Opinion ID: 835750
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Oregon Territorial Laws and Statutes at Statehood

Text: Few statutes enacted by the Oregon territorial legislature or by the Legislative Assembly soon after statehood in 1859 related to the regulation of firearms. However, some statutes are helpful to our analysis as to whether the guarantee set out in Article I, section 27, carried with it legislative regulatory authority respecting the possession of arms as to certain groups of persons. See generally Lakin v. Senco Products, Inc., 329 Or. 62, 71-72, 987 P.2d 463 (1999) (examining relevant territorial laws to discern framers' intent respecting particular constitutional provision); Jory, 153 Or. at 294-96, 56 P.2d 1093 (examining legislative actions at time of statehood as demonstrative of drafters' intent respecting legislature's constitutional power to increase salaries of governmental officials). At the outset, we note that the right to bear arms was incorporated as part of the Organic Law of the Provisional Government, adopted by a vote of the people of Oregon in 1845. Article I, section 5, of the Organic Law provided, in part, that [n]o person shall be deprived of the right of bearing arms in his own defence[.] Organic Law of the Provisional Government of Oregon, Art. I, § 5, pp. 59-60 (Deady 1845-1864). No statute existing at statehood operated to restrict that right as to any groups of persons, including criminals, minors, vagrants, or the insane. Within the first years after statehood, the only statute that imposed a firearm restriction prohibited selling or giving any firearms or ammunition to any Native Americans without the authority of the United States. General Laws of Oregon, Crim. Code, ch. XLIX, § 654, pp. 564-65 (Deady 1845-1864) (effective Oct. 1864). [28] In 1869, 10 years after the adoption of the Oregon Constitution, the legislature enacted a statutory right as to certain firearms for white male citizens, with no exceptions:    Every white male citizen of this state above the age of sixteen years, shall be entitled to have, hold, and keep, for his own use and defence, the following firearms, to wit: either or any one of the following named guns, and one revolving pistol: a rifle, shotgun (double or single barrel), yager, or musket; the same to be exempt from execution, in all cases, under the laws of Oregon.    No officer, civil or military, or other person, shall take from or demand of the owner any firearms mentioned in this chapter, except where the services of the owner are also required to keep the peace or defend the state. General Laws of Oregon, Misc. Laws, ch. XXII, §§ 1-2, p. 613 (Deady & Lane 1843-1872) (effective Oct. 1868). Relatedly, Oregon's early militia laws did not exempt felons or other ex-convicts from voluntary militia service. Laws of Oregon 1855-1856, 7th Regular Session (1855-56), An Act to Organize the Militia, pp. 55-63 (setting out no exceptions to military service) (effective Jan. 1856); Oregon Laws 1856-1858, 8th Regular Session (1856-57), An Act to Amend an Act Entitled An Act to Organize the Militia, p. 34 (effective Dec. 1856) (exempting from militia service persons subject to bear arms under original militia law who are conscientiously opposed to bearing arms); General Laws of Oregon, Misc. Laws, ch. XXXVI, § 4, p. 666 (Deady & Lane 1843-1872) (exempting persons exempt under federal law, ministers, various state officers, and clerks in telegraph offices, and no other persons) (effective Oct. 1862). Most statutes that pertained to firearms at statehood or shortly thereafter were directed at prohibiting dueling and increasing punishment for crimes that involved the use of dangerous weapons. See, e.g., General Laws of Oregon, Crim. Code, ch. XLIII, § 524, pp. 530-31 (Deady 1845-1864) (crime to engage in, or to challenge someone to, duel with deadly weapon) (effective Oct. 1864); id. at § 529, p. 531 (assault and robbery while armed with dangerous weapon) (effective Oct. 1864); id. at § 532, p. 532 (assault while armed with dangerous weapon) (effective Oct. 1864); Oregon Laws 1857-1858, 9th Regular Session (1858), An Act to prevent the escape of Penitentiary Convicts, pp. 57-58 (death penalty to be imposed on territorial convict who, with deadly weapon, strikes, wounds, stabs, shoots, or shoots at penitentiary personnel or sheriff) (effective Jan. 1858). The legislature did not act to prohibit the carrying of concealed weapons until 1885 and did not act to limit the possession of firearms by felonsor the possession of certain arms by any personsuntil 1925. See Laws of Oregon 1885, An Act to prevent Persons from Carrying Concealed Weapons and to provide for the Punishment of the same, §§ 1-4, p. 33 (enacting original statutory prohibition on carrying of concealed weapons); General Laws of Oregon 1925, ch. 260, §§ 2, 5 (enacting predecessor statutes to former ORS 166.250 (1953) (ultimately held unconstitutional in Kessler, Blocker, and Delgado ) and ORS 166.270). As to the rights of felons or ex-convicts generally, the following provisions from Chapter LIII of the Criminal Code of 1864 are informative: § 701. A judgment of imprisonment in the penitentiary for any term less than for life, suspends all the civil rights of the person so sentenced, and forfeits all public offices and all private trusts, authority or power during the term or duration of such imprisonment. § 702. A person sentenced to imprisonment in the penitentiary for life, is thereafter deemed civilly dead. § 703. The person of a convict sentenced to imprisonment in the penitentiary is under the protection of the law, and any injury to his person not authorized by law, is punishable in the same manner as if he was not convicted or sentenced.      § 706. No conviction of any person for crime, works any forfeiture of any property, except in cases where the same is expressly provided by law; but in all cases of the commission or attempt to commit a felony, the state has a lien, from the time of such commission or attempt, upon all the property of the defendant, for the purpose of satisfying any judgment which may be given against him for any fine on account thereof, and for the costs and disbursements in the proceedings against him for such crime. General Laws of Oregon, Criminal Code, ch. LIII, §§ 701-703, 706, pp. 575-76 (Deady 1845-1864) (effective Oct. 1864) (emphasis added); see also Laws of Oregon 1858-1859, 10th Regular Session (1858-59), An Act to Amend an Act to create a Lien upon the Property of Criminals in certain cases, pp. 43-44 (effective Jan. 1859) (setting out enactment creating lien on property of all persons who shall be convicted of any crime). Thus, as to the rights of persons convicted of felonies, the first Oregon Criminal Code provided a distinction between those persons sentenced to the penitentiary for life (thereafter deemed civilly dead) and those sentenced for less than life. As to that latter groupwhich presently would include felons as at issue hereimprisonment operated to suspend their civil liberties during the course of that imprisonment but not to terminate those liberties. Notably, that statutory provision made no exception respecting the bearing of arms. Further, although the state automatically had a lien on the property of such persons dating to territorial law, the legislature soon after statehood exempted firearms from execution under the statutory guarantee, set out earlier, that granted all males older than 16 years the right to possess certain firearms. See General Laws of Oregon, Misc. Laws, ch. XXII, §§ 1-2, p. 613 (Deady & Lane 1843-1872) (effective Oct. 1868). Additional territorial and early statutes, to some extent, addressed other topics relating to felons or ex-convicts. For example, an 1859 law disqualified persons convicted of felonies or misdemeanors involving moral turpitude from serving as jurors. Laws of the State of Oregon, First Extra Session, § 1 (1859), p. 14. However, the original territorial laws did not prohibit felons or ex-convicts from voting. See An Act to Establish the Territorial Government of Oregon, 9 Stat. 323, § 5 (1848), reprinted in General Laws of Oregon, p. 54 (Deady & Lane 1843-1872). [29] Further, although the territorial and early state legislatures developed a comprehensive statutory framework governing operation of the state penitentiary and the monitoring of inmates, nothing in the statutes at statehood or shortly thereafter created any system for monitoring ex-convicts after their release from the penitentiary. [30] Rather, the only statutory provisions pertaining to the discharge of inmates concerned payment upon discharge. See General Laws of Oregon, Misc. Laws, ch. XLIV, §§ 26-27, p. 704 (Deady & Lane 1843-1872) ($5.00 paid to convicts upon discharge, plus $0.50 for each merit mark, subject to forfeiture for damages caused while incarcerated) (effective Oct. 1864). Finally, we note that, unlike the state of the law in colonial America (discussed below), early Oregon statutes imposed the death penalty for only first-degree murder and certain crimes committed during incarceration in the penitentiary. See Statutes of Oregon 1855, ch. III, §§ 1-3, p. 208 (death penalty for first-degree murder; imprisonment for second-degree murder); Oregon Laws 1857-1858, 9th Regular Session (1858), An Act to prevent the escape of Penitentiary Convicts, pp. 57-58 (death penalty to be imposed on territorial convict who, with deadly weapon, strikes, wounds, stabs, shoots, or shoots at penitentiary personnel or sheriff) (effective January 1858); see also generally Don B. Kates, Jr., Handgun Prohibition and the Original Meaning of the Second Amendment, 82 Mich. L. Rev. 204, 266 (1983) (felons at colonial times punished with automatic forfeiture of all goods, usually accompanied by death). As to the types of laws qualifying as felonies, Oregon's first criminal code identified certain crimes as felonies that did not involve any injury to person or property. See, e.g., General Laws of Oregon, Crim. Code, ch. XLVI, §§ 616-18, p. 554 (Deady 1845-1864) (felony to bribe Oregon voter or to receive such bribe) (effective 1864); General Laws of Oregon, Crim. Code, ch. V, §§ 632-35, p. 429 (Deady & Lane 1843-1872) (felony to induce or persuade voter from another state to vote in Oregon or to induce Oregon voter to stay away from polls) (effective 1870). In short, like the Oregon Constitution of 1859, the Oregon statutes in effect both before and shortly after statehood limited the rights of felons in some circumstances ( e.g., in suspending civil liberties while imprisoned and in disqualifying felons from serving on juries). However, nothing in those statutes expressly provided for the disarmament of felons after release from the penitentiary. Further, the statutes in effect at that time expressly protected arms possession, both in prohibiting deprivation of the right generally and in guaranteeing the right of all white males over 16 years old to possess certain firearms.