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SanFran Chronicle: If they want to secede, let 'em
San Francisco Chronicle ^ | 11/13/2012 | Caille Millner

Posted on 11/14/2012 1:05:46 PM PST by TheWryFederalist

It's barely been a week since President Obama's re-election, and some people can't believe, truly can't believe, that things didn't go their way.

As of Wednesday morning, 37 states had posted petitions on the White House website to secede from the United States of America. (Some not-so-brilliant citizens of Georgia and South Carolina actually have two different secession postings each, but I'm counting those knuckleheads only once.)

I'm sorry to report that this not-so-illustrious group includes California, where nearly 7,000 citizens have signed a petition quoting the Declaration of Independence and insisting on the right to set up their own government.

This is clearly part of a movement to draft all the states, and Lord knows that there are certainly enough foolish people in each and every state in the union who would be willing to put their name on anything at all. But seeing as this country did fight the most bloody war in its history over the secession of the chattel slavery-holding states, it's sad to see that those are the same states that currently boast the most popular secession petitions.

Louisiana (around 30,000 signatures). Florida (about 24,000). South Carolina (around 28,000). Alabama (nearing the 23,000 mark). And last but never least, Texas, which rates as the state most likely to secede at more than 80,000 signatures.

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/opinion/article/If-they-want-to-secede-let-em-4035092.php#ixzz2CEQjDxxO

(Excerpt) Read more at sfgate.com ...


TOPICS: Editorial; Politics/Elections
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To: Spktyr

Most of the leftists I know would not want us to secede only because they want to control us and make us work and give them our pay check. Now that they can win elections mostly by fraud and promising welfare they need slaves to pay for it.


81 posted on 11/14/2012 2:35:55 PM PST by Rusty0604
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To: TheWryFederalist
All you would have to do is announce a flat tax for the Republic of North America and an absolute abolition to ALL social welfare programs, perhaps exempting social security for ONLY those elderly who have ACTUALLY paid into it for most of their working lives. That and a free one way ticket to the land of Obozo "phones" for all who want them.

The deadbeats would flock to the north and the productive few left up north would flock south. Then pop some corn, sit back, and watch the “zombie Apocalypse" up north unfold! They`d soon be eating their way thru the leftists like a horde of locusts on a wheat crop!

82 posted on 11/14/2012 2:37:37 PM PST by nomad
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To: buwaya

In my mind the taxpayers are now the slaves.


83 posted on 11/14/2012 2:39:54 PM PST by Rusty0604
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To: hillarys cankles

lol

California wouldn’t have any water or electricity without the rest of us :)


84 posted on 11/14/2012 2:44:32 PM PST by TexasFreeper2009 (Obama lied .. the economy died.)
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To: LaRueLaDue
Not really. It was only decided for that particular instance.

That's what I said ... in the absence of a political agreement amongst all the states - such as when Czechoslovakia separated - then force of arms will decide.

We know how that worked in 1861-65; we don't know how it would play out a second time.

85 posted on 11/14/2012 2:46:06 PM PST by JackOfVA
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To: TheWryFederalist
When the USSR collapsed in the early 90s, its vassal states inside and outside of it declared their independence and the Kremlin was powerless to prevent it.

That is more than likely what will happen in our case. There won't have to be any (or much) shooting, and the Feds won't be able to do anything about it. And the required financial collapse is just around the corner. We better start thinking now about how to take advantage of it.

86 posted on 11/14/2012 2:48:27 PM PST by LaRueLaDue
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To: Dilbert San Diego

I think the Civil War pretty much charted this territory.


87 posted on 11/14/2012 2:50:43 PM PST by cydcharisse (`)
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To: LaRueLaDue

The biggest issues would be ... who gets stuck with the national debt, and what happens to federally owned lands (much of the west of owned by the federal government)


88 posted on 11/14/2012 2:56:44 PM PST by TexasFreeper2009 (Obama lied .. the economy died.)
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To: TheWryFederalist

It might take a financial collapse but it wouldn’t hurt to have some governors and state legislatures with some balls.


89 posted on 11/14/2012 2:59:06 PM PST by Terry Mross (I haven't watched the news since the election. Someone ping me if anything big happens.)
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To: TheWryFederalist
CW1 was fought over the worst issue any war’s ever been fought over.

Wrong. The War Between the States was not fought over slavery. It originated in a fight over the extent of states rights and the usurpation of these rights by the Federal government. Slavery wasn't the primary issue for 1 1/2 to 2 years into the war, and was put forward by Lincoln as a way to keep the north fighting (and to win re-election). If slavery wasn't brought to the forefront as the "primary" issue of the war, the north would not have re-elected Lincoln and would have sued for peace shortly thereafter, just to end things. It was a VERY unpopular war in the north until the slavery issue was manipulated by Lincoln. (A quite clever way, actually, to get what he wanted out of the war: a very strong federal government with essentially unlimited powers, and a way to hamstring the political power of the south. It was all about politics and federal versus state governmental power.)

