OPINION
Wallowa County Chieftain
A4
Wednesday, April 3, 2019
Oregon’s
complicated
past with capital
punishment
VOICE of the CHIEFTAIN
O
regon’s history tells story of a pop-
ulace’s fi ckle approach to the death
penalty.
Initially adopted in 1864, capital punishment
has since twice been abolished and three times
reinstated by a popular vote of the people. The
one time the State’s Judicial Branch stepped in
— holding it unconstitutional in 1981— was not
well received by the voters who in turn amended
the Constitution to reinstate it just three years
later.
There are plenty of reasons why the outdated
practice of capital punishment is not only unnec-
essary, but also unwise. And as a practical mat-
ter, Oregon hasn’t executed an individual since
1997— our court system makes it nearly impos-
sible to accomplish.
It would seem that the Oregon Legisla-
ture is attempting to carve out some middle
ground. While technically not abolishing the
death penalty, House Bill 3268 effectively does
just that by only allowing capital punishment
in cases involving terrorism-related killing of
more than one person. If history lends any per-
spective, the independent spirit of Oregon vot-
ers will not appreciate being dictated to by the
courts or the legislature, the bill’s nominal effect
notwithstanding.
Rather than use valuable political capital
pushing through legislation with little foresee-
able benefi t, Oregon’s politicians should engage
a campaign to educate the public on the folly of
death row but allow Oregonians the ultimate say.
Developments in the social sciences, fi scal
impact studies and our society’s capacity to pro-
tect itself from violent criminals speak volumes.
The harsh nature of the death penalty has never
proven to be a deterrent. Taxpayers actually save
money when the state doesn’t engage in capi-
tal punishment. And most importantly, too many
people are convicted and sentenced, only to fi nd
out later the verdict was incorrect.
In fact, the only rational support for capi-
tal punishment boils down to a human impulse
for revenge. But contemporary psychology pre-
scribes that any perceived gratifi cation that one
derives from revenge is not just short lived, but
often leaves an individual feeling worse than
before. Revenge in the place of justice does not
fi ll the void left when we lose a loved one.
Mrs. Coretta Scott King, the widow of Mar-
tin Luther King Jr., knows as well as anyone
the pain and heartbreak of the senseless mur-
der of a loved one. And perhaps she says it best:
“An evil deed is not redeemed by an evil deed in
retaliation.”
Even more, perhaps Oregon’s ambiva-
lence surrounding this highly controversial act
lends insight. The state’s history of fl uid value
judgments regarding the death penalty pro-
vides a narrative of clashing interests, pitting
the impulse for revenge against the instinctive
squeamishness that tells us the government has
the right and obligation to protect and to pun-
ish, but not to kill. The collective body ought to
always set the bar high, and should never stoop
to dangerously emotional impulses.
Until the people of Oregon come to this con-
clusion themselves, any legislative attempt
to dictate value judgments appears futile and
costly.
Christian Ambroson is the editor of The Wallowa
County Chieftain. He lives in Joseph.
WHERE TO WRITE
Washington, D.C.
The White House —
1600 Pennsylvania Ave.
N.W., Washington, D.C.
20500; Phone-comments:
202-456-1111; Switch-
board: 202-456-1414.
U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden,
D — 516 Hart Senate Offi ce
Building, Washington D.C.
20510. Phone: 202-224-
5244. E-mail: wayne_kin-
ney@wyden.senate.gov
Web site: http://wyden.sen-
ate.gov Fax: 202-228-2717.
U.S. Sen. Jeff Merk-
ley, D — 313 Hart Senate
Offi ce Building, Washing-
ton D.C. 20510. Phone: 202-
224-3753. E-mail: senator@
merkley.senate.gov. Fax:
202-228-3997.
Navigation by bushes
I
need to be more careful about
being careful about what I wish
for. My new job has me down in
the Imnaha Canyon a bunch, and it’s
great. So they say to me, hey, do you
wanna go around and do the tempera-
ture loggers once a month? These log-
ging devices are small doodads in the
water that take the temperature of the
stream every so often. They scrib-
ble little digital notes to themselves
and you come along periodically to
squeeze the information out through
some wires. Then you carry that info
back to town and put the numbers
inside a thinking box, which is called a
“computer.” It’s kind of technical.
