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Oregon’s contemporary Patriot movement does not come out of a local void. Despite its reputation as a liberal stronghold, the state has a long
history of Hard Right politics—including large grassroots movements. These include the racial exclusion laws the state was founded on; a large Ku
Klux Klan presence; various Nazi and White supremacist groups; Posse
Comitatus recruiting and activism; Roy Masters’s foundation and media activities; the homophobic and anti-abortion Oregon Citizens Alliance; and Christian Patriot and militia movement in the 1980s and 1990s. Just like
the Oath Keepers, Three Percenters, and Malheur occupiers did in 2015 and
2016, in the 1970s to early 2000s Hard Right groups in Oregon—including
the Posse Comitatus, Aryan Nations, the Oregon Citizens Alliance, and
Southern Oregon Militia—all hitched their horses to land-use issues. And numerous Sovereign Citizens have been arrested in the state for years, especially in Jackson County.
Early Foundations
Racial Exclusion Laws
Oregon was founded on racial exclusion laws. In 1844, when it was still a territory, a law was passed subjecting to lashings any free black citizen
who did not leave. This was repealed, but an 1849 law prohibited African- Americans from coming to the territory; this too was repealed. Oregon was accepted into the union as a non-slave state, but its 1857 Constitution prohibited any African-Americans from moving to the state who were not
already residents. Voters overturned the law in 1926.(1) The state also ratified the Fourteenth Amendment (which granted citizenship to freed
slaves) in 1866, but rescinded it in 1868; it was only re-ratified in
1973. And Black Oregonians were not the only group persecuted; in 1893, LaGrande’s Chinatown was burned down, and its residents fled.(2) Today,
the state is 77 percent White (non-Hispanic/Latino)—one of the most white
in the country, which is currently 62 percent.(3)
Ku Klux Klan
Oregon’s Ku Klux Klan had meteoric rise and fall; it was founded in 1921, dominated the 1923 state election, and by 1925 had fallen apart. Lawrence
J. Saalfield, author of a book about the Oregon Klan, described Portland
as “the virtual headquarters of the Klan west of the Rocky Mountains.”(4)
There were 14,000 to 20,000 Klan members in the state by the early 1920s,
and before the decade’s end as many as 50,000 may have passed through the organization’s ranks.(5)
Oregon’s Klan was an overtly White supremacist organization; however,
while it occasionally campaigned against people of color—in particular
those of Japanese descent—its main focus was against Roman Catholics, many
of whom were recent immigrants. At the time, they were demonized in the
same way Jews often are: as a fifth column in the nation, who dominate its institutions, but whose real loyalties are to a foreign power. Scholar
Eckard V. Toy wrote, “The racial and moralistic attitudes of Klansmen were
not significantly different from those of other Oregonians”—who were overwhelmingly white, Protestant, and native-born.(6)
The 1922 vote was a two-fold victory for the Klan. First, the Republican candidate they backed, Walter Pierce, was elected governor; and second, a referendum they supported, aimed at crippling the Roman Catholic private
school system, was passed. In March 1923, both Pierce and Portland Mayor
George L. Baker paid their political dues by attending a banquet for Klan leader Frederick L. Gifford. Klan-backed legislation was also passed,
banning teachers from wearing religious headgear in public schools (aimed
at Catholics), and limiting land ownership by non-citizens (aimed at
Japanese). But other bills failed. Beset by internal faction-fighting, the state Klan faded from sight in 1925, although there was a brief revival in 1926.(7) But the Klan’s power had faded so much that, the same year, the African-American exclusion clause was repealed from the state
constitution. The private school referendum they had backed was also
struck down the year before by the Supreme Court.
Silver Shirts and Japanese Internments
In the 1930s, the state had a visible membership in the Silver Legion of America (better known as the Silver Shirts), a pro-Nazi organization.
