From the Washington Times:
You’ve got North Carolina and North Dakota, so why not Northern Colorado?
Voters in several rural Colorado counties will be asked whether they want to form a new state tentatively named Northern Colorado the November election, a reaction to the Democrat-controlled state legislature’s “war on rural Colorado.”
The Weld County Commissioners voted unanimously at Monday’s meeting to place a measure on the Nov. 5 ballot asking voters whether they want the county to join other rural counties in forming another state.
“The concerns of rural Coloradans have been ignored for years,” William Garcia, chairman of the Weld County Commissioners, said in a statement. “The last session was the straw that broke the camel’s back for many people. They want change. They want to be heard.”
Three other rural counties — Cheyenne, Sedgwick and Yuma — also plan to place the 51st state referendum on the fall ballot. At least three more counties plan to consider the proposal this week at their commission meetings, said Jeffrey Hare, spokesman for the 51st State Initiative…
I’ve long argued in favor of this – you see, the government is just not responsive to the people, on the federal or State level. This is especially true in the Western States where the States were created, willy-nilly, when they had tiny populations. Gigantic geographic areas, mostly empty at the time of Statehood, were pushed within State boundaries and since that time, with population growth and economic development, the interests of the various regions of the States have often diverged. More extreme than the Colorado example is the example of California.
There were fewer than 100,000 people living in California in 1850 when it became a State. Most of the State, of course, was completely empty of people. Over the past 163 years, the population has increased to more than 38 million and these people are spread out over the vast territory of the State and have developed lives of their own. California isn’t a unified entity with a strong community of interests – it is a cobbled together grouping of several different communities which, however, are politically dominated by the two largest concentrations of people in the Los Angeles and San Francisco areas. Now, there’s nothing wrong with LA and SF – they are people with a full right to decide for themselves how they want to live…the trouble is that by being in the same State as Victorville and Palmdale, which have vastly different ideas than SF and LA, the people of LA and SF get to dictate to the smaller populations of Victorville and Palmdale. That just isn’t fair – doesn’t matter how Palmdale votes, they will always get a government which adheres to the wishes of San Francisco and Los Angeles. California is not one State – it is four States (at least) forced to live under the domination of one State (the coastal area of California running from Long Beach up to San Francisco).
By breaking up the States along lines of interest, we can have States which reflect the will of their people, broadly speaking, and which take care to protect the interests of the State (no more will northern California’s logging interests be at the mercy of anti-logging San Francisco, for instance). Additionally, by breaking up the States we ensure that representation in the United States Senate more accurately reflects all of the people – right now, both of California’s Senators are from San Francisco and while they heartily and ably represent the interests of San Francisco (and Los Angeles), they aren’t really putting before the United States Senate the interests of the other States currently contained within California’s borders. This break up of the States should also be coupled with increasing the size of the House to at least 601 members – thus making our House representatives more representative of the people.
The one thing I can’t stand is domination of one party by another. People in their localities should pretty much do it as they want, limited only by the strictures of the Constitution. It is way past time that we completely reformed American government to ensure that the local people rule their own lives. Secession is the answer to the problem – by making government smaller and closer to the people, it will be less corrupt and oppressive.
Blogs For Victory 
The Left has established a strong presence in Colorado, but the recent gun restriction laws passed by the statehouse have gotten a lot of us very pissed off. Recall petitions were circulated for several legislators, and two of the petitions passed muster—the recall election is scheduled. Not only that, but the Looper, Gov. John Hickenlooper to be exact, is in trouble, for a variety of things, including his support of gun rights restrictions.
The Colorado Legislature passed something like 415 bills last year, and the Looper signed every one of them. That is ridiculous.
I don’t live in any of the counties that would form the new state, but I’d sure consider moving.
I live in the SOVEREIGN state of Fla…….just most of the northerners here dont know it. Time to tell the feds to screw off ….ANYTHING NOT in the constitution is a state matter PERIOD!
Time to NULLIFY the feds, the IRS, DEA, OSHA, EPA, NEA etc etc etc……..they cant stand if we together dont let them.
I say lets go state by state and withhold our federal taxes to barry and the boyz and see how long AF1 and the endless vaaaacations and OPM for muslim and derelict rappers dinners at the white hut last.
We Americans let some slimy cretin like this Moron dictate to us???
