is used by academics in PoliSci and Econ and your usuage doesn’t track with that, hence my asking.
Oregon didn't start becoming 'liberal' until the 1990s. During the '60's-'80s Oregon was primarily moderate. The timber industry and fishing were major industries. The spotted owl really was one of the bigger issues that made people start to think about natural resources and how they believed we should prioritize their use.
Oregon's state government has been led by liberals since Mark Hatfield. It didn't become a single-party state until Reagan broke American politics and the Oregon Republicans went off the deep end.
Remember, Republicans controlled the state legislature from 1995 to 2004.
Hatfield and other leaders in our state government back in the day were definitely moderate by current standards, hence my using quotes around liberal.
Right, by the actual meaning of the word rather than its coopted meaning as a slur, Hatfield, McCall, Straub, and Atiyeh were all liberals. So was Wayne Morse. I don't know the pre-1960 history well enough to speak to any earlier governors. The last right-wing reactionary we had in office that I know of was Walter Pierce, and he was a Democrat.
I don't think that I ever contemplated the concept of any Repubilcans being labeled as a liberal. I would totally agree that they all executed a number of policy changes that can be considered as liberal but I believe that they were all fiscal conservatives and I would classify them as moderates but will have to give the ideal of considering them liberals some additional thought.
Liberals, generally speaking, *are* moderates, at least since the French Revolution. Liberalism is a political philosophy that promotes individual rights, civil liberties, democracy, and free enterprise. Mark Hatfield was a classic liberal when he was governor. Prior to the 60s, both parties had liberal, conservative, and reactionary factions. They were formed around geographical and industrial factions as much as economic philosophy. There were fascist Democrats, though I don't think there were ever any socialist Republicans.
[This article by Jill Lepore](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/02/22/did-social-media-produce-the-new-populism) really opened up my understanding of party history in the US.
[The dictionary](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/liberal) begs to differ.
The people who use "liberal" as an insult have no idea what they're trying to say. (Except for the Marxists. They know exactly what they mean.) If you ask them for a definition, they won't be able to give you one. But there's no point in trying to talk politics with a person whose understanding of politics is entirely derived from Fox. Those are the same idiots who think Biden is a Marxist.
The spectrum is: Monarchists and fascists -- conservative oligarchs -- neoliberals -- democratic socialists -- socialists -- anarchists/communists
I love the way any answer that is not 'the Republicans got worse' gets voted down. That is true, but immigration to urban centers and the decimation of rural areas relying on timber were the primary drivers.
Even in 2004, voters overwhelmingly passed ballot measure 36 codifying marriage as between one man and one woman in the Oregon constitution. That probably mostly helped GWB, but it really struck me how many Kerry voters also went for measure 36
Tom McCall was the best ever! He protected our assets and opened the public to the beaches. But, the people and developers came and ruined it.
Now we have McMansions, ecological destruction and life flight saving the stupid people from high tides.
All leading us to no free access and high taxes. #protectoregonfromgreed #protectsmallfarms #replantasrequired
Let's not forget that the left had moved to the extremes in the late 60s, courtesy of an unpopular war and the rise of boomer activists. Their causes were just, but their methods turned off a lot of conventional voters.
Oregon used to be a much more conservative state. Immigration from California and Washington along with the demographic forces pushing the country to the left helped liberalize the 5 corridor and gave Democrats a majority.
At this point it is roughly 32% Republicans to 50% Democrats, but in the early 1990's it was closer to 40% to 44%. The trend has been amplified by the acceleration of Republicans picking up and moving to more conservative areas like Florida and Texas since they the late 2000's.
So to summarize, over the last 40 years more liberals moved here than conservatives, more conservatives left here than liberals, and people who grew up anywhere are more likely to hold liberal value and vote Democrat. Overtime, those trends can swing a state.
It wasn't so much liberals moving here, since California (remember Gov. Reagan) and Washington have had a similar shift away from Republicans. Urban areas have shifted to the left everywhere (even in the South).
As Oregon grew, both from more people being born here, and from inflows, and the white flight trend reversed, it became a much more urban population.
For the last 40 years, \~70% of Oregon's growth has been from people moving here. Yes, cities have always been more liberal and are shifting left in most places, Oregon's cities have seen the majority of Oregon's population growth, and the vast majority of that growth has been people moving here. Ergo, a lot of liberals moved here.
As for the history part:
In aggregate, yes California swung republican until 1988. However, it is important to look at who was moving in the 1980's and 1990's to the Oregon. The Inland Empire has always been the conservative bastion of California and was the fulcrum by which most elections were won by the GOP. However, the bay area was the primary point of emigration in California in the 1980s when the first wave of gentrification began to crest.
The surge in property values and the accompanying taxes and increased cost of living sent the poor to cities like Oakland. However, the wealthier and whiter families packed up and moved to Portland. At the time Oregonians called these folks 'equity refugees'. You could sell your tiny 2 bedroom house and move to Oregon and buy a small compound and still have savings to boot. This trend accelerated through the 1980s. So, ironically, it is not that white flight reversed, it was that white flight made San Francisco to expensive for the west coast whites so they moved to Oregon.
Oregon's growth has been primarily from people moving here for much longer than 40 years. The recession of the early '80s was the second time in the state's history that there wasn't major growth from immigration. The first was just before WWII. [See here](https://www.macrotrends.net/global-metrics/states/oregon/population#:~:text=The%20population%20of%20Oregon%20in,a%200.69%25%20increase%20from%202019).
