Talk:Constitution of Oregon

Ongoing work?

The edit history seems to indicate no activity for about a month. Is someone actively working on the lists to turn them into encyclopedic text? -- "J-M" (Jgilhousen) 03:48, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

I'm not sure, but that would definitely be a welcome improvement. I have suggested this article for WikiProject Oregon's Collaboration of the Week. Äþelwulf Talk to me. 10:32, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

Article I

I removed the following section from the article ([1]). There's no reason we should have a detailed table of Article I's sections, without covering the other Articles in similar detail.

However, the wikilinks contained within it seem useful, and maybe worth including either in a future version of this article, or in the Oregon Constitution pages on WikiSource. -Pete (talk) 17:38, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, reincorporating the wikilinks would be good.

By the way, concerning the photo req, I emailed the Blue Book guys a short while ago asking if their scans of the original document are copyrighted. My gut says no since I don't see any significant alterations that would create copyright, but I'm playing safe. If I get a response in the negative, I will upload them to the Commons. Also, if the Constitution is on public display (and I see no reason it shouldn't be), a picture of that display would be great. Does anyone on WP:ORE live near Salem? — Athelwulf ^[T]/_[C] 13:19, 21 December 2008 (UTC)

Proposed additions

I'm looking at other state constitution articles, and I see some good stuff. Here are some thoughts:

Indiana is pretty well developed. It includes brief histories of their two conventions, notable provisions, and criticisms of both constitutions. Ours seemed to be very popular upon the vote, but surely a 30.88% vote against shows there were significant criticisms, and surely they're documented somewhere. The Weekly Oregonian was being published at the time. I wonder if there are any microfilms at any libraries alongside the modern Oregonian. Or maybe whatever Portland's paper was at the time.

A section overviewing the convention would be great.

Our neighbor to the south has a history of significant amendments and revisions. It also shows differences between it and other state constitutions, which would be a good parallel section to our federal/state comparison. Utah lists "unusual" provisions and facts. Does ours have any unusual facts? Possibilities: The facts that we have no lieutenant governor; that our legislature normally has biennial sessions; that our constitution's preamble doesn't mention an Almighty Anything, unlike others; that our constitution wasn't amended at all from statehood until 1902, when the initiative process was established; and that we established it first. (Incidentally and interestingly, that historic section was usurped by the current section.)

Utah also discusses rights enjoyed by Utahns. So do Minnesota and Maryland. That's a good way to include the recently removed list of sections in our bill of rights.

Most constitutions' preambles are included. Seems like a good idea, even though ours isn't very interesting, unlike Massachusetts's.

How about significant Oregon Supreme Court cases affecting constitutional law?

Okay. Any other ideas? — Athelwulf ^[T]/_[C] 16:53, 21 December 2008 (UTC)

I forgot to mention, this article is in desperate need of source material. I just found an interesting, comprehensive exhibit hosted on the Oregon government's website, "Crafting the Oregon Constitution: Framework for a New State". It would be great for this article as well as the one for the convention. (And by the way, why do we have separate articles for the two?) — Athelwulf ^[T]/_[C] 18:55, 21 December 2008 (UTC)

Good ideas, all of them. Just to take on one for the moment, I think the Oregon Constitutional Convention article stands well on its own, but don't see any reason we couldn't merge as we fill in more detail here. If we were to merge now, that wouldn't be good, because this article would be very heavily weighted toward the convention. Also, it will probably be very long once fleshed out and merged, so we might want to split off a List of participants in the Oregon Constitutional Convention or something like that to keep it from getting too unwieldy. I'll be back for more soon... -00:31, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

That's a good idea, no merger for now. As for the list, I'm not sure what to think. A list of participants in the convention doesn't seem quite notable enough to me. But maybe I'll have a different opinion once I see which direction we're going with this. — Athelwulf ^[T]/_[C] 18:12, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

Some relevant Oregon Supreme Court cases

They all seem to affect initiative amendments to the Constitution: Armatta v. Kitzhaber, Lehman v. Bradbury (2002), Swett v. Bradbury (2002), and Baum v. Newbry (1954). Basic information can be found here. — Athelwulf ^[T]/_[C] 04:02, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

Assessment

I have reassessed this article. I feel that it is borderline START and C so have leaned toward C. You can help to secure this C class by expanding the article with additional inline references. C. Williams (talk) 06:07, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

Possible sources for this article

I just happened to check out this article and notice it was made WP:ORE's collaboration of the week. Awesome!

Coincidently, just today, I found this thick book that has quite a bit of information on Oregon's constitution:

The Oregon Constitution and Proceedings and Debates of the Constitutional Convention of 1857. Ed. Charles Henry Carey. Salem: State Printing Department, 1926. 543 pages.

It has a whole wealth of information. This includes the journal of the convention. On one page there's a multi-year abstract of votes in the Oregon Territory on whether to hold the convention. There's also analysis of sources of inspiration for the Constitution; for example, evidently the article dealing with the state judicial branch is similar to that of Wisconsin. The copy I looked at is in the Shaw Historical Library at the Oregon Institute of Technology. If this wonderful book exists in Klamath Falls of all places, it must exist in the Willamette Valley, where I'm guessing the majority of WP:ORE members live.

A librarian discovered two other publications that might be relevant:

1. Commission for Constitutional Revision. A new constitution for Oregon; a report to the Governor and the 52nd Legislative Assembly. Salem: 1962. 84 pages.
2. The U.S. Constitution—alive and breathing; the Oregon Constitution—still original. Lake Oswego: Oregon State Bar, 2006.

I believe number 1 is in OIT's library, which I can pretty easily get to. Number 2 seems to discuss Oregon Constitutional law, comparing it to the federal counterpart. As I suggested already on this talk page, I think information on landmark Oregon Supreme Court cases affecting Oregon Constitutional law would be very valuable for this article. The Oregon State Bar might have some of that info. Possibly some law professor at any law school in Oregon would know where to start looking for such info as well.

Hopefully this is all helpful. — Athelwulf ^[T]/_[C] 07:01, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

Re: Amendment process (under "Differences from U.S. Constitution")

Under the section entitled "Differences from U.S. Constitution," the second sentences reads: "Amending the U.S. Constitution requires a two-thirds vote in Congress and ratification by three-fourths of the states." However, it should read something along the lines of: "Amending the U.S. Constitution requires either a vote of two-thirds majority in both Houses of Congress or the application by two thirds of the states' legislatures for a convention for proposing amendments; and in either case, the proposed amendment or amendments must be ratified by three fourths of the states."

My sources for this is Article 5 of the U.S. Constitution, the first clause of which reads (with the relevant portion emboldened):

"The Congress, whenever two thirds of both Houses shall deem it necessary, shall propose Amendments to this Constitution, or, on the Application of the Legislatures of two thirds of the several States, shall call a Convention for proposing Amendments, which, in either Case, shall be valid to all Intents and Purposes, as part of this Constitution, when ratified by the Legislatures of three fourths of the several States, or by Conventions in three fourths thereof, as the one or the other Mode of Ratification may be proposed by the Congress;"

While the language is a bit convoluted as compared to modern parlance and composition, it is clear that there are two methods of proposing amendments to the states for their consideration, one which directly involves Congress, and another of which Congress plays only a functional role -- that is, upon the application of two thirds of the states' legislatures, Congress formally calls the convention, but that no vote is required. Such campaigns are currently happening, and at least one state (Vermont) has made such an application.

Wikipedia already has an article outlining the details of this process: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Convention_to_propose_amendments_to_the_United_States_Constitution Balarick (talk) 01:01, 18 July 2014 (UTC)