The part that sounded good to
me was walking up the creeks every
month. Seeing new territory is always
nice but I sure do enjoy revisiting cer-
tain spots to see what they look and
act like in different moods. So I was
keen to get acquainted with these
creeks through regular checkups. I
believe I went so far as to say these
words out loud: “It’ll be great to really
get to know them.”
Well, mission accomplished. I was
shown the locations of the temperature
logger sites and when the next month
rolled around, I assured my bosses
I could fi nd those suckers again, no
problem. You just go up the creek and
then there’s that trail, by those trees.
And some rocks. Maybe a bush? Um.
A call to action for Child
Abuse Prevention Month
We Can Prevent Child Sexual Abuse
in Wallowa County.
We’ve all seen the stories: A trusted
adult is charged with sexually abusing
the children they care for.
Child sexual abuse is a serious health
problem that can happen anywhere, even
in Wallowa County. Luckily, it can be
stopped.
According to the prevention orga-
nization Darkness to Light, one in 10
children will experience child sexual
abuse before their 18th birthday. And
the impact can be long-lasting. Research
shows that children who are sexually
violated are far more likely to experience
psychological problems.
Fortunately, there are steps to prevent
this from happening in Wallowa County.
The Ford Family Foundation’s Pro-
tect Our Children program administers
a nationally acclaimed training curric-
ulum, Darkness to Light’s Stewards of
Children. The training is available for
free at Building Healthy Families.
Youth athletic coaches regularly inter-
act with kids and teens and can become
excellent mentors who help guide stu-
dents on productive paths forward.
That’s why all coaches should be trained
to detect and prevent child sexual abuse.
In honor of National Child Abuse
Prevention Month in April, I am ask-
ing you to help me put an end to child
sexual abuse. The next free training
will be held on Friday April 26, 2019,
at 9 a.m. at Building Healthy Fami-
lies. Advance registration is required by
phone 541.426.9411 or email to mdal-
ton@oregonbhf.org.
We owe it to the children of Wallowa
County. Let’s be a champion for them.
Maria Weer
Enterprise
AND
FURTHERMORE
Jon Rombach
Man, there’s a lot of rocks and little
trails and bushes in the world. And a
lot of them start looking alike if a per-
son isn’t careful.
On my very fi rst try I gained inti-
mate knowledge of two drainages in
particular. There was some poison
ivy involved. Thorns. It was snowing.
Lots of backtracking. Getting whipped
in the face by tiny branches. What
I was looking for were sections of
small cable, attached to trees and run-
ning into the creek. The business end
of the cable is attached to metal hous-
ings to protect the little digital loggers.
The diameter and color of the cable is
not too much different from the four-
teen-zillion stalks of grass and small
twigs that also drape themselves along
these creekbeds and run into the water
at the same angle a cable would. I, uh,
really got to know the area.
Thing was, when I was shown the
sites on the fi rst go-round we were
walking along talking about work and
this and that and a few other things
and then suddenly, whoah. Here we
are. See this rock here? And this tree?
LETTERS to the EDITOR
Response to Op-Ed
conceding Rail with Trails
In a March 27 Op-Ed, Annette Lath-
rop charges Trail advocates of deceit and
manipulation. We challenge her to sup-
port these claims.
What are the specifi c “partial truths,
half-truths and untruths”? What are her
opposing arguments and supporting
evidence?
She claims: “Tens of thousands of
dollars in grant money has allowed the
hiring of a slew of professionals to pro-
duce this application.” Specifi cally, how
has this resulted in a fl awed application?
The “confl ict...of a powerful group
pushing a recreational trail vs. hard
working local agricultural producers,
long term county residents with a record
of supporting the community” is a false
dichotomy. We are a cooperative, inter-
woven and interdependent community,
not a war zone.