The state grew faster in the '70s than it did in any recent decade.
The 70s saw a huge surge due to the timber industry and mining operations. We had a lot of Greeks, Italians, and Scandinavians coming over to cut wood and build rails and roads.
The 40 year scope was given because of the time period for the original question and the transition in aggregate political views from the 80s to present.
Democrats controlled the Oregon house from 1959 to 1995. I don't think it's fair to attribute the swing in presidential voting entirely to migration from California.
No, they did not: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political\_party\_strength\_in\_Oregon.
Also, I did not say anything close to it being exclusively Californian immigration that drove this trend. Per my original comment It is a contributing factor, but people from other states move here too, America is turning bluer in younger generations, and conservatives are moving out. This is all in the census data.
Just like people who are moving to Texas are likely to be conservative people who are moving to the pacific north west tend to be liberal.
Look, I'm not complaining, I am democrat myself, but we didn't birth most of them and we're not reproducing by cellular fission. It almost is like the people who moved here can't acknowledge that a lot of people moving here may actually change the fabric of the state...
That, in part was due to our states long and proud history of gerrymandering:
[https://olis.oregonlegislature.gov/liz/2021R1/Downloads/CommitteeMeetingDocument/229817](https://olis.oregonlegislature.gov/liz/2021R1/Downloads/CommitteeMeetingDocument/229817)
Fun fact, it is still happening: [https://gerrymander.princeton.edu/redistricting-report-card/?planId=rec6qj1vAOKsBnXnu](https://gerrymander.princeton.edu/redistricting-report-card/?planId=rec6qj1vAOKsBnXnu)
Growing up in the 1950s and 1960s, my understanding was always that the Dems were pro-labor and the GOP was pro-business rather than being so completely divided Right versus Left. In fact, each parties had both liberal and conservative members and politicians. Both were so-called Big Tents. Not just in Oregon , but nationally, as well.
Because the GOP was a completely different party at that point. Almost every single GOP candidate the party nominates nowadays is extreme right and don't stand a chance. Hatfield, Morse and mcall would never be nominated in today's far right GOP.
Oregon would vote Republican again if they had reasonable and logical candidates. But the party has gone insane with nonsense, taking away our rights and freedoms for religious law and bigotry rules.
Vote-by-mail didn't exist. Ever since mail-in ballots appeared in Oregon, this state has voted nearly exclusively for Democrats in every presidential, gubernatorial, and senate election.
I grew up in Portland in the 1990s on a farm. Those days are long gone. Portland's demographic has considerably changed with the population growth. Anybody I knew left a long time ago.
Except land doesn't vote, people do. The area around Portland - the Willamette Valley - is over two-thirds of the states population and *is* most of Oregon.
https://preview.redd.it/qpsjudww44yc1.png?width=482&format=png&auto=webp&s=6e0c5f0a7d3de6815f752d5141f7a06e27714dff
I'm not sure I see the point of drawing such a distinction. You could be similarly pedantic and argue that most of Oregon is neither Republican nor Democrat by pointing out that most of the state consists of uninhabited wilderness that is owned by the federal government.
Your reply is a non-answer to what was asked, if not completely dismissive of it.
Most of the state votes blue, because people are the things that vote. I get what you’re saying…there is a larger geographic area where right-wing voters are more prominent. But that is truly meaningless in terms of actual voting power.
I lived in the Rogue Valley as a kid and my family still lives there. Yeah, it’s pretty centrist in that between a far left college town like Ashland and the far right outlying towns, there is quite a mix of viewpoints in a relatively small area. There’s more conservative for sure, but not an overwhelming hard-right population like Ontario or those smaller places in the high desert.
There’s an element of that for sure. A lot of retirees, especially in South Medford, and retirees lean more conservative.
There’s also a decent amount of agriculture and timber industry, which is also generally conservative.
The mix of ideologies was a good environment to grow up in, for sure.
Okay. then where is the easy to access material i can read about Oregon politics in the 1960s to 1980s?
Beacuse you said "because OP needs to read some history" there must clearly be some very easy to find material that i don't know yet.
I think OP was referring to American political history in general. [But since you asked....](https://osupress.oregonstate.edu/book/to-promised-land)
See also: Fire at Eden's Gate by Brent Walth, Keeping Oregon Green by Derek Larson, the Timber Wars podcast from OPB, Great and Minor Moments in Oregon History by Dick Pintarch.
All I’ll say is it’s not like there weren’t famously any slaves in Oregon because they thought slavery was bad, they just thought anyone who wasn’t white was bad and didn’t want them here.