TIME for a REAL CHANGE!!! back to sanity.
Henry Waxman leads newest attack on guns
Plan would ban ‘virtually any part used to build a semi-automatic weapon’
Read more at http://www.wnd.com/2013/08/henry-waxman-leads-newest-attack-on-guns/#KXEVoFQExdrPy2XP.99
This is something that our founding fathers did not forsee when they found this nation. During their time the U.S. was only 13 states. You are correct America has grown too big and the proper representation of its people is lost. Congress is not helping by redrawing congressional boundaries which result in less Congressman. That is our problem, the voices of regular hardworking tax paying Americans has been muffled by those in power seeking their own agendas and pleasing those who line their pockets. It is also a shame that Illegal immigrants are heard more than our own citizens.
They did “foresee” it–reread the Constitution. There are remedies but it will take the States and a portion (not too large) of the population to change the current direction.
I agree with secession if that is the will of the people, but that alone is not enough. We need a concerted effort at the national level to push more authority down to the states – decentralization of power is a must if we are to ever get better representation of ALL the people.
Cluster, this is why I keep pushing for conservative candidates to concentrate on POLITICS instead of being lured off into the weeds by ISSUES. Because if we would consistently bring every discourse and debate back to the central issue of living in a country whose foundational documents were based on the concept of home rule, if we would never allow ourselves to be distracted from the message that the strength of this nation lies in its citizens and not in its legislatures, we could start to make some progress.
And this would solve many of our problems. Right now power is so concentrated in one place—Washington DC—-and in our national government, corruption is not only inevitable it is easy. But if that power is removed from the central government and spread out, power seekers will have to choose where to go to try to establish control. Instead of just going to DC, they will have to choose—Sacramento, Austin, Denver, ???? And even then, any power gained will be a fraction of that in the whole country, and more easily offset by what is going on in the other states.
And if the movement were properly executed, even Sacramento would not be completely powerful in terms of California because counties and cities would have more say in their own government.
It might be kind of tough. For a new state to be formed the Both Colorado and congress would have to approve it.
Art. 4 Sec 3 of the Constitution
“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.”
I see a new trend on the horizon which may lead to the States regaining the power they should have rather than a centralized Federal government. I am not talking about altering the Constitution but rather making avail of what is constitutional to break-up the power structure that currently exists.
It will not be today, tomorrow or even next week but it needs to be done if this Republic is to survive. Honestly, we have “peter tweeters”, “whore-mongers” and “gropers” running for office while there are those who cannot explain their whereabouts or dealings while Americans have died (F&F plus Benghazi for example) who still hold office as well as promote those underlings who have failed spectacularly upwards.
What we have as a government is embarrassing to anyone who is not a low- or misguided voter and includes both parties since Wilson. This will be a difficult turnaround but needs to start now if there is to be any hope on the horizon.
BTW, it is not a Constitutional Convention but rather 34 of the States joining together to reign in this out of friggin’ control centralized Federal craphole.
without the Consent of the Legislatures of the States concerned as well as of the Congress.
Yeah, casper, we already got that figured out.
Or did you miss the part about the first step being the referendum to place this on the ballot ? “The Weld County Commissioners voted unanimously at Monday’s meeting to place a measure on the Nov. 5 ballot asking voters whether they want the county to join other rural counties in forming another state.”
“Amazona August 21, 2013 at 12:23 pm
without the Consent of the Legislatures of the States concerned as well as of the Congress.
Yeah, casper, we already got that figured out.
Or did you miss the part about the first step being the referendum to place this on the ballot ? ”
I didn’t miss anything. There is nothing in the Constitution about a state being created by ballot. But then you should know that.
I used to live in Wyoming so you can’t convince me that up there the legislature of the state is not guided by the will of the people. And just how do they know how the people feel? By what the people TELL them.
Duh.
Same thing here. So a ballot in which the people can express themselves in a way that can be counted, officially, as in the count of votes, is the best way to let the legislature know what they want. This is the first step toward the legislature CONSENTING to the formation of a new state.
Are you really having that much trouble following this? Or do you believe, for some bizarre reason, that a state legislature would just CONSENT to something this momentous without a very strong commitment from the people that this is what they want?
Really?
Or that you find fault with the system of the county commissioners voting to allow the people to vote on whether or not they would like a new state, so the state legislature can have an accurate reading of the will of the people?
