Reporting the Oregon Story by McKay Floyd J.;

Author:McKay, Floyd J.; [McKay, Floyd J.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Oregon State University Press

Stafford Hansell is a blunt and respected state legislator with a degree in economics. His computerized hog ranch is across the interstate freeway from the ammunition igloos. When the Army’s plan was announced, he called his hands together and told them he had lived with the weapons of mass destruction for two decades and wasn’t worried about a little more nerve gas. The workers agreed. “This is not a college community,” Hansell observed. “We haven’t argued the morality of the thing.”

R. P. “Joe” Smith did argue the morality, from an unlikely position as district attorney of Umatilla County. Smith, a lean and articulate descendent of the Joseph Smith who founded the Mormon Church, was a bit of an anomaly in the rural county—a liberal Democrat, he had lived there only two years. He became the local lightning rod for the debate. “What you have down there (Hermiston) is a mini military-industrial complex,” he told me, referring to chemicals stored at the depot as “genocidal weapons.”

It was a precursor, I later realized, of any number of situations in which a small community would opt for good jobs despite an environmental or livability threat, while urbanites with more diverse economic opportunities would see a larger picture. Logging, coastal development, nuclear power, and field burning were some of the big-picture issues that looked quite different in Hermiston or Halsey than they did in Portland or Eugene.

As the Vietnam War generated anger and even violence nationwide, the nerve gas standoff brought into focus states’ rights, and an increasingly unpopular war machine; ultimately it also brought national attention to Oregon’s governor and the state’s reputation for independence. Governor McCall wrote to President Nixon and Vice President Agnew to no avail. He lined up all but one of the Oregon-Washington congressional delegation to oppose the shipment. The holdout was critical, however; the hawkish Washington Democratic senator Henry “Scoop” Jackson had enormous influence with Nixon. When Jackson finally turned against the shipments in May 1970 they were abandoned. Jackson was credited for the victory, but McCall had kept the battle alive.

It took six months for the battle to play out, during which Tom emerged as a stronger and stronger advocate of Oregon citizens. In the midst of the battle, I moved to the unfamiliar world of television news, my home for the next seventeen years. My very first commentary, on April 13, 1970, was on the nerve gas issue. It was a somewhat convoluted argument—too complex for television, as I would learn—and it was based on the low-profile Third Amendment to the US Constitution (you know, the one prohibiting the quartering of soldiers in civilian homes). I argued:

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