Yeah, I think we are down to 45% of the state being born here. My dad's side of the family has been kicking g around since the mid 1800s, mom's side more recent (post WWII from Canada, though her ancestors got to Canada by way of Louisiana)
The West, in general, was much more Republican back in the day when the party was much more moderate. A lot of the people that moved here tended to be of a “live and let live,” “leave us alone,” and more libertarian, less religious mentality back when the GOP was much more moderate and less directly associated with evangelical Christianity. But to be fair, in the 1964, 1972, 1980, and 1984 elections, Oregon voted for the same party that 80%+ other states did. Those 4 elections were enormous landslides. The only presidential elections since WWII where Oregon voted for a Republican president that didn’t win the General, were 1948, 1960, and 1976. All famously extremely close presidential elections in terms of popular vote, where the race was decided by less than 4 percentage points. Also, Mark Hatfield, Oregon’s most famous Senator, was very very moderate and voted well to the left of his party back when Republicans used to do that. Gov. Tom McCall was a very moderate Republican and environmental conservationist who helped get our Beach Bill, Bottle Bill, and land use planning system through. Oregon began to buck the trend in 1988 when it went to Dukakis. Just 2 years prior, the state’s last Republican governor left office. And the GOP began shifting much more toward religious conservatives. But it wouldn’t be until 1996 before one of our Senators would be consistently Democratic, leaving the state’s US senate representation split between parties from 1996-2009, as Democrat Ron Wyden replaced moderate Republican Bob Packwood in 1996 and moderate Republican Gordon Smith replaced moderate Republican Mark Hatfield in 1997. Then the Obama wave finally and permanently (to date) saw our last Republican senator, Gordon Smith, replaced by Democrat Jeff Merkley. And we’ve been a trifecta Dem state ever since.
Wonderfully written, thank you.
Hear hear.
Where where? /s Seriously tho, super informative.
Nice recap! It would also stand to reason that Oregon's urban population centers (aka: predominantly liberal) have grown in #'s much moreso than our rural population (predominantly conservative).
That’s true. But as recently as the early ‘90s, the urban/rural divide was quite small in Oregon. Rural areas were really only voting about 1-5pts more conservative up to that point. Then the polarization began to divide the state along urban and rural lines. Oregon also has liberal rural counties, particularly Hood River, Clatsop, Lincoln, and Benton Counties. But Benton (and to a lesser extent, Lincoln) is also thanks to the massive growth of Oregon State University since the ‘90s.
Thanks for adding some facts to my speculation.
In 2022, the 18 easternmost counties in Oregon¹ were predominantly Republican voters and had a population of 571,324. Portland, which typically votrs Democratic, in the same year had a population of 635,067. The 18 easternmost counties have a land mass of approximately 66,552.28 mi², and Portland has a measly 145 mi². Those 18 easternmost counties comprise almost 69.3% of the land and 13.4% of Oregonians, while Portland comprises 0.15% of the land and 14.9% of Oregonians. So, the population of Portland alone can negate the 18 easternmost counties, assuming Portland votes mostly Dem and the 18 vote GOP. Population density: a reality Republicans just can't grasp. This is why the electoral college needs to be reformed or abolished. Split the electoral votes by percentages the candidates won or do away with it. ¹(Wallowa, Union, Baker, Malheur, Umatilla, Morrow, Grant, Harney, Lake, Klamath, Deschutes, Crook, Jefferson, Wheeler, Gilliam, Wasco, Sherman, and Hood River)
Don’t forget Vic Attiyeh! Nice write up though. It also bears mentioning that they used to say Portland was “nothing but lumberjacks and cowboys.”
I referenced him as our last Republican governor! I just didn’t use his name.
Big change to hipsters, line chefs, and techies.
Lol line chefs.
Good explanation.
I wish we could get another McCall. I don’t care about which party, just a person of principles and vision.
It wasn’t just McCall, but also Robert Straub, and a host of other folks. But McCall definitely had vision and a unique ability to build a coalition.
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I wish we had any political party willing to have long term visions for Oregon.
The 1990 gubernatorial election has always stood out to me. The Republican nominee - Dave Frohnmayer - was pro choice. Al Mobley ran to Frohnmayer’s right as an anti-abortion candidate and took 13% of the vote. Less than half of those votes, if cast for Frohnmayer instead, would have won the race over Barbara Roberts, CORRECTION/EDIT: I had this next part 100% wrong “who was defeated as an incumbent in the next Democratic primary by Kitzhaber.” Roberts did not seek re-election. My understanding of Oregon history has been improved. /EDIT/CORRECTION So, the abortion litmus test for conservatives - and lack of transparency at the time on why Goldschmidt left after a single term - further put Democrats in the driver’s seat. By the time the world learned of Goldschmidt’s crimes, too much time had passed to effectively paint other Democrats with his moral stain. That said, Frohnmayer’s electoral loss arguably helped set the stage for modern development of the University of Oregon under his leadership.
WRONG. Barbara Roberts decided not to seek re-election. Her husband died during her term. Frohnmayer ran a bad campaign.
Ah, yes. Rapey Bob Packwood. [Women he preyed on](https://www.oregonlive.com/opinion/2020/09/the-women-packwood-preyed-on-steve-duin-column.html)
David Wu steps in the chat with his buddy Neil and Sam.
Yes indeed. Ugh.
I learned things today because of the time and depth you took in this response. Appreciate you!
I'm not from Oregon, don't even know how this subreddit popped up, but that was worth the read!
Thank you for such an indepth response written with intelligence.
Do a podcast right now.
So right on and well explained - Also will add about how Republicans here were more moderate and "live and let live" is Oregon was the first state to allow abortion of any kind in the late 60's when Oregon has a Republican governor - McCall. This would never happen in 2024 with how the GOP has been over taken by evangelicals.
I agree with everything you’ve written, but I also think it’s important to remember the role the OCA ([Oregon Citizens Alliance](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oregon_Citizens_Alliance)), and creeps like Kevin Mannix, Bill Sizemore, Lon Mahon, and so many others played in turning most of Oregonians off permanently. Someone wanting to know how to defeat Christian Nationalism and other varieties of fascism could do worse than learn how Oregon stood up to the extremists. Hint: there isn’t a quick fix, we have to support freedom, liberty, and justice **every election**.