Really?
You’re not much of a fan of this bottom-up, people making their own decisions and then telling the feds what they want, approach to government?
Or are you just playing your little “look how silly casper is willing to look” game?
Its a great idea, but there is no way the Colorado state legislature is going to let it happen.
Weld county make too much $$ to let it go.
The same argument is made when Alberta gets tired of funding the whole country of Canada so a bunch of toffee-nosed Libs out in Keh-bec can try to shove the nation to the Left.
Keep in mind that the suggested Northern Colorado includes part of SE Wyoming and eastern Kansas and Nebraska—in other words, the whole Niobrara oil formation. And of course on top of all that oil lie vast cornfields and cattle herds. Cutting this off from the Lefties in Denver and the Peoples’ Republic of Boulder would hurt.
That is why I want a North and South Nevada – even though I live in South Nevada (though my heart yearns for that area somewhere up there between Fallon and Sparks, Nevada). The Nevada legislature (which does meet in North Nevada – Carson City) greedily eyes, especially, the mines of North Nevada…they have been massively profitable during this whole economic crisis as the demand for mined materials has grown in certain areas. In order to support a growing dependent class in Clark County, there are plenty of proposals to more heavily tax the mines…taking wealth from the North for no other reason than to provide money for government in the South. Break up the State in to two and North Nevada can take care of itself and South Nevada would be faced with a stark choice: either reform things so that gaming isn’t the only thing in town (we should be a manufacturing and transport center…as well as the actually good idea of using our sun for solar power generation), or go the way of Detroit.
Mark,
I curious, would you also be in favor of splitting off the five boroughs of NYC as states. Each boroughs has more people than many of our western states. We could do the same with many of the other large cities.
Casper,
Here is something I have always wondered why it has never been adopted. Everyone, feel free to comment. I understand why neither party would go for it but why the population (voters) could not demand it–like term limits and repeal of a couple of bogus amendments. .
Voting districts should be determined starting with zip code of the Representative. Once you fill your primary zip code–you get parts of others until you meet the requirement of total number of voters per “Representative” while returning the Senate to State Legislative selection. No gerrymandering allowed. Even my phone’s GPS can tell where I am when I turn it on–it isn’t that difficult to make our “Representatives” actually represent us.
db
–it isn’t that difficult to make our “Representatives” actually represent us.
HUH?? sorry but WTF??
they DONT, and DONT give a shiite about us unless we are out of state racist mobs with microphones and hit contracts on other citizens then the “representatives fall over
usthem.Casper,
Ultimately, it would all be up to the people of the localities – but in thinking about it, these are some of the logical divisions I see:
North and South New York; Albany south to NYC and including Long Island become South New York, the rest becomes North New York (or East and West New York, if preferred).
East and West Florida, breaking along the line just east of Tallahassee.
North and South Nevada, essentially Clark County, NV – which includes the Las Vegas metro area – would become its own State, the rest of the State would become North Nevada (its tourism and gaming in Clark County, mining, ranching and farming in the rest of the State…the perfect example of a State which has two distinct identities and little community of interest…yet Clark County’s population ensures it calls the shots for the whole State).
South California (Orange County to the border), West California (the coastal counties from Los Angeles to San Francisco and including the Sacramento area), North California (just above the San Francisco- Sacramento line up to Oregon) and West Nevada (all the rest of the State).
East and West Washington (the mountains just east of the Pacific coast would be the divider).
North and South Michigan (the upper and lower penninsulas going their separate ways).
North and South Illinois (Cook county and environs to be North Illinois).
Other States which may be divided are Texas and Pennsylvania, but so far those States seem to retain a community of interests across their State territory…though, truth be told, it is absurd that as much territory and as many people as live in Texas only get to Senators.
That is at least 9 new States – and now with Colorado throwing its hat in to the ring, 10…and if Texas and Pennsylvania go that way, then add 2 or 3 more. Let’s say it really catches fire and that Guam and Puerto Rico decide to come in and we wind up with 65 States – 130 Senators or 30% more representation of the interests of the States and their people in the upper chamber.