If Joseph Branch Trail Consortium
“cherry picked” data to produce an “illu-
sion of massive public support,” provide
data that this is not true.
The author resents funds for the Trail
come from grants and tax dollars. How
are non-agricultural workers supposed to
view taxes that support farm subsidies?
In a pluralistic society, none of us has the
luxury of providing taxes only to select
organizations that personally benefi t us.
Finally, “JBTC does not understand
nor value our agricultural lifestyle, set-
ting up an unhealthy county dynamic.”
Another false dichotomy. Those of us
not directly involved in farming can
still understand and value agriculture
practices; this is one reason many of us
moved here! To suggest the trail will
Wallowa County’s Newspaper Since 1884
M EMBER O REGON N EWSPAPER P UBLISHERS A SSOCIATION
Published every Wednesday by: EO Media Group
VOLUME 134
USPS No. 665-100
P.O. Box 338 • Enterprise, OR 97828
Offi ce: 209 NW First St., Enterprise, Ore.
Phone: 541-426-4567 • Fax: 541-426-3921
Contents copyright © 2019. All rights reserved.
Reproduction without permission is prohibited.
General manager, Jennifer Cooney, jcooney@wallowa.com
Editor, Christian Ambroson, editor@wallowa.com
Publisher, Chris Rush, crush@eomediagroup.com
Reporter, Stephen Tool, steve@wallowa.com
Reporter, Ellen Morris Bishop, ebishop@wallowa.com
Administrative Assistant, Amber Mock, amock@wallowa.com
Advertising Assistant, Cheryl Jenkins, cjenkins@wallowa.com
OK. Now, this very faint trail is what
we’re looking for. I tried to sear the
landmarks into my brain. Really took
some mental notes. What I should
have taken was my GPS.
Back when I was learning the
ropes of rafting on the Grande Ronde,
rowing the gearboat for Wind-
ing Waters River Expeditions, there
may have been some trial and error
involved with me fi nding certain
camps. “Remember: start pulling over
when you see that tree on the bend
with those rocks, next to the bushes.
Can’t miss it.” OK. Got it. Rocks and
bushes. And a tree. But, hey, it’s like
taking the wrong exit off the freeway
in Portland. You end up going over
some bridge and it takes forty minutes
to backtrack and you learn your lesson
after doing that three or four times.
I wish I was one of those people
with a built-in compass that was fac-
tory-installed before being born. Or do
I? Do those people ever really appre-
ciate the instinctive knowing of exact
coordinates? Maybe, just maybe, a
person needs to experience some fruit-
less searching fi rst with a vague under-
standing of where they need to be
before they can truly know what it is
to fi nd what they’re after. Yeah, prob-
ably not. That internal compass pro-
gram sounds way better.
Jon Rombach is a local columnist
for the Chieftain.
bring the end of agriculture in Wallowa
County borders on an unhealthy delu-
sion that should be called out for what
it is.
Terry and Ron Polk
Lostine
David vs. Goliath?
The David vs. Goliath compari-
son described in last week’s anti-Jo-
seph Branch Trail Op-Ed is accurate —
except the writer has it backwards. The
real Davids are the many hard working
neighbors throughout our community
who support a simple trail which will
connect two of our towns.
That support represents a long term
investment in a unique project which
will benefi t the majority of our citizens.
It has everything to do with our mutual
support of agriculture and our rural lives
by connecting us more to each other, not
by dividing us as insinuated.
The Goliath the author portrays is not
a “powerful group pushing a recreational
trail… .” Instead, an anti-this, anti-that,
anti-anything cloud, which lurks over
our valley under the guise that “any
and all change must be bad.” The cloud
forms when positive things like the trail,
which would improve the lives of the
majority of our citizens, appear.
It’s the Goliath-size cloud that has
now permeated proceedings of the mis-
named “planning” commission. The
commission reached a negative deci-
sion based on hearsay: “what-if” specu-
lations, false perceptions and a failure to
follow required procedure. Finally, the
commission failed to address the valid-
ity of the comprehensive study in the
conditional use permit that concluded
a trail would not interfere with farming
See Letters, Page A5
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