Former Oregon Klan leaders Gifford and Luther I. Powell even joined the
group, which in 1939 had 750 members in the state.(8)
The pro-Nazi group was suppressed by the U.S. government during the
war—but the federal government turned around and enacted its own racist policies in the state. In 1942, the federal government forcibly interned
4,000 Oregonians of Japanese descent (including both Japanese expatriates
and native-born citizens) in camps. When they returned after the war, 75 percent of the land they had owned before 1942 was no longer in their
hands.(9)
Posse Comitatus
In the 1970s, Oregon also became a center for the Posse Comitatus
movement, centered around Portland’s Henry Lamont “Mike” Beach. A former
member of the Silver Shirts, Beach became a key link between Oregon’s past
and future Hard Right.
Many of the tactics and organizing approaches used by the 1970s Oregon
Posse Comitatus can be seen in use today by the Patriot movement; these includes establishing relationships with radical gun rights groups, establishing fake courts, anti-environmental activism, and armed
takeovers. In 1974, a “citizens grand jury” was organized by the Lane
County Posse Comitatus. The same group also made links with a gun rights
group, the National Association to Keep and Bear Arms (NAKBA).(10)
In 1973, Beach plagiarized the writings of Posse Comitatus founder William Potter Gale into a short booklet, the Blue Book, and started issuing his
own charters for groups. Soon there were at least nine Oregon counties
with chartered Posse Comitatus groups.(11) Many were in the same areas
where the 1920s Klan had been strong, in Oregon’s south and east—the same political strongholds of Posse Comitatus, and today of the various Patriot movement groups.(12)
In 1975, the Klamath County Posse Comitatus chairman sent threatening
letters to state legislators, saying they would be tried for treason by
his movement’s fake grand juries if they did not repeal a 1973 land conservation act. The threats were discussed on the floor of the state
senate, and the Oregon state attorney general was consulted.(13)
Posse Comitatus activists sued Josephine County for accepting paper money
for tax payments.(14) And foreshadowing the Malheur takeover, in 1976
Posse Comitatus activist Everett Thoren claimed (falsely) that he owned
half of a farm in rural Umatilla County. He recruited Posse Comitatus
activists from California and Portland, and engineered an armed takeover
of the farm—although Thoren himself did not join in. Like at Malheur, none
of the occupiers were locals, but unlike Malheur, they surrendered the
same day to authorities.(15)
Josephine County: Roy Masters and the State of Jefferson
Many communes, cults, and alternative religious communities set up shop in Oregon in the 1970s and 1980s. One of those was Roy Masters’ Foundation of Human Understanding, which came to Josephine County in 1979. Masters—who promotes a right-wing brand of Christianity, deeply infused with
libertarian economics, and patriarchal and homophobic views. The group allegedly tried to take over the county government. Locals soon dubbed his followers “Roybots,” and he was embroiled in numerous lawsuits.(16)
Masters—host of the radio show Advice Line—later established the right-
wing Talk Radio Network, which included Art Bell’s popular overnight
conspiracy show Coast to Coast AM. The network passed to Roy’s son Mark Masters, and featured Michael Savage and Laura Ingraham.(17) WorldNetDaily (WND), one of the most popular right-wing conspiracy theory websites
today, was originally based at Roy
Masters’ headquarters.(18) The right-wing conspiracy website News With
Views, based in Merlin, appears to be part of Roy Masters’ orbit as well;
the site features many of his talks. County officials, including former
Sheriff Gil Gilbertson, have written for the site while in office. (See Josephine County section.)
Josephine County is also one of the centers for the regional separatist
State of Jefferson movement. Covering parts of northern California and southwestern Oregon, the proposed state’s flag has two X’s to symbolize it being “double-crossed” by Salem and Sacramento. The State of Jefferson
idea dates back to 1852, but today many activists who are involved in the libertarian-leaning secessionist project are closely aligned with the
Patriot movement.(19) State of Jefferson flags are commonly seen at many Patriot movement rallies.
