The low elevation forests of western Oregon have checkered history involving railroads, corruption and even the Supreme Court since settlers moved west.

The history of these lands date back to how the west was settled. One of the biggest obstacles to westward expansion was transportation. Moving goods from one place to the next and encouraging people to move thousands of miles across a rugged, wild landscape was certainly a challenge – without the advantage of cars and airplanes as we have today.   

Just after the Civil War, in order to assist settlement, Congress began offering land grants from federally owned land to assist rail and wagon road construction. In 1866 the State of Oregon was fortunate to receive a huge grant including every other square mile in a 40-mile swath of land stretching from Portland south to the California border.

Oregon then awarded a private railroad company the land, to sell to settlers, in order to cover the costs of railroad construction and encourage settlement.  The company would take over management of the railroad they built.  In order to prevent the giveaway of the land to big corporations, the following stipulations were placed on the grant:

    •     Bona fide settlers must buy and settle the land.
    •     Only 160 acres could be sold at a time, and only to one settler.
    •     $2.50 per acre was the maximum price.

The Great Oregon Forest Giveaway
The Oregon and California Railroad Company immediately started building the important railway and promptly violated all three conditions placed on the disposal of the forestland. Instead, the company sold off the gigantic timber to the highest bidder. In 1903, the Southern Pacific Railroad --– which bought the O&C Railroad Co. and finished the railway – ceased selling the land to settlers altogether because of the mounting value of the old-growth timber.

When this was found out the State of Oregon was furious, as they were interested in seeing the land settled, not sold off to timber interests. The U.S. Congress eventually passed a resolution that reclaimed the land in federal ownership. The railroad sued.  Legal battles drug on for years and the case eventually made its way to the Supreme Court. The high court ruled that Southern Pacific had to give the land back and enjoined any further land sale.

The court left it to Congress to figure out what to do with the land. They passed the Chamberlain-Ferris Act in 1916 and the O&C Act in 1937, putting the management of these forests in the hands of the General Lands Office. The Office merged with the Grazing Service in 1946 to become the BLM. While the BLM wound up with almost 2.4 million acres, several hundred thousand acres were located on lands administered by the Forest Service.

It might have made more sense to have the U.S. Forest Service manage these federal lands, as they managed almost all of the forest reserves in the U.S. at the time. Nevertheless, six BLM Districts in western Oregon, in an agency more accustomed to managing cows in arid deserts than forested watersheds, now administer some of the nation's most unique public forests.

Legacy of Abuse
The federal timber sale program began in earnest with the post-World War II housing boom.  The logging of the Pacific Northwest’s ancient forests is legendary. In 50 years over 80% of the old growth was leveled. The western Oregon BLM Districts facilitated logging by administering timber sale contracts. Logging reached a feverish pitch in the 1980s, leaving many damaged watersheds, boomed then busted rural economies, and a monoculture of tree plantations dominating a once lush landscape of cathedral forests.  

Since the Northern spotted owl was listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act – because the rate of old forest removal would not sustain the old-growth dependant species – logging has been curtailed on the BLM’s forests. There are still numerous old-growth timber sales, but several hundred thousand acres were protected in old-growth reserves.

Because the land that was granted was every other square mile (section), it formed what has been called a “checker board” ownership pattern.  Several areas have been consolidated over the years as a result of land exchanges and large blocks of roadless ancient forest do still persist on the Oregon BLM.

The Threat is Growing
Despite the importance of the Oregon BLM, numerous old-growth logging projects threaten the overall integrity of these low-elevation forests. Particularly on the Coos Bay, Roseburg and Medford BLM, timber planners have targeted remaining ancient forests in spotted owl critical habitat and in key watersheds for salmon recovery.

In a move that threatens up to 800,000 acres of remaining old-growth forest, the Bush administration has proposed to remove protections on the Oregon BLM. Arguing that the 1937 O&C act makes timber production more important than wildlife, clean water or other uses, the Bush administration is poised to open up currently protected old-growth forest. 

The corrupt history of the some of the most majestic forests on earth is continuing. In the summer of 2005, the BLM began revising management plans for western Oregon BLM forests. We can only hope that the citizens of Oregon and all Americans will step in again, like they did almost 100 years ago, and save these forests for future generations to come.

Click here for more information and PDF documents on the legal history of O&C lands.