Article IV, Section 3 of the Constitution talks about States that split in half, or States that join together.

“1: New States may be admitted by the Congress into this Union; but no new State shall be formed or erected within the Jurisdiction of any other State; nor any State be formed by the Junction of two or more States, or Parts of States, without the Consent of the Legislatures of the States concerned as well as of the Congress.”

Doesn’t this recognize the possibility of secession, by referring to political bodies formed in parts of the territory of other States? Here it’s saying that these political bodies won’t be admitted as new States without the old State’s permission. Doesn’t that imply the possibility?

I’m not sure the founders got that deep, but it is interesting that this section doesn’t refer to insurrection. There’s a tacit acknowledgement of reorganizations of States, and this section refers to how the Union will treat this acknowledged possibility of reorganization in a manner that’s fair to the existing Union members.

Either way, W. Virginia sort of blows a giant hole in the case that Lincoln’s government found secession to be illegitimate.

Rather, the position of the radical Republicans seems to have been the ‘real’ reason for the Civil War: to conquer the government of the legitimately seceded Confederate States in order to abolish slavery and maintain a strong union on the continent which maintained broader economic powers. It was a purely imperial action, executed of course by the “Empire of Liberty”.

There was nothing illegal about secession, this was Lincoln’s stupid lie. Rather, the Union found it within its national interest to go to war to engage in imperial conquest over the new southern nation.

So it seems.

I laugh histerically everytime tom says “waive incense”

Absolutely excellent, Tom !!! Truly the 3×5 card (on this subject) to break all 3×5 cards !!!

I just want to add a very minor note here, namely the point that if the citizen of the various states had known that this was a one-way membership into the union, it would be ridiculous not to have debated the loss of their sovereignty!

Conversely, if they had all been swindled into loosing their sovereignty without debate, that then that alone would be a reason to declare the union null and void.

I agree with you completely. I remember learning in my constitutional law class when I went to law school in the early 1980s that the STATE is the sovereign…in other words, the sovereign “country” is California or Texas or New Hampshire, etc. And the federal union was for the purpose of regulating fair trade among each of these sovereigns for the convenience and prosperity of all (who, previously, were hampered by such things as each having individual tariffs, etc. against the other states), and to deal with foreign countries. So I have ALWAYS felt that any state definitely could, and should, be able to secede if it so desires, despite the fact that that thug, Lincoln, ran roughshod over that fundamental right for egoistic purposes. Of course, if the federal government today repeats the violent stuff that Lincoln did, against, as an example, North Dakota, who as far as I understand actually has a solid and responsibly administered state government treasury and is kind of like “Germany” in a union of “Greeces” and “Spains” and therefore may actually wish to separate out of this mess, then this would be no different than a mafia don sending his machine-gun-toting boys over to shoot up the owner of a dry cleaners store who has decided he doesn’t want to pay the protection money any more. Definitely immoral, and also illegal. I remember from eighth grade that the individual states would NOT have ratified the Constitution if that would mean the loss of their sovereignty. Otherwise, what was in it for them?

Speaking of the true meaning of the federal government, something that really drives me up the wall, is whenever I see Obama (or any U.S. President) described as “the leader of the free world”. The President certainly isn’t the leader of ANY world, free or not; he isn’t even the “leader” of the United States. To be such a leader would make him a dictator, or a king, or a fuhrer. He is simply a chief executive of one branch of government, not higher than the bulk of the Congress, not higher than the whole of the Supreme Court. And his enumerated powers are actually pretty slim; why, I think Queen Elizabeth may actually have more actual, legal powers than the U.S. President, although I may be pushing it a bit, there (but not by much). So I really wish that ignorant people would STOP using that horrible phrase, for surely it goes to the head of those all-too-easily-corrupted individuals who are placed there in that office, and for the people to continue to spread that lie is to actually in effect make it actual, even when it isn’t “true”.

THANK YOU! MORE PEOPLE WILL UNDERSTAND WE JUST WANT PEACE AND NO DICTATORSHIP! WE WANT TO KEEP OUR CONSTITUTION IS ALL WE WERE SAYING!

Secession threatens them on a deep personal level IMO.