Nazi Skinheads and Aryan Nations
Oregon was one of the centers of the neo-Nazi movement in the late 1980s
and early 1990s. In the mid-1980s, racist leaders floated a plan called
the Northwest Territorial Imperative, which sought to establish a White ethnostate in the region. The Nazi skinhead movement in particular
established a strong following in the state, and in 1988 members of a
Portland Nazi skinhead gang—loosely connected to Tom Metzger’s White Aryan Resistance (WAR)—murdered Ethiopian immigrant Mulugeta Seraw. (20) (The
SPLC won a major lawsuit against Metzger for inspiring the murder,
bankrupting WAR.)(21) In 1990, the American Front, one of the largest
national Nazi skinhead organizations, relocated their operations to
Portland. Elsewhere in the state, other neo-Nazis were active; these
included the National Socialist Vanguard, and the national organization Volksfront, which was founded in 1994.(22) Followers of Christian
Identity, an openly racist and antisemitic version of Christianity, were
also active in the state, and sometimes served as a bridge between the
neo-Nazi and Christian Patriot groups.(23)
The Aryan Nations, based in Idaho and led by Richard Butler, targeted the state. Butler had been in the same Christian Identity church as Posse
Comitatus founder Gale; Butler took the church over, moved it from
southern California to northern Idaho, and renamed it Aryan Nations.
However, he continued to have a long, on-again-off-again relationship with
the Patriot movement.(24)
In 1991, Aryan Nations targeted Oregon for a recruiting drive, attempting
to exploit public resentment against environmental restrictions to save
the spotted owl, which was then a federally recognized endangered species.
The group’s plan to make Josephine County the center of an organizing
drive in 1995 was cancelled after an anti-racist march in Grants Pass drew 1,500 people. After Butler died in 2004, a number of splinter groups
formed which all took the group’s name. In 2010, one of these splinter
groups tried to move its headquarters to John Day, Oregon. This, too, was scrapped after strong local opposition, aided by the Rural Organizing Project.(25)
Oregon Citizens Alliance
The homophobic, anti-abortion Oregon Citizens Alliance (OCA) became a
powerful force in Oregon politics in the late 1980s and early 1990s as a
local manifestation of Christian Right-driven culture wars. Formed in 1986
by Lon Mabon, the OCA repeatedly employed Oregon’s accessible ballot
referendum system to push a reactionary social agenda. In 1988 the OCA won Measure 8, which repealed the state rule against sexual orientation discrimination, and prohibited any new protections from being implemented. (This was their only state referendum victory, however, and the courts
would later overturn it.) Turning to abortion issues, Measure 10 in 1990 required parental notification for abortion for minors, but it was
defeated. OCA’s major battle, which attracted national attention, was
Measure 9 in 1992, which would have amended the state constitution forcing schools and government agencies to discourage “homosexuality, pedophilia, sadism and masochism.”
The measure eventually failed—and opposition to it led to the formation of
the Rural Organizing Project. But similar measures were passed in several localities before being overturned by state legislation.(26) In addition,
the OCA closely aligned itself with the corporate-funded, anti-
environmental Wise Use movement, incorporated its views into the OCA
platform, and sponsored a land-use ballot initiative.(27)
1980s—2000s Militia and Patriot Movement
By the 1980s, post-Posse Comitatus groups operating under the banner of
the “Christian Patriot” movement started to appear in Oregon. These were succeeded by a number of militias in the early 1990s.
Republic v. Democracy Redress
In the 1980s a number of individuals and groups in the state continued to employ the fake legal strategies that were pioneered by Posse Comitatus.
