Creating four states out of the three makes more sense

In the previous installment of North Idaho Journal I attempted to make the point that North Idaho, both politically and geologically, has never fit well with the rest of Idaho state. The joining of the two areas is unnatural.

I left off with the finding that, 140 million years ago, North Idaho and British Columbia had just arrived at the North American continent from the Pacific via continental drift. Plate tectonics is the relatively new science of continental drift and tells us that the continents and oceans are actually on huge plates that ride on top of a molten layer beneath the Earth’s crust.

As these plates float around, they crash, in very slow motion, into each other. When India collided with Asia, the Himalayas, the highest mountains in the world, were formed by the resultant crash and scrunch.

Well, over a long time, say 70 or so million years, oceanic plates crashed into each other, and lots of small islands and reefs were scrunched together to form a land mass that later collided with Idaho.

At about this same time, another scrunched-together oceanic land mass crashed into Mexico and began creeping up the coast. After another 50 million years, and a northward journey of 1,000 miles, this compacted bunch of islands formed what is now coastal British Columbia and northern Washington.

The other land mass, the one that crashed into Idaho, had moved into position to form interior British Columbia, northeastern Washington and North Idaho. That left North America with no Oregon, and only the northern third of Washington. Idaho was once again beachfront property.

In Hill Williams’ book, “The Restless Northwest: A Geological Story” (published in 2002 by Washington State University Press), there is a lot more detail about all of this, and it also completes the story of where Oregon and the rest of Washington came from. My concern here is just with North Idaho.

Hopefully, from this brief sketch, you can see my point. And again my point is that North Idaho does not fit well in the rest of Idaho state. So, how do we remedy this situation? I propose that we do so with a realignment of the Northwest states based on this new geologic information.

There is a long history of animosity between different areas of the three states of the Northwest. Spokane residents decry their tax dollars going to support various projects in Seattle. Most recently it has been highway projects for the incredibly congested Seattle-to-Olympia corridor.

Before that it was money to build a baseball stadium for the Seattle Mariners. However, I think that now we can all agree that Safeco Field, despite what the Mariners do, or do not do, was worth every penny. At least I’d pay to just sit there on a summer’s day and enjoy the stadium, with or without a game.

Still, basic differences in viewpoint and lifestyle exist. Why else would this geologically unique area of Washington be attracting so many who are fleeing the other geological area? And the same goes for Western Oregon/Eastern Oregon and Idaho/North Idaho.

I’d propose four new states with two old names. “Oregon” would be the current Oregon, west of the crest of the Cascade Mountains. “Washington” would similarly be the current Washington, west of the crest of the Cascades. In each state, this relatively narrow strip has most of the population and a decidedly different culture from that east of the Cascades.

The portion of Oregon east of the Cascades might want to align with extreme northern California, an area which has a similar identity crisis. I’d propose Bend as the capital – certainly not Klamath Falls. My favorite part of eastern Oregon is the Malheur basin, so “Malheur” would be my new state name.

Finally, and most importantly, I’d combine the remainder of Washington with the nine northern Idaho counties – Lewis County north. I’d propose “Columbia” as the name for this state and Spokane as the capital.

However, based on population, it might be more practical to combine the states of Malheur and Columbia. We wouldn’t want to become a Wyoming in the United States Congress, with virtually no representation. With this larger state, the Tri-Cities would be a more practical capital. The three towns could be combined into one city called “Tricities,” for less confusion.

Naming such a state would be a bigger problem. What would all three areas have in common? Actually, much of this area was being seriously settled in the mid-1800s. How about “Lincoln” as the new state? Why should Washington be the only president to get a state?

Well, what do you think? I’m sure that there are some details that would need to be worked out. I’d be willing to change the name of this column. And geologically we’d be more correct. It makes a lot more sense than the original process did 140 years ago.