How Would Secession Work?

A left-liberal at AlterNet, where nationalism is taken for granted, hashes out some of the nuts-and-bolts questions that would be involved if the so-called red states were to pursue secession.

Talk of secession is, of course, “pretty silly,” the author assures us. After all, everyone knows that the number of square feet that constitute the United States is absolutely sacred, and only the uppity and impious would even conceive of changing it. We also know it is absolutely impossible that a political unit could become so large as to be dysfunctional even by government standards. Impossible, I tell you. And it is always preferable, when a country is divided over important ideas, to force it to remain together so that one side may continually try to impose its ideas on the other, instead of letting each side govern itself on its own.

With that irrepressible bit of sarcasm out of my system, I still do find it interesting that a conventional left-liberal actually bothered to consider the issues that would arise if the Sacred Number of Square Feet were indeed ever challenged.

Joel

Been saying for years that America is too big. I’d prefer a true voluntaryist society where government at all levels withered away to nothing, but I’d settle – in the short term – for breaking the USA up into a minimum of 15 separate nations. There are AT LEAST 15 separate regions and cultures in the USA, and being forced together does nobody any good.
Michael S. Alford

The article did nothing to address how secession works constitutionally, in that it is a function of the state governments. It also misrepresents the white House petitions which were written by individuals with no state government backing.
http://www.facebook.com/jester2069 Jesse Jewell

The article is bad, but man, the comments are worse. Just save your sanity and don’t read them.
Henry

A succession movement would fail if people in one or multiple states took up arms against the federal government. They would be crushed. It could only be done non-violently in the way India succeeded from the UK. It can only be achieved if enough people were convinced to disobey all federal laws, such as paying income taxes, and did not resist when the government came to throw them in jail. This would have to include the governor of the state making a formal statement of succession, similar to a declaration of independence, merely stating they won’t send anymore representatives to congress, etc. A non-violent succession is not unprecedented.
http://rosarynovice.stblogs.com/ Augustine

Heck! Before the nation-state was, it was not.

Italy and Germany used to be each one nation with multiple states. As a matter of fact, after those multiple states merged into a nation-state, both Italy and Germany became aggressive states too, spreading mayhem throughout Europe and Africa.
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100000438665713 Danny Gorton II

Wow. I should have heeded your warning, but I’m a glutton for abuse, so I started reading comments anyway. I had to stop at “People who espouse this concept are dangerous to all of us because they have given their loyalty to something other than the nation which provides for them.” It’s the seeming futility of cooperating with people having that mindset that drives the secession movement.
Patrick

It would be nice if somebody could engage one of the Talking Heads in a discussion of “What if the South had won? Would you support secession for the northern states who didn’t want to remain in a union that supported slavery?”
Franklin

Oh! Three cheers for this!
Sometimes the most obvious, argumentative weapon is standing before my eyes, yet I don’t have the sense to take it from its sheath.
Perfectly said.
http://plenarchist.wordpress.com/ plenarchist

“Liberals would no doubt worry about minority voting rights in Alabama and conservatives would be equally worried about the right of Montanans to own firearms. One way to address these concerns would be to have both new countries adopt our existing Constitution.”

Really? Maybe if the US of A would “adopt our existing Constitution,” no one would be talking secession in the first place.
kirk

if freedom is desired, separation is required.

if separation is achieved, articles of confederation are preferred over a constitution.
Anonymous

Im not sure if I would qualify Indian independence as “succession,” or even as non-violent (despite how it is idealized), but regardless of those minor qualms, the geographical differences alone make cinparing that situation and ours irrelevant. Have you any other examples?

Quibbling aside, I see you point. Violence never guarantees results, and even if it could it would be in and of itself undesireable. Only a peaceful solution can solve our problems, as a violent one would be a bigger problem. With that in mind, I don’t see succession at having much chance of success.

I fear that the rhetoric and disruption of non-violent activism may make more enemies, rightly or wrongly. You wont win that battle, not if you loose the PR war. A diplomatic solution is needed in any case. I see the best route forward then being decentralization, not seperation. Given current political trends, decentrilization and even nullificafion (possibly in a new guise) would be beneficial to all parties, and is most likely to be appealing as such.

If nothing else, working with the current national boundries to gain decentralization could be seen as a positioning move that makes succession more plausible, and as such would be a first step, and thus should be a higher priority.
Katii

There wouldn’t be talk of succession if the elected just honored their respective Oaths of Office, and actually respected States Rights. What part of that don’t these “sides” – identified in “useful fool” ways such as red and blue, donkey and elephant, left and right (ANYTHING to keep we the people divided) get?
Anonymous

I live in Arizona where a great deal of land is owned by the federal government. And need I mention Grand Canyon National Park?

Even if “Barack Lincoln” would stand for it – he has already spoken out against secession – how would all the federally owned land be dealt with? There are a myriad of other practical problems to be dealt with.

All this is not to say that I am against secession. I would be for it.
Henry

If there is a difference between independence and succession, please let me know. I think they are synonyms. It doesn’t really matter if technically, India’s succession had episodes of violence. What matters (for the success of the movement) was the perception that Ghandi was very peaceful and passive, while the British were the big bad guys.

I personally believe that succession is so unpopular today because people associate it with the violence that took place during the “civil” war. What would have happened if the South did not attack, and Lincoln attacked first? That would’ve made him the aggressor.

There is no way to work within the current political system. The natural path is for the government to grow. In fact, the federal government has never shrunk, and there is no reason to expect it to. It will continue to amass power for itself no matter what (Ron Paul is the biggest success that is possible, what did he accomplish within government?). Give me an example of a government shrinkage that lasted for the long term.

As for another example of non-violent succession, I cannot come up with another off the top of my head. However, the only way significant freedom struggles have been won is through non-violent disobedience. MLK being the prime example. All it requires is the will-power of a large enough population.
http://www.facebook.com/people/Christopher-Bell/1063326951 Christopher Bell

America is too big and the peoples in it are too diverse(ideologically).
Michael S. Alford

The land belonged to Arizona before it belonged to the feds,