In Oregon City, this included the racist and antisemitic group Republic v. Democracy Redress, publishers of BEHOLD! They held that only white people
could be full U.S. citizens.(28)
The tactics of the newly emerging Sovereign Citizen movement had a more
general following in the state, as well. In just nine months of 1982, 15
to 20 “cases which involved combinations of harassing lawsuits and common
law liens and common law ‘signature’ liens had been filed” in the
state.(29)
Medford Citizens’ Bar Association
Two Hard Right groups, with an intertwined history, ran a politically
based tax scam in Oregon for decades: the Medford Citizen’s Bar
Association (MCBA) and the Christian Patriot Association. The MCBA
published a paper called the CBA Bulletin, which promoted fake legal,
racist, and antisemitic writings.(30) The group also ran a warehouse
bank—an illegal private service which provided checking services to
members while hiding its paperwork from the IRS, thereby enabling tax
evasion. (Opposition to the federal income tax has long been a popular
issue on the Hard Right, and the right-wing tax protest movement was one
of the currents that fed into Posse Comitatus.) The bank was raided by the government in 1985. Several members were convicted in 1990, although one,
Art Hollowell, fled.(31) (He was caught and sentenced in 1996; in 2010 he reappeared in Patriot circles.)(32)
By 1994 the MCBA’s periodical had changed its name to The American’s
Bulletin, and was run by Robert Kelly.(33) Two years later, the group
itself was reported to be defunct, although the periodical continued under Kelly’s editorship.(34) The American’s Bulletin defended the militia
movement, and in the late 1990s was a leading promoter of the “redemption movement”—a Sovereign Citizen financial scheme to defraud banks.(35) The American’s Bulletin is still published today out of Central Point, Oregon,
just outside of Medford, and in early 2016 ran Sovereign Citizen articles defending the Hammond family in Burns.(36)
Christian Patriot Association
The 1985 IRS raid of the MCBA did not stop the illegal banking activities, which were handed over to the Christian Patriot Association, run by
Richard Flowers, the following year.(37) The Christian Patriot Association published a periodical (The Patriot Review) and books, as well as
distributing other titles. They distributed fake legal works, as well as racist, antisemitic, and Christian Identity texts, and weapons
manuals.(38) In 1996, it was raided by authorities, and in 2000 a number
of members were arrested. In 2002 they were convicted, and after a lengthy appeals process, the main sentences were handed down in 2005. The
Department of Justice claimed that between 1986 and 2000, the Christian
Patriot Association had “provided anonymous banking for 900 members
nationwide and handled deposits totaling over $186 million.”(39)
In addition, many people connected to the MCBA and Christian Patriot Association made headlines for violent criminal activity. Maynard
Campbell, from Ashland, advertised his how-to guides for making biological weapons like ricin in the CBA Bulletin. In 1992 he was arrested after a standoff with police, and was murdered in prison in 1997.(40)
In 1996, during the Justus Township standoff, two armed men—Mike Bartee
and Tad Silveira—tried to reinforce the compound with food and ammunition;
they said they had The American’s Bulletin press credentials. Bartee also identified himself as associated with the Embassy of Heaven church.(41) In 1997, this church—which was also utilizing these fake legal strategies—was foreclosed on in Sublimity, Oregon. Scott Roeder, who murdered abortion provider George Tiller in 2009, had previously received instruction from
the church, although he did not receive “citizenship”—which the church
granted its followers—from them. (The church, which today is in Stayton, Oregon, opposes violence.)(42)
In 1997 in Damascus, Oregon, a bomb was set off at a pornographic video
store as a diversionary tactic before a bank robbery. In 2002, two
men—Fritz Springmeier and Forrest E. Bateman, Jr.—were arrested in
connection to this. They had met at a meeting of the Christian Patriot Association, and both were also connected to the violent anti-abortion
group Army of God.(43) Springmeier was the author of several conspiracy
theory books, and after his release spoke in Sellwood (just outside of Portland), hosted by the 9/11 Truth Alliance, in both 2011 and 2012.(44) Despite their obsession with fabricated paperwork and secret banks, the Christian Patriot movement didn’t ignore land use issues. A 1990 report by Portland’s Coalition for Human Dignity quotes a Christian Patriot movement activist as saying, “Oregon is 50% controlled by the Federal Government—by those who control the Federal Government—because 50% of the land is