90 posted on 11/14/2012 3:01:48 PM PST by LaRueLaDue
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To: TheWryFederalist

I have read in several sources that the CW actually started over taxes, and slavery was just thrown in so the yankees would go for it.


91 posted on 11/14/2012 3:07:05 PM PST by Rusty0604
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To: Rusty0604

Which is why we should let them all go. Most of those states get more from the federal government than they pay in. Classic takers. I’d be happy to see them all cut their ties and save the rest of us makers a lot of money.


92 posted on 11/14/2012 3:11:15 PM PST by IlliniCon
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To: TexasFreeper2009
The biggest issues would be ... who gets stuck with the national debt, and what happens to federally owned lands (much of the west of owned by the federal government)

Easy: the national debt goes with what is left of the original USA (mostly "blue states"); all previous federally-owned land in the seceeding states reverts to the individual states, to be handled as they see fit (hopefully to start drilling/mining on, as needed and feasible).

93 posted on 11/14/2012 3:11:54 PM PST by LaRueLaDue
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To: LaRueLaDue

This is disingenuous.
The very reason for the friction between North and South WAS slavery; the “states rights” at issue were those cases where the South demanded the North honor Southern slaveowners property rights.
Why did South Carolina secede ? What justifications did they use ? The answer is quite clear. It was at bottom a matter of slavery.

From the South Carolina Declaration of Secession, the complaint that precipitated the act is clearly specified -

“The Constitution of the United States, in its fourth Article, provides as follows: “No person held to service or labor in one State, under the laws thereof, escaping into another, shall, in consequence of any law or regulation therein, be discharged from such service or labor, but shall be delivered up, on claim of the party to whom such service or labor may be due.”

This stipulation was so material to the compact, that without it that compact would not have been made. The greater number of the contracting parties held slaves, and they had previously evinced their estimate of the value of such a stipulation by making it a condition in the Ordinance for the government of the territory ceded by Virginia, which now composes the States north of the Ohio River.

The same article of the Constitution stipulates also for rendition by the several States of fugitives from justice from the other States. “

Basically they were complaining that the Northern states had passed laws declaring slaveowners property rights unenforceable in the North.


94 posted on 11/14/2012 3:12:22 PM PST by buwaya
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To: LaRueLaDue

lol

good luck sticking them with the debt.

and the US government is never going to let all that land and the minerals that come with it go.


95 posted on 11/14/2012 3:30:53 PM PST by TexasFreeper2009 (Obama lied .. the economy died.)
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To: LaRueLaDue

“Wrong. The War Between the States was not fought over slavery.”

Nope. It its aggregate the value of 4 million slaves represented the largest privately held asset in the world in 1860: 4 billion dollars (2.4 TRILLION in 2010 dollars) and the southern politicians, nearly all slaveholders, knew as new states were admitted it was only a matter of time until slavery was outlawed by simple majority vote.

Secession was the only way to prevent that.


96 posted on 11/14/2012 3:32:53 PM PST by TheWryFederalist
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To: TexasFreeper2009

Well, I don’t see how the debt apportionment would be agreed upon prior to secession. The seceeding states would be stupid to take any “old” debt on. That is one of the reasons to leave.

And if the land you mentioned is in one of the seceeding states, the old US wouldn’t have a choice. If it is in the border it belongs to the seceeding state.

Of course, this assumes that the secession would work... Granted, a big assumption. These sorts of things would only be decided after the fact, not prior.


97 posted on 11/14/2012 3:39:59 PM PST by LaRueLaDue
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To: TheWryFederalist

The really sad thing is that I think Obama would be proud to oversee the break up of the United States.

Just the same, it would be great to separate from the mongo moocher democrat states, encourage our moochers to immigrate to those states, then seal off the borders between them and us.

Give them a couple of years of rioting and “self educating” and starvation, then invite them back in under strict conditions.


98 posted on 11/14/2012 3:46:52 PM PST by FreeAtlanta (christian.bahits.com)
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To: altsehastiin

Good luck trying to take Lackland AFB, Fort Sam Houston, and Corpus Christi NAS away from the Pentagon. They’re really attached to those bases, and all the little ones too.


99 posted on 11/14/2012 3:52:24 PM PST by Bill ORightsly (Sine lege vivere, oportet esse honestum)
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To: TheWryFederalist; buwaya

See, as you both stated, it is about property and property rights, and the valuation and compensation (if deprived of the property) thereof. Slaves were the property involved, but it is not about slavery, per se, but the monetary value involved.

Slavery was dying in the south by the time of the civil war. It was becoming uneconomical, and wasn’t a real popular institution anywhere. If some sort of agreement had been able to be reached concerning some sort of compensation to relinquish slaves, I think it would have been a moot issue in less than 10 years. Lincoln actually looked into doing something like this, but was unable to get anywhere with it, as the abolitionists would have nothing to do with