Increasing the House to 601 members (which is still less than Britain’s House of Commons and the Brits are only 1/6th as many as we) gives us a big boost in representation in the people’s House…601 is no magic number, of course; other than keeping it odd (to give the greatest possibility of having a majority party), it could be anything up to 701 or even 801 (beyond that we might be getting to an unwieldy body). The basic thing I’d like to ensure is that each State has a good chance of at least two House members – better if there are at least 3 in each State…though some may still wind up with just one, at-large member.
Internally, there should also be subdivision of power – rather than the current leftwing push to shove many cities and counties together under larger bodies less responsive to the will of the people. The whole point of American government is for the people to run their own affairs on the local level – we do that, and more than half our problems will solve themselves.
Mark, in general I like your ideas, but I wonder if it would be wise to make the separations dependent so much on uniformity of industry or politics instead of geography. That may not have been your intent, but it could work out that way.
So I would suggest dividing Florida across the middle east to west, not north to south, because cutting in half lengthwise would make each of the new states very long and narrow, making it harder for representatives to visit all constituents. Ditto for your division of Washington. While there is some logic to separating according to the geography of coastal vs plains, divided by the mountains, I think that a state that is long and narrow makes it harder to govern and I don’t like the idea of consolidating any particular geographic thing to one state. I think two Washington states would both benefit by having a mix of prairie, mountain and coast.
Along with the division of states into more manageable sized and increasing representation, we might take another look at the 17th Amendment. The change from having Senators appointed by state legislatures to having them elected by popular vote has always been subject to a lot of disagreement and this seems like a topic that should be addressed in discussion of establishing new states.
Amazona,
There is more than one way to skin a cat, or split a State. As for returning to in-direct election of the Senators, that is something I’ve long argued for. Making Senators popularly elected has essentially just turned the Senate in to another version of the House. It wasn’t supposed to be like that – the Senators are supposed to represent their States, not their people, as such – the House is for representing the people. Each State has its varied interests and the Senators are supposed to represent them…so, it is actually logical that our Nevada Senators discourage gaming around the country and promote it via the Senate for Nevada…that is an interest of our State. So, too, with States that have, say, large oil or ranching or farming interests. But the States need to break up because some States have not only very diverse interests, but often interests which conflict…so, the conflict of interests between liberal environmentalists who run California against those farming, ranching and mining interests in the non-coastal areas of the State.
Ama
making it harder for representatives to visit all constituents.
I have NEVER seen, met, known, one in any state in my entire life and I used to be a committeeman.
good luk wit dat
neo, isn’t the idea to make things better? To fix things that don’t work very well right now?
I read the discussion on splitting up states as centering on the idea that the states, as they now exist, are too big and far-flung, to operate very efficiently, or to provide adequate representation. So I extrapolated from that that one goal would be to increase representation, making each Senator or Representative answerable to fewer people, thereby increasing the likelyhood that constituents WOULD be able to meet with them.
My Representative makes himself pretty available to those who seek him out, and has had many town hall meetings, as well as hosting local groups such as church groups for tours of government buildings in DC, etc. Sounds to me like representation needs to be addressed on several levels, ranging from who you elect in the first place to how many people he/she is expected to represent.
Hmmm. Should these foolhardy, highly improbable attempts at statehood be approved by all of the powers that be and actually come to pass …
… shall we count how long it takes for these indignant faux-patriots and their newly elected representatives to appeal to the federal government for massive subsidies and other financial support?
Tell you what, lab—why don’t you start counting right now?
Just go off by yourself and start.
Kudos on finding a new way to use the Left’s beloved “faux”, though. Bet you worked on that a long time. You seem pretty proud of it.
Yeah, you see this as a chance to express your contempt for people who believe in the Constitution (the usual targets of the sneering and dismissive “patriot” comment from a Lefty) but no one really cares. So you keep projecting the Left’s dependence on OPM onto these people, whom you clearly disdain, and we’ll just keep ignoring your impotent bleating.
Interesting that you can’t/don’t address the actual issues underlying the idea, and just revert to Libspeak, which is to snarl and hurl what is supposed to be an insult.
Almost certainly not at all – there is still a massive amount of Jacksonism in the American body politic. This, as it turns out, is the only correct attitude for a Republic: leave me alone, I’ll look after myself. Me, my family, my neighbors – we’ll do it. We’ll only need you to step in during an actual emergency.
This is especially true when you consider that the places which are simmering with secession are the places where genuinely productive work is being done.