During the first two decades following statehood in 1859, the Oregon Supreme Court heard a great many disputes about personnel or activities of the new state government. Were Oregon blacks entitled to vote after national ratification of the Fifteenth Amendment, even though Oregon itself voted not to ratify? Did the federal legal tender acts require Oregon to accept payment of its own taxes in depreciated greenbacks? Could a landowner's eminent domain recovery be reduced by an improvementrelated increase in the value of remaining land?