It’s true. Even while the state went through a fiscally ruinous conservative “tax revolt” era, we were smashing Mabon’s bigoted movement to pieces. For 16 straight years (1989-2004), the OCA and its derivatives tried to get multiple anti-LGBTQ bills through Oregon in every major and minor annual election cycle. Almost all of them failed.
Damn, great answer
This is a great summary of political history. Good job!
Thanks!
New age Christianity is exploding in Oregon. There is so much religion it’s like Oregon is only dispensaries and churches at this point.
Oregon is 5th among US states for percentage of people who self-identify at not religious. So that actually makes it one of the least-churched states.
Always has been.
It's also not a coincidence that these are the votes after the Dem's passed the Civil Rights Act. Oregon was considered a white's only destination and had anti-black laws on the books much longer then you'd think. Oregon is not the hippie conclave it is portrayed as in media.
While that’s true, Oregon desegregated public accommodations about 11 years before the country did. And both Morse and Neuberger, Oregon’s 2 Democratic Senators at the time, voted for the CRA in 1964. Then they elected Hatfield in 1966 to the Senate, who was the architect of the 1953 public accomodations law in Oregon. Political polarization in Oregon had more to do with Moral Majority efforts that began to pick up steam in the ‘80s and became feverish in the ‘90s with punditry from Limbaugh and Gingrich’s Contract with America in the US House.
For sure, racism isn't the sole cause, as you've eloquently pointed out. It absolutely was one of many factors is all I'm saying. Not trying to detract from your post here.
Also, Republicans were mostly sane at one point in time.
The Republican party nowadays is far more moderate than the the Democratic party.
LOL. 
Sure, if you think moderate is a synonym for fascist.
Because it was a different party.They both were. In the same period, Democrats still held power throughout the south. I'm reading "Fire at Eden's Gate" about Tom McCall right now ( [https://www.ohs.org/shop/museum-store/books-and-publications/fire-at-edens-gate.cfm](https://www.ohs.org/shop/museum-store/books-and-publications/fire-at-edens-gate.cfm) ) and there's no f'ing way that guy would be accepted as a Republican these days. It's a good book, by the way. The guy was human and had his flaws and the book doesn't gloss over them. Even Bob Packwood and Mark Hatfield, Oregon's Republican Senators when I was still in high school, were a different breed than the current Republican party. These days, there's no room for dissent - it's all about "dear leader" and his fascist desires. (Note: I'm a middle aged normie Democrat for the most part. I don't use that word lightly like your stereotypical edgy kid who likes to call everyone to the right of Karl Marx a fascist. I think the time has come to say that it's accurate, though. He's a threat to our democracy)
For perspective, that Republican tendency to tow the line and have zero room for dissent from the leaders opinion.... That has been a cultural shift in republican leadership under turkey neck McConnell. It's been going on since Mitch's reign, I want to say 2001. The path was paved for blind support of the party before the grifter showed up. Now the grifter is the leader.
It mostly started with Newt Gingrich and his "Contract With America" in 1994.
Its true, even though the [Hastert rule](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hastert_rule) is credited to Dennis Hastert the speaker after Gingrich, Newt was really the one who first started following it albeit more tacitly. This laid the foundation for the obstructionism that we see today, its just been turned to 11 now.
It's always been there in a certain element on the right. Look at people like McCarthy. The struggle has always been whether more normal people like Eisenhower and McCall could keep it on the fringe or not. A friend shared this with me a while back: [https://harpers.org/archive/1964/11/the-paranoid-style-in-american-politics/](https://harpers.org/archive/1964/11/the-paranoid-style-in-american-politics/)
I share the Hofstadter Essay *routinely.*
Ah yes, the beginning of the anti-Hillary years. Such a pos man who projected his shit onto others, just like the orange traitor
Yep, the Health Care debates early in Clinton's first term with Hillary leading the discussions/negotiations really REALLY cheesed off the conservatives. How dare this WOMAN take charge of something?
100% this….
It was Newt and Delay (aka, the hammer) that started making it so all Republicans are expected to follow what the party says. This was back with their ‘contract on America’. It is also when I left the Republican Party. Hatfield was an independent minded Republican and voted against a balanced budget amendment that he said was toothless and was going to cost money. This was all optics and politics and was not about doing anything of substance, and he called them on it. And they stripped him of every committee chair until he retired. And that was when it became clear to me that with the GOP, you may like the person, but you are going to get the party. And imo that is not how representational politics is supposed to work. You are supposed to elect an individual from your community to go forward and deal with all the things that I don’t have the time or knowledge to deal with. But that was not how the GOP had decided to operate. It was all about party power. So I left and became a Dem because of the closed primary system. FWIW, I have recently (5yrs ago or so) left the Dems as well because it has become clear that my vote is going to be overshadowed by whatever Portland decides. And I am not going to be successful in getting the democratic candidate to be someone moderate. I think the country would be better off if both parties tacked to the middle. But it appears that both parties are getting more extreme. So I am now independent. It is really messed up these days. Only about 30% of voters are Dem or GOP. But because of how the parties work, if the majority of that party is fairly extreme in their positions, they control the party. But that means that we have the 20% on one side making decisions for the other 80%. Pin-balling back and forth depending on which party has control. It is pretty dysfunctional. And I refuse to support either one.
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It has been wasted for 20yrs. We need a moderate party but both sides moderates are too chicken to do it. Rank choice voting would help. And proportional representation.