natural forest. So this state is dominated by a foreign power… [look at]
the spotted owl and the lack of funding for industry, and the movement of industry down south….” The report also noted that all the MCBA members
worked in the wood products industry.(45)
Fake Courts
In the mid-to-late 1990s, a number of fake courts based on Posse Comitatus/Sovereign Citizen ideas sprang up around Oregon. Rodney Elliot Askelson, who helped run the Christian Patriot Association in the 1980s,
was a founder of the Common Law Supreme Court of Oregon.(46) The other
courts included Our One Supreme Court of Wasco County, the United States District Court of Oregon, and the Multnomah County Common Law Court.(47)
The latter pledged support for the Embassy of Heaven when it ran afoul of
the law.(48)
Other Sovereign Citizen Activity
The Oregon Observer is a Patriot newspaper founded in 1992, and is still published today as the US~Observer. Referred to as “Oregon’s premier
patriot organ,” publisher Ed Snook of Josephine County took part in
hanging a black lawmaker in effigy in Salem in 1998. In 1999 he was
involved in campaigns to recall elected officials in southwestern
Oregon.(49)
Herbert Crawford was arrested in March 1996 arrest for drug manufacturing;
he had been an associate of the Montana Freemen.(50) In March 1998, Ronald
A. Griesacker, who was affiliated with a range of Patriot-style groups,
was arrested on fraud charges in Oregon.(51)
Other arrests and threatening activity by Sovereign Citizens in Oregon
include:
In 1999, the Jackson County sheriff complained he was harassed by
activists associated with Freedom Bound International, a Sovereign Citizen group.(52) Led by Brent Johnson (host of the radio show American
Sovereign, which is now the Voice of Freedom), Freedom Bound International
is based in Klamath Falls and still around today. They sell DVDs and
books, including Johnson’s The American Sovereign: How to Live Free From Government Regulations. You can even buy an “international driver
permit.”(53)
In 2001, two Sovereign Citizens in Medford, Donald Harley Carter and Floyd Bradley Howe, received three-year sentences for their participation in redemption schemes.(54)
In 2005, Oregon’s John David Van Hove, a.k.a. Johnny Liberty, was arrested while in Hawaii on tax fraud, wire fraud, and obstruction charges, and sentenced to two years. In the 1990s, he had been noted for promoting
Sovereign Citizen theories to progressives and environmentalists. Van Hove wrote a number of books, including the massive Global Sovereign’s
Handbook, which includes many conspiracy theories and a focus on Native American sovereignty. Today he runs the Global Source Center in Ashland,
and still sells his old books and audio courses.(55)
In March 2010, people involved in Pinnacle Quest International were
convicted of tax and wire fraud, and money laundering. They included
Ashland restaurant owner Eugene “Gino” Joseph Casternovia, who had run a
group called Southern Oregon Resource Center for Education, which
advocated Sovereign-style tax evasion strategies.(56)
In October 2011, a “de jure Grand Jury” sent every Oregon district
attorney an indictment for “treason, kidnapping, and slave trafficking.
The documents also called on ‘provost marshals’ to arrest the officials
and suggested that in some cases the death penalty might be
appropriate.”(57)
In October 2011, Ronald and Dorothea Jolings from Coos Bay were indicted
for tax evasion; apparently afterwards they embraced Sovereign Citizen ideology, filing false liens against federal officials and claiming each
one owed them $100 million. In 2015 they skipped their sentencing,
although were caught soon after; Ronald received eight years and Dorothea
four for tax evasion. In February 2016, they pled guilty to new charges
related to filing the false liens.(58)
In June 2014, Gary Lewis, a Sovereign Citizen, was arrested for murdering
a tenant in his fortified Northeast Portland house.(59)
Also in June 2014, a police SWAT team killed 73-year-old Ashland resident
Earl Cranston Harris after he greeted police efforts to enter his house to serve an eviction notice with a shotgun. Harris spent years filing
Sovereign Citizen documents in an attempt to prevent his home’s foreclosure.(60)
In December 2015, Winston Shrout, a Hillsboro, Oregon, Sovereign Citizen
“guru” who traveled around the world teaching his legal theories, was
charged with 19 counts of tax evasion. He later received additional
charges for attempting to defraud banks with fake documents. An advocate
of the redemption scheme, Shrout gave seminars in Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and Great Britain.(61)
Militias
Militias were part of the same political milieu of illegal banks,
Sovereign Citizen periodicals, and pretend courts that dotted Oregon in
the 1990s.
