The Politics of Public Ventures

Two centuries after Lewis and Clark paddled down the Columbia Gorge so vividly pictured on the books cover, Jack Beattys memoir describes how young veterans of WW II moved into Oregons political life, revived the Democratic party, cooperated with young Republicans and forced legislative reapportionment. Months later Beatty defended the constitutional amendment from legal challenge. As counsel to the Democratic Party and later as a lawyer Jack dealt with Oregons two combustible Democratic senators, Wayne Morse and Richard L. Neuberger, then with Senator Maureen Neyberger elected to succeed her husband following his untimely death. Beatty suggested Sidney I. Lezak as Oregons U.S. Attorney to Congresswoman Edith Green. Lezaks appointment was famously blocked by Senator Maureen Neuberger for a year. Practicing law, co-chairing Robert Kennedys Oregon campaign for the presidency, Beatty served six years on the Portland School Board leading that urban district through the difficult late sixties. Governor Tom McCall appointed him to the Circuit Court, Governor Robert Straub appointed him to his Task Force on Corrections which proposed major changes in criminal law. Chief Justice Denecke made Judge Beatty legislative spokesman for the Judicial Conference and vice chair of the Commission for the Judicial Branch in the great restructuring of Oregons courts in the 1980s. Retiring from the court in 1985, Beatty served until 1990 as Vice Chair of the Criminal Justice Council under former Speaker Hardy Meyers in a massive reformation of Oregons criminal sentencing process. In 1996 Judge Beatty chared a Portland City Club study of the Oregon Initiative which proposed major limitations to that constitutional process. A candid description of history in the making, this memoir is also a concise description of the role of judging and the complex problems of our criminal justice system.