Cascadia
From Free net encyclopedia
- For the Oregon ghost town, see Cascadia, Oregon
Image:Cascadian flag.jpg Cascadia is a geological, ecological and climatic region of North America. It is generally bounded by the Cascade Range and the Pacific Ocean, but interpretations of the region often include other areas as well. Its ecoregions are distinct from those of the more arid lands to the east and south, and so its agriculture and forestry also vary.
It is often claimed that the region also has a shared political culture. In his book Nine Nations of North America, author Joel Garreau claimed that the Pacific Rim region he called Ecotopia had a different culture from that of what he called The Empty Quarter to the east, and was necessarily different economically as well as ecologically. It must be notes that the concept of "Ecotopia," which is specific in its boundries, does not identically match that of "Cascadia," which varies in its definition.
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Secessionist and autonomy movements and ideas
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Cascadia is a proposed name for the independent sovereign state that would be formed by the union of British Columbia, Washington and Oregon were these states and provinces ever to successfully secede from their respective federal governments in Ottawa and Washington DC. The boundaries of this Cascadia would incorporate those of the existing province and states.
The idea for an autonomous or independent Cascadian state first arose after Thomas Jefferson sent Lewis and Clark into the Pacific Northwest in 1803. Jefferson envisioned the establishment of an independent nation in the Western portion of the North American continent that he dubbed the "Republic of the Pacific". Jefferson's original idea has since been embraced by a number of different groups with generally similar aims. Some groups have sought to extend the interpretation of "Cascadia" to embrace parts of Northern California and Alaska, while others are more closely aligned with such related concepts as the State of Jefferson, the New California Republic, State of Trinity, State of Jackson, State of Klamath, State of Shasta and Pacifica.
Political motivations for the secession and autonomy movements deal mostly with perceived shared Cascadian political culture, values, language dialect, history and interests, which the eastern federal governments are accused of ignoring and being out of touch with.
Elements among the regions population sought to secede from the United States and form their own country from the very beginning of Oregon's statehood. While the Southern states broke away to form the Confederacy, some Oregonians saw it as a perfect opportunity to do the same and give new life to Jefferson's original idea, by trying to establish a country under Jefferson's name: the "Republic of the Pacific". The American government launched a successful propaganda attack to destroy the movement by trying to associate the Pacific movement with a group called the Knights of The Golden Circle which was a pro-Confederate, pro-slavery organization.
At the same time, other movements inside of Cascadia, such as the Klamath movement, Trinity and Jackson movements all sought to wrench certain areas of Cascadia free from U.S. control. These too failed, largely by being put down through various uses of force.
In the 1930's, the State of Jefferson movement came into being and is to date, the best known of such movements in the region. On the surface, that movement appeared to be a drive to tear Southern Oregon and Northern California away from California and Oregon. As this is historically a depressed area, many locals placed the blame on the governments of Salem and Sacramento. For that reason, a flag bearing two X's and a gold pan was adopted. The two X's represented the so-called "double crosses" from Sacramento and Salem. Though that is the State of Jefferson movement on the surface, many of those who organized it actually saw that the problems in "Jefferson" actually stemmed from the federal government and those people saw Jefferson statehood as a stepping stone to eventually breaking free from U.S. rule altogether. During 1940 and 1941, organizers attracted massive media attention by arming themselves and blockading Highway 99 to the south of Yreka, California where they collected tolls from motorists and passed out proclamations of independence. When a California Highway Patrolman turned up on the scene, he was told to "get down the road back to California". Local representatives were scheduled to meet with Congress on December 8 1941, but as a result of the attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7 1941, the issue was tabled. After Japanese firebombs exploded in Oregon, killing several people, the entire movement faded away to support the war.
In 1956, groups from Cave Junction, Oregon and Dunsmuir, California threatened to tear Southern Oregon and Northern California from their respective state rulers to form the State of Shasta. Several of the organizers involved took it one step further and threatened the federal government with armed resistance unless certain demands were met.
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Two novels by Ernest Callenbach, Ecotopia (1975) and Ecotopia Emerging (1981), are fictional portrayals of the secession of the region from the United States. Callenbach's novels include Washington, Oregon, and the northern half of California in the new country (with the dividing line between northern and southern California drawn roughly through Santa Barbara and Bakersfield). Seriatim was a short-lived magazine published in El Cerrito, California in the late 1970s which also promoted the secession of the region along the lines portrayed by Callenbach.
Unrelated to any of the other secessionist movements and regarded with near-universal hostility among residents of the Northwest was the Northwest Territorial Imperative, a secessionist proposal promoted by the Aryan Nations during the 1980s.
In more recent years, a more organized movement calling for the re-unification of the original Oregon Country (which included the area of the modern day southern British Columbia, Washington, Oregon, and Idaho and into a single entity for the purpose of gaining independence from both the United States and Canada has come into being under the name of the Evergreen Revolution. Supporters of the Evergreen Revolution hope to one day achieve the independence of Cascadia through peaceful means, much the same way as was done in the former Czecho-Slovakia's Velvet Revolution in 1989.
The region is already served by several cooperative organizations and interstate or international agencies, especially in forestry and fishery management and emergency response - the whole region being prone to earthquakes. These organizations are thought by some to be precursors of a bioregional democracy, perhaps along the 'Republic' lines.
Cascadia (Megacity)
Cascadia is also used as the name for the megacity occupying the Cascadia region. This megacity (also known as a conurbation, an agglomeration, or a megalopolis) stretches along Interstate 5 in the states of Oregon and Washington and the province of British Columbia. It occupies four distinct geographic regions: the southeastern shore of Vancouver Island, the Fraser River delta also known as the Lower Mainland, the shores of the Puget Sound, and the Willamette Valley. It is comprised of several cities and metropolitan areas, including Victoria, Vancouver, Bellingham, metropolitan Seattle and Tacoma (including Bremerton and Olympia), Kelso and Longview, metropolitan Portland and Vancouver, Salem, Albany, Corvallis, and Eugene. The Cascadia megacity has a 2004 population of about 9.6 million.
See also
External links
- The Cascadian Republic A recent site devoted to Cascadia
- Cascadian BioRegionalism A discussion group devoted to exploring Cascadian BioRegionalism.
- Cascadia A wikiproject related to the bioregion and its culture.
- Cascadia Forums An internet discussion forum dedicated to the discussion of Cascadia.
- Cascadian English Cascadians discuss their own regional dialect. Included are articles detailing research into Cascadia's unique dialect, including details on Chinook Jargon, Cascadia's original trade language.
- AltaColumbia A comprehensive list of Cascadian autonomy and secessionist movements and groups.
- The Cascadian National Party proposed an independent state consisting of Washington and Oregon. CNP is now more or less defunct due to inactivity.
- The Cascadia Institute promotes consciousness of a bioregion extending along the coast from northern California up to northern British Coumbia and extending east into parts of Idaho and Alberta.