The Southern Oregon Militia, founded by Ralph Bowman and based in Jackson
and Josephine Counties, was formed in 1993; the secretive group still
exists today. It threatened to intervene during the 1996 Justus Township standoff in Montana.(62) In 2001 they also threatened to intervene in the Klamath Basin Water Crisis (see below).
Carl F. Worden, the group’s liason officer, describes the Southern Oregon Militia as a “clandestine” group. However, its secrecy does not preclude
the group from endorsing candidates for office, and in May 2014 the
militia gave its seal of approval to Corey Falls’s successful bid for
Jackson County sheriff, which it later revoked. It refused to join the
Sugar Pine action or support the ongoing Malheur occupation. However,
Worden defended Malheur’s occupiers from repression, saying, “If this
stupid bitch Governor Brown gets the feds come in and kill ANY of those protestors in Burns, we will come in and will exact the kind of revenge
only revered on battlegrounds. Dear Ms. Brown: Your life and the lives of everyone you care about are on the line here. Make the wise choice,
BITCH!”(63)
In the summer of 1994, the Portland suburb of Hillsboro was home to the
Oregon Militia.(64) The larger Northwest Oregon Regional Militia, led by
Mike Cross, formed in October 1994. It claimed members in 18 counties, but
was disbanded following the shock of the Oklahoma City bombing.(65) The
smaller Central Oregon Regional Militia, based in Prineville, but also
active in neighboring Deschutes County, was founded the same month and
also disbanded following the bombing.(66)(Kenneth Medenbach claimed he was
a member of this latter group when he ran into legal problems in 1995 for claiming rights to federal land. In 2016, he was the first person arrested
in connection with the Malheur Refuge takeover, after driving into Burns
in a stolen Refuge truck.)(67) In 1996, the Eastern Oregon Militia made an appearance by also threatening to intervene in the Justus Township standoff.(68) In conjunction with other groups, they also suggested
setting up a common law court to resolve the standoff—similar to how the Pacific Patriots Network offered to intervene between the FBI and the
Malheur occupiers in 2016, and using almost the exact same language—to
prevent the government from “trying to instigate another Waco-type situation.”(69)
Klamath Basin Water Crisis
In the Klamath Basin water crisis of 2001–2002, militias capitalized on land-use conflicts to forward a much broader political agenda, just like
what happened at the Malheur Refuge occupation.
The Klamath River Basin (which spans southern Oregon and northern
California), is more than 60 percent federal land, and is the site of a still-unresolved dispute over water rights.(70) There are multiple parties involved, including farmers dependent on river irrigation, local
governments, Native American tribes with water rights, fishers, environmentalists, and the federal government.
In April 2001 the federal government bowed to pressure from the tribes, reducing the water flow significantly in order to reverse fish die-off. In response local farmers organized a protest in the form of a “bucket
brigade,” where they symbolically drew water from the river. They
specifically relied on cowboy imagery, riding on horses dressed up as
cowboys, to show their opposition to the Native tribes’ water claims.
While these protests were rooted in the local community, outside Patriot movement groups joined in. The Southern Oregon Militia sent an email which fantasized about killing Bureau of Land Management employees. The local
sheriff refused to enforce trespassing laws against the protestors, and a
local police officer was put on leave after an incendiary speech
threatening violence against local environmentalists. One man who was
arrested claimed to be part of a fake court which was involved in
“proceedings” against real officials. An out-of-state convoy that came
there in August 2001 was organized by Patriot movement activists,
including the Militia of Montana. While this militia did not actually
follow the convoy into Oregon in order to downplay tensions, at least one member did on his own. And just as in the Malheur conflict in 2016,
Patriot movement activist Richard Mack made an appearance, and U.S. Representative Greg Walden weighed in on the farmers’ side.(71)
https://rop.org/uia/section-i/oregons-hard-right-history/
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