We Oregonians take great pride in our independence, so much so that we occasionally tell the federal government to go take a hike where a law is concerned. Thus Oregon is, at least for now, a “sanctuary” state so far as immigration is concerned, and marijuana is a drug available for legal consumption.

Yet setting our own course by choosing to ignore federal law creates some ethical problems, it seems to me. And whether or not I support either or both of the two laws mentioned above, I think the issues the whole idea raises are very real.

Oregon’s sanctuary state status is 31 years old. It has its roots in a now-closed restaurant in Independence, when four police officers approached four Hispanic men and began questioning them about their citizenship.

At least one of the men, Delmiro Trevino, was a U.S. citizen, and I don’t know about the other three. He finally was released, and, as any good American would, he found a lawyer and sued. He’d been humiliated, he said, and he accused the police of acting at the behest of the Immigration and Naturalization Service, predecessor to ICE.

A decade later, in 1987, Trevino’s lawyer, Rocky Barilla, became a member of the Oregon Legislature and introduced the sanctuary bill that became law. It bars city and county police agencies here from assisting the federal government in enforcing immigration law.

The marijuana law cannot trace its roots to a single incident. Rather, supporters of the idea began cautiously, persuading voters to legalize the use of medical marijuana in 1998. We were slower to legalize recreational weed. Voters turned down recreational legalization bids three times, in 2004, 2010 and 2012. The idea finally was approved in 2014.

Both laws fly directly in the face of the federal government, which is responsible for immigration and which considers marijuana a dangerous drug. And, while Oregon’s sanctuary state law does not violate any federal law, neither does it win friends at the federal level.

It’s a different matter where marijuana is concerned. So far the federal government has been willing to keep a wary eye on Oregon’s legalization and do no more, although that could change, I suspect.

And I wonder sometimes just how far we’re willing to go on our own path or whether there’s room for similar challenges by Oregon’s cities or counties. We may be about to test that last idea.

People in at least seven counties, and maybe as many as 22 counties, in Oregon may have the chance to adopt what are being called Second Amendment preservation ordinances this fall. I don’t know if they’re identical, but the initiative petition being circulated in Deschutes County would give the sheriff the right to decide which gun laws are both constitutional and enforceable.

I don’t know if that’s such a great idea. Gun legislation has the advantage of having been vetted by a whole Legislature, and the process can work to moderate the kookiest ideas on both sides of the argument. Giving that same power to a single elected official could eliminate the need for moderation, and that, I think, is a bad thing.

I also have a sort of motherly concern about our willingness to set federal law aside in favor of something we like better, and that’s this:

Most of us, I suspect, try to teach our kids to obey the law. I can’t imagine a parent not doing that, in fact: No one wants a son or daughter hurt jaywalking, or jailed for drunk driving, or worse.

Yet that’s exactly what Oregonians have done with both sanctuary and marijuana laws. They’re not political protests against a perceived injustice, and I’m not sure how we explain the difference to our kids. There’s moral outrage as an argument, or perhaps an explanation about the shortsightedness of the laws we don’t like. In the end, however, I wonder if the real answer isn’t less high minded: We do this because it suits us and our independent Oregon streak. It’s an answer that falls short, I’m afraid.

— Janet Stevens is deputy editor of The Bulletin. Contact: 541-617-7821, jstevens@bendbulletin.com