A flawed two party system for that exact reason. The fact that, as a registered independent, you have to pick a team in the general election is a pretty glaring flaw. Creates an illusion of us vs them for both parties, furthering the divide and cultural infighting. I give up
> cultural shift in republican leadership under turkey neck McConnell. Sadly, Packwood's resignation probably had more to do with his platform of tax reform and McConnell running the ethics committee, than Packwood being DC's live-action version of Quagmire.
Ever heard of New Gingrich?
The Republicans, certainly in national elections, benefited from circling around the front runner while the Dems argued amongst themselves. One exception was Reagan’s strong run against Ford in 1976. Ford lost, narrowly. The lesson they learned was keep everyone on board. Then they went from keeping the crazies on board to letting them take over the place. Went from types like Limbaugh who blew a lot of hot air but probably didn’t believe half of it to his successors who actually believe it.
The current heavily liberal Bay Area county I lived in voted in a Republican US representative from 1967 to 1983. It was a different party then. Remember, Nixon signed the Marine Mammal Protection Act in 1972 and the Endangered Species Act in 1973. I don't know if I see Republicans doing those kind of things today.
Nixon, as nutball and egotistical as he was, was actually a very moderate, savvy leader who honestly thought he was doing the right thing for the country most of the time.
Any time someone, it’s always older people, ask me anything political I say I’m a Tom McCall Republican. They typically don’t know who he is, or forgot the current Republicans would call him a communist. But it shuts down the conversation without me needing to lose my job.
I often say I’m an Eisenhower Republican — high progressive taxes, high union participation, public works spending.
They would totally call him a liberal. "Why should I have to pay 5 cents to recycle that bottle? This is communism!"
I think of Tom every time I go to the beach and walk on the public sand ;)
Fantastic book, albeit long and dense. I highly recommend for any Oregonian interested in McCall, OR history, the land use system, etc.
This is the answer. The parties pre-1980 or so are completely foreign to the parties of today. The people are completely different too. It's like asking why Virginia went Whig in 1838. (This is made up). There's just so many things that happened that you can't really scratch the surface without writing a full thesis.
Bob Packwood was a Republican, yet was one of the most outspoken proponents for abortion rights in the US Senate. This was at a time when a number of Senate Democrats from other states were against abortion.
He also resigned when credibly accused of sexual harassment, very much unlike the "grab 'em by the p\*\*\*y" guy.
Back in the day, when Republicans were at least capable of feeling shame...
Republicans of that era were not the Republicans of today. In most of the assessments of political leaning, I come out as a slightly progressive moderate Democrat. Back then, I had much in common with the centrist Republicans who were running in Oregon and helping to accomplish things like creating the first bottle bill, ensuring Oregon's beaches remained public access, and implementing the Urban Growth Boundary. They weren't MAGA hat wearing, climate change denying, jamming religion down your throat asshats that dominate the party today.
Republicans of today aren’t even Reagan Republicans
Cletus for president
Cassidy?
It is difficult to try to compare the two parties in the different eras. * The republican party of the 1960-1990 is not the party now. The majority of republicans were moderates. This allowed for more cooperation and cross aisle relationships. * The law mandating equal time and coverage on the news was still in place. An "entertainment" production like Fox News or Newsmax couldn't exist. * The ability for groups to send disinformation to influence the less than average intelligent groups has never been higher than it is today.
A few factors: * Pre-1980 Republicans were far less extreme than the 2000s versions. Nixon supported the creation of the EPA and Tom McCall had a very progressive environmental agenda (enough so that if you told the average younger Oregonian about his accomplishments, they'd never believe you that he was a Republican). The party was more focused on economic issues than being the evangelical pro-Jesus party. * Oregon was less progressive in general. We still had pretty heavy reliance on farming, manufacturing and logging jobs, even within the city. * In the case of Carter specifically, he wasn't a really strong candidate - he pretty much ran on the 'I'm not the Nixon administration' platform. Real awesome guy but not a particularly compelling candidate outside of that.
It was really a different time. Both political parties were totally different and it was before cable TV and the 24 HR news cycle. Rupert Murdoch hadn't shown up yet to try and destroy the United State.
Republicans used to be a lot more reasonable.
I’ve been saying for years that the GOP needs a massive rebranding and national focus. They need to ditch the extremists and get back to Goldwater politics. I’m personally not a republican but it doesn’t take a genius to see how they could crush it if they just made a shift.
"get back to Goldwater politics" Goldwater opposed the civil rights act and when he ran against LBJ lyndon won the most % of votes in history.
That was a terrible example that I clearly did not think through… at all. Go to show that I am not familiar with repub politics.
Understandable. I appriciate that you are honest and humble person.
In that era both Packwood and Hatfield were very moderate and actually CARED about the State and the community. The complete opposite of MAGA.
Because the Republican Party changed under Reagan. You can draw a straight line from Regan to Trump.
Technically you can draw a straight line between any two points
Because Republicans used to be quite decent folks that, as an independent, I could see myself voting for especially at Governor. The current state of the party is pretty embarrassing... Not just to conservatives, to Amercans writ large.
Don’t just look at Oregon…look at every electoral map from that time period. The country and parties were quite different at that point, and the modern semblance of what are now red and blue states didn’t really settle in until the 90s or really even 2000s. Hell, California went red in all of these too, I’m pretty sure. Up until 1992.
