Robert Colby is a Butte County resident and editor of TALES OF THE PARADISE RIDGE, the biannual publication of the Paradise Historical Society. An edited version of the article below ran in the Paradise Post Dec. 9, 2000.

Jefferson, Reality or a State of Mind?

By Robert Colby

Citizens of Butte County rise up and throw off your shackles; it is long past time to join the State of Jefferson! We citizens of Northern California pay our taxes only to be pillaged by the Southern California Megalopolis. Not only were we virtually disenfranchised in the last presidential election, the Metropolitan Water District is draining Our Lake Oroville down to a pathetic, muddy little puddle. And the bureaucrats and politicians in Sacramento say it is only their due. Well, let's show them. We'll join the State of Jefferson and secede from California.

The idea for a separate state started back in 1850 when citizens of Northern California and Southern Oregon felt that their respective state governments collected taxes and yet neglected them and were indifferent to their problems, especially their poor roads. In 1852 the California Legislature actually considered a bill for what was to be called the State of Klamath.  The boundaries were to be from Cape Mendocino in California north to the Umpqua Heads in Oregon with the southern boundary running to the eastern California border and northern border running to the eastern edge of the Oregon Territory. The bill never got out of committee in the legislature. Even back then, Northerner's destiny was in the hands of others.

In 1854 the name was changed and delegates from both states elected a slate of officials and passed a resolution urging the formation of the Territory of Jackson. This resolution was ignored when it was sent to the United States Congress and the legislatures of both California and Oregon. Miners in both Northern California and Southern Oregon pretty much did as they pleased, considering themselves citizens of whichever state was, at the moment, convenient. They claimed either state as their own, depending often on which state's tax collector was at the door. They also voted in whichever state they happened to be at election time.

The California Legislature also considered a plan to split the state into three parts in 1854-55. Modoc, Siskiyou, Humboldt, Shasta, Trinity, Plumas and part of Butte Counties were to become the State of Shasta. Monterey, Merced and part of Mariposa were to become the State of Colorado while the rest of the state would still be called California. The State Assembly endorsed the plan, but the Senate ignored it.

In 1859 the State of Jefferson was again proposed when citizens of Siskiyou, Del Norte, Klamath, Humboldt, Trinity, Shasta, Plumas and Tehama Counties felt that their postal service and military protection were not worth the high taxes that they were paying. This same year the California Legislature passed and the governor actually signed a bill to allow Southern California counties to form their own state, but Congress in Washington would not approve it. Even back then the Southerners got their way, at least within the state. Then in 1877-78 the legislature unsuccessfully tried to revise the State Constitution again to form a State of Shasta. Secessionist feelings and legislative finagling pretty much died down until 1909 when some citizens of Curry County, Oregon, unsuccessfully proposed the State of Siskiyou. Then in 1935 a judge in Crescent City, California, proclaimed himself governor of a facetious movement to secede named Jefferson to draw attention to the deplorable condition of the roads in Del Norte County. He was serious about the roads and the state did make a minimal effort to repair them.

In November 1941, the most "serious" effort to establish the State of Jefferson was initiated, again by those in Curry County, Oregon, just above the border with California. This time it was to include the counties of Siskiyou, Del Norte and Modoc in California and the counties of Curry, Josephine and Jackson in Oregon. Again the citizens in these counties felt ignored and abandoned by both state governments. This time the name of Mittelwestcoastia was decided upon until cooler heads prevailed and the State of Jefferson was adopted. Part of the platform was that there was to be no taxes on income, sales or liquor and that slot machines were to be outlawed as unfair competition to local stud poker parlors.

Neither state government took the threat of secession very seriously as the only chance for success was for both State Legislatures and the United States Congress to approve.  And the cause probably was not helped when "The Oregon Cavemen ", a Grants Pass, Oregon, booster club got involved. Their idea of the title for the state treasurer was "Keeper of the Wampum." Apparently they eventually faded back into the depths of the Oregon Caves from whence they had come in 1922.

But neither cavemen nor the states' indifference stopped the secessionists, especially those in Northern California, when they heard that State Legislator said that the "Northern border counties bartered only in bear claws and eagle beaks." With this insult, the Northern California secessionists took charge and the State of Jefferson's capitol was moved to Yreka, California.

The San Francisco Chronicle considered the episode important enough to dispatch a reporter to the scene. His articles on the "Yreka Rebellion" were so convincing and dramatic that in 1942 he was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in Journalism for his efforts.

Now the secessionists had the attention of more than the local folk as
the Chronicle's man wrote that he felt that their intentions were at least "half serious." About this time, the citizens of Lassen County decided that they wanted to join the movement. An acting governor and a slate of State officers, including a State Senator, were appointed. The State of Jefferson was now in "Patriotic Rebellion" against the indifference and double-dealing of state governments in both Sacramento and Salem. In Yreka mounted members of a civic club armed themselves with hunting rifles and set up roadblocks on Highway 99. Their intent was really benign, as they only wanted to pass out handbills and windshield stickers to motorists stating "I have visited Jefferson, the 49th State." Needless to say the California Highway Patrol took a dim view of this, regardless of the intent. 

On December 4, 1941 Life and Time magazines sent photographers. Probably for their benefit, a celebration and torch light parade were held with local citizens dressing in western costume. Banners with such slogans as "Our Roads Are Not Passable, Hardly Jackassable" were proudly displayed. The new governor had himself photographed with a bear cub and would have been inaugurated that day had he not been indisposed due to too much celebrating.

On December 6, 1941, the newly elected state officials met to get things going. On December 8 a newsreel was to be released throughout the United States. But, on December 7, the State of Jefferson came to an abrupt end, "in view of the National Emergency." But, it did not go without first making a plea to both State and Federal governments to do something about the roads, now because of the "immense deposits of strategic and necessary defense materials" existing in what some thought should have become the State of Jefferson.

So WWII put the kibosh on the state of Jefferson. But hope dies hard and in the 1960s it was alive again as Northern Californians and Southern Oregonians still felt over taxed and under served by their respective state governments. In 1971 it was proposed that Jefferson become the 51st state with its capitol in Grants Pass. By 1988 the capitol was back in California and by 1998 the State of Jefferson had been increased to seven California and six Oregon counties. It still exists today, as a "state of Mind." And it can be found on the web at www.jeffersonstate.com .

Serious or facetious, the State of Jefferson is an idea that has been around for 150 years. Butte County really has never had much part in it, but who is to say that we should not. Considering how we are treated by the LALAlanders who control our state government, maybe it is an idea whose time has come. If nothing else, it will get their attention and just maybe they will take us less for granted.