[Governor Dinwiddie]

Yes, they’ve come a long way since those days of black folk slaving away in Oregon’s cotton fields and tobacco plantations. Oregon is the epitome of “systemic racism”. </sarc>

[A strike]

“Oregon’s cotton fields and tobacco plantations.”

Is there another Oregon no one else is aware of ?

[Verginius Rufus]

When Oregon was first settled, free blacks were excluded (and of course there was no slavery). So there were no black people being oppressed in Oregon at that time--they were being oppressed elsewhere (assuming they were being oppressed but we can take that for granted if they lived near any white people). But Oregonians can feel guilty about their forebears' systemic racism in not letting blacks be oppressed in Oregon.

Oregon became a state in 1859. My great-great-great-grandfather was an early settler and signed a petition in support of statehood. If only I could go back in time and tell him how unenlightened he and his white Oregonian compatriots were.

/s