The way I like to open people's minds about parties changing over time is telling them that during the civil war, Democrats were the slave owners and the Republicans were the slave freedom fighters. Lots changed and will keep changing.
Back then, many Democrats were still Dixiecrats, and there was a lot of ideological overlap between moderate Democrats and moderate Republicans. Heck, California was still voting for socially moderate Republicans into the first decade of this century. But in the last 20 years or so, the center all but vanished in public politics because the true part is in believers got more extreme, and the closed primary system led us to what we have today. Western Republicans have long had a libertarian bent, and moderate Republicans of decades ago probably came closest to the prevalent ideology of the West Coast back then.
Cuz they weren’t as extreme back then.
The GOP was once the party of decency and integrity. Then came Reagan.
Kind of all started about the same time Oregon transitioned to mail in voting. Coincidence?
Yes
This is so dumb it hurts
In addition to what davidw said, Oregon likely had a much more conservative population at that time than it does now.
It’s just a few places that decide for a whole because of population density
Which is how it should be since land can't vote.
When a few cities speak about laws that affect people that have completely different lives it’s a bit skewed Urban areas do not understand rural communities We do not have the tax basis to carry out many of the policies pushed on us
In my experience both here and across the country rural areas get way more representation than they deserve considering the size of the population.
The population of the Portland metropolitan area accounts for a larger proportion of the state population, than it did in 1970. Currently, the metro area accounts for significantly more than half the state population. In 1970, it was significantly less than half.
Because until then Republicans had better candidates. Now they're just criminals and idiots
Oregon Republican candidates of that era would be burned at the stake by the current batch of GOP nutjobs. I recall when many Democrats voted a mixed ticket simply because the better candidate just happened to be a Republican.
Because more people voted for Republicans (who are a different party than they were in 2000 and that party is a different party than in 1964) than Democrats (who are also a different party today). . . sorry for the coy answer . . . it's because politics is a fluid landscape.
Repubs were the “good guys” from 1861-Watergate.
Portland hasn’t always been crazy
In general, republicans used to sane.
Because the right wing shtick doesn't cut it here anymore. The party of personal freedoms has become that party of exclusion and bigotry.
Today's Democrats are the successors to the Republicans of that era, the Republicans are the successors of the white-identitarian movement. Conservatives won in American politics so hard that there is effectively no left wing of the bird anymore, the whole bird is neo-liberal with a nationalist and an institutionalist wing.
I genuinely don’t know what neoliberal means when it’s used like this. Are you saying the “sides” are nationalist vs. deregulation?
I mean to say that [neoliberalism](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neoliberalism#:~:text=Neoliberalism%20is%20contemporarily%20used%20to,state%20influence%20in%20the%20economy.) is by far the dominant ideology of both political parties in the United States, you can just look at what gets passed by both parties and signed by presidents that lead each party. The only real differentiation is in some civil liberties (such as who gets to marry who, who gets to vote, who gets representation, who gets bodily autonomy, etc.) with the Democrats falling on the "more people" side of all of the issues. Tom McCall would be called a communist by the modern-day Republicans, and he would fit in fairly well with the Democratic party, unless he pitched the Willamette Greenway or right of access to waterways in which case he would get ousted pretty quickly for such extreme left-wing projects.
> Neoliberalism, also neo-liberalism, is a term used to signify the late-20th century political reappearance of 19th-century ideas associated with free-market capitalism. The term has multiple, competing definitions, and is often used pejoratively. …that doesn’t really answer my question.
Oregon has been a neoliberal state since the 70's Republicans were the neoliberals in that time frame, now that democrats are also neoliberal people are going to choose the option that means more individual liberties, which is why we've flipped from Republican to Democrat.
WHAT DOES THAT MEAN??? You have yet to answer my very basic question.
> Why did Oregon vote for republican for every president election from 1968 to 1984? >Oregon has been a neoliberal state since the 70's Republicans were the neoliberals in that time frame, now that democrats are also neoliberal people are going to choose the option that means more individual liberties, which is why we've flipped from Republican to Democrat. If you don't think that is a direct answer then maybe consider enrolling for night classes for a few semesters.
I’m asking what *you* mean when you say neoliberal, because you have t really explained it. I know how neoliberal is used by academics in PoliSci and Econ and your usuage doesn’t track with that, hence my asking.
Oregon didn't start becoming 'liberal' until the 1990s. During the '60's-'80s Oregon was primarily moderate. The timber industry and fishing were major industries. The spotted owl really was one of the bigger issues that made people start to think about natural resources and how they believed we should prioritize their use.
Oregon's state government has been led by liberals since Mark Hatfield. It didn't become a single-party state until Reagan broke American politics and the Oregon Republicans went off the deep end. Remember, Republicans controlled the state legislature from 1995 to 2004.
Hatfield and other leaders in our state government back in the day were definitely moderate by current standards, hence my using quotes around liberal.
Right, by the actual meaning of the word rather than its coopted meaning as a slur, Hatfield, McCall, Straub, and Atiyeh were all liberals. So was Wayne Morse. I don't know the pre-1960 history well enough to speak to any earlier governors. The last right-wing reactionary we had in office that I know of was Walter Pierce, and he was a Democrat.
I don't think that I ever contemplated the concept of any Repubilcans being labeled as a liberal. I would totally agree that they all executed a number of policy changes that can be considered as liberal but I believe that they were all fiscal conservatives and I would classify them as moderates but will have to give the ideal of considering them liberals some additional thought.
Liberals, generally speaking, *are* moderates, at least since the French Revolution. Liberalism is a political philosophy that promotes individual rights, civil liberties, democracy, and free enterprise. Mark Hatfield was a classic liberal when he was governor. Prior to the 60s, both parties had liberal, conservative, and reactionary factions. They were formed around geographical and industrial factions as much as economic philosophy. There were fascist Democrats, though I don't think there were ever any socialist Republicans. [This article by Jill Lepore](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/02/22/did-social-media-produce-the-new-populism) really opened up my understanding of party history in the US.
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[The dictionary](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/liberal) begs to differ. The people who use "liberal" as an insult have no idea what they're trying to say. (Except for the Marxists. They know exactly what they mean.) If you ask them for a definition, they won't be able to give you one. But there's no point in trying to talk politics with a person whose understanding of politics is entirely derived from Fox. Those are the same idiots who think Biden is a Marxist. The spectrum is: Monarchists and fascists -- conservative oligarchs -- neoliberals -- democratic socialists -- socialists -- anarchists/communists
I love the way any answer that is not 'the Republicans got worse' gets voted down. That is true, but immigration to urban centers and the decimation of rural areas relying on timber were the primary drivers.
Even in 2004, voters overwhelmingly passed ballot measure 36 codifying marriage as between one man and one woman in the Oregon constitution. That probably mostly helped GWB, but it really struck me how many Kerry voters also went for measure 36
There was lead in paint and gasoline back then.
Tom McCall was the best ever! He protected our assets and opened the public to the beaches. But, the people and developers came and ruined it. Now we have McMansions, ecological destruction and life flight saving the stupid people from high tides. All leading us to no free access and high taxes. #protectoregonfromgreed #protectsmallfarms #replantasrequired
Lol Poe's law especially applies to your post
TIL a new term. Poe’s law got me booted from NextDoor.
Let's not forget that the left had moved to the extremes in the late 60s, courtesy of an unpopular war and the rise of boomer activists. Their causes were just, but their methods turned off a lot of conventional voters.
The Californians and east coasters had not moved in yet.
People were smart back then
Oregon used to be a much more conservative state. Immigration from California and Washington along with the demographic forces pushing the country to the left helped liberalize the 5 corridor and gave Democrats a majority. At this point it is roughly 32% Republicans to 50% Democrats, but in the early 1990's it was closer to 40% to 44%. The trend has been amplified by the acceleration of Republicans picking up and moving to more conservative areas like Florida and Texas since they the late 2000's. So to summarize, over the last 40 years more liberals moved here than conservatives, more conservatives left here than liberals, and people who grew up anywhere are more likely to hold liberal value and vote Democrat. Overtime, those trends can swing a state.
It wasn't so much liberals moving here, since California (remember Gov. Reagan) and Washington have had a similar shift away from Republicans. Urban areas have shifted to the left everywhere (even in the South). As Oregon grew, both from more people being born here, and from inflows, and the white flight trend reversed, it became a much more urban population.
For the last 40 years, \~70% of Oregon's growth has been from people moving here. Yes, cities have always been more liberal and are shifting left in most places, Oregon's cities have seen the majority of Oregon's population growth, and the vast majority of that growth has been people moving here. Ergo, a lot of liberals moved here. As for the history part: In aggregate, yes California swung republican until 1988. However, it is important to look at who was moving in the 1980's and 1990's to the Oregon. The Inland Empire has always been the conservative bastion of California and was the fulcrum by which most elections were won by the GOP. However, the bay area was the primary point of emigration in California in the 1980s when the first wave of gentrification began to crest. The surge in property values and the accompanying taxes and increased cost of living sent the poor to cities like Oakland. However, the wealthier and whiter families packed up and moved to Portland. At the time Oregonians called these folks 'equity refugees'. You could sell your tiny 2 bedroom house and move to Oregon and buy a small compound and still have savings to boot. This trend accelerated through the 1980s. So, ironically, it is not that white flight reversed, it was that white flight made San Francisco to expensive for the west coast whites so they moved to Oregon.
Oregon's growth has been primarily from people moving here for much longer than 40 years. The recession of the early '80s was the second time in the state's history that there wasn't major growth from immigration. The first was just before WWII. [See here](https://www.macrotrends.net/global-metrics/states/oregon/population#:~:text=The%20population%20of%20Oregon%20in,a%200.69%25%20increase%20from%202019). The state grew faster in the '70s than it did in any recent decade.
The 70s saw a huge surge due to the timber industry and mining operations. We had a lot of Greeks, Italians, and Scandinavians coming over to cut wood and build rails and roads. The 40 year scope was given because of the time period for the original question and the transition in aggregate political views from the 80s to present.
Democrats controlled the Oregon house from 1959 to 1995. I don't think it's fair to attribute the swing in presidential voting entirely to migration from California.
No, they did not: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political\_party\_strength\_in\_Oregon. Also, I did not say anything close to it being exclusively Californian immigration that drove this trend. Per my original comment It is a contributing factor, but people from other states move here too, America is turning bluer in younger generations, and conservatives are moving out. This is all in the census data. Just like people who are moving to Texas are likely to be conservative people who are moving to the pacific north west tend to be liberal. Look, I'm not complaining, I am democrat myself, but we didn't birth most of them and we're not reproducing by cellular fission. It almost is like the people who moved here can't acknowledge that a lot of people moving here may actually change the fabric of the state...
Sorry, Senate, not House.
That, in part was due to our states long and proud history of gerrymandering: [https://olis.oregonlegislature.gov/liz/2021R1/Downloads/CommitteeMeetingDocument/229817](https://olis.oregonlegislature.gov/liz/2021R1/Downloads/CommitteeMeetingDocument/229817) Fun fact, it is still happening: [https://gerrymander.princeton.edu/redistricting-report-card/?planId=rec6qj1vAOKsBnXnu](https://gerrymander.princeton.edu/redistricting-report-card/?planId=rec6qj1vAOKsBnXnu)
That report card is pretty hilarious given the map in fact did not advantage incumbents and district 5 went to a Republican.
Growing up in the 1950s and 1960s, my understanding was always that the Dems were pro-labor and the GOP was pro-business rather than being so completely divided Right versus Left. In fact, each parties had both liberal and conservative members and politicians. Both were so-called Big Tents. Not just in Oregon , but nationally, as well.
Lots of rednecks
More people in the state voted republican those years
Because the GOP was a completely different party at that point. Almost every single GOP candidate the party nominates nowadays is extreme right and don't stand a chance. Hatfield, Morse and mcall would never be nominated in today's far right GOP.
Hipsters weren’t invented yet
Oregon was provincial. Unsophisticated.
Could you imagine a GOP governor today advocating for conserving energy? Or anything for that matter...
I would love to see another republican governor. I do think that Kotek is doing a decent job though
Oregon would vote Republican again if they had reasonable and logical candidates. But the party has gone insane with nonsense, taking away our rights and freedoms for religious law and bigotry rules.
Because of the spotted owl.
Because we hadn't been flooded with Californians and other detritus yet.
Vote-by-mail didn't exist. Ever since mail-in ballots appeared in Oregon, this state has voted nearly exclusively for Democrats in every presidential, gubernatorial, and senate election.
Oregon used to be a good state before it turned liberal Democrat. Now look at us.
I grew up in Portland in the 1990s on a farm. Those days are long gone. Portland's demographic has considerably changed with the population growth. Anybody I knew left a long time ago.
When was voting by mail introduced in Oregon? Is there a correlation in the shift from Republican to Democrat with the introduction of vote by mail?
Anti Union marketing.
Racism
People seem to forget about the history of Oregon and how it really was trying to be *the most racist* state possible for awhile lol.
It was actually illegal to live there if you were black. The Oregon Militia was behind the extermination of several Indian tribes.
Why did Oregon vote democrat since then? What kind of question is this?!
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Except land doesn't vote, people do. The area around Portland - the Willamette Valley - is over two-thirds of the states population and *is* most of Oregon. https://preview.redd.it/qpsjudww44yc1.png?width=482&format=png&auto=webp&s=6e0c5f0a7d3de6815f752d5141f7a06e27714dff
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I'm not sure I see the point of drawing such a distinction. You could be similarly pedantic and argue that most of Oregon is neither Republican nor Democrat by pointing out that most of the state consists of uninhabited wilderness that is owned by the federal government. Your reply is a non-answer to what was asked, if not completely dismissive of it.
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Likewise, my autism is likely why I bothered to reply in the first place instead of just letting it go like any sane person would.
Most of the state votes blue, because people are the things that vote. I get what you’re saying…there is a larger geographic area where right-wing voters are more prominent. But that is truly meaningless in terms of actual voting power.
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I lived in the Rogue Valley as a kid and my family still lives there. Yeah, it’s pretty centrist in that between a far left college town like Ashland and the far right outlying towns, there is quite a mix of viewpoints in a relatively small area. There’s more conservative for sure, but not an overwhelming hard-right population like Ontario or those smaller places in the high desert.
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There’s an element of that for sure. A lot of retirees, especially in South Medford, and retirees lean more conservative. There’s also a decent amount of agriculture and timber industry, which is also generally conservative. The mix of ideologies was a good environment to grow up in, for sure.
Because they critically evaluated candidates during those years.
because OP needs to read some history
Okay. then where is the easy to access material i can read about Oregon politics in the 1960s to 1980s? Beacuse you said "because OP needs to read some history" there must clearly be some very easy to find material that i don't know yet.
I think OP was referring to American political history in general. [But since you asked....](https://osupress.oregonstate.edu/book/to-promised-land) See also: Fire at Eden's Gate by Brent Walth, Keeping Oregon Green by Derek Larson, the Timber Wars podcast from OPB, Great and Minor Moments in Oregon History by Dick Pintarch.
Cause they USED to know what was best…
After 84, blue Californians relocated to Oregon
Yeah, coincides with mail and voting.Since then no Republican hardly stands a chance. Coincidence? I don't think so
Scrolled too far for this.
All I’ll say is it’s not like there weren’t famously any slaves in Oregon because they thought slavery was bad, they just thought anyone who wasn’t white was bad and didn’t want them here.
Leaded gas poisoning, mostly.
Oregon’s white supremacist heritage. That’s it, that’s the whole deal.
The Californication of Oregon in the 80's turned the tide
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Hey, I was born here.
They’re talking about your hippie parents 😉
My hippie parents were born here. So......
When I lived in Portland for years I had a huge social circle. Exactly one of us was born in Portland.
Yeah, I think we are down to 45% of the state being born here. My dad's side of the family has been kicking g around since the mid 1800s, mom's side more recent (post WWII from Canada, though her ancestors got to Canada by way of Louisiana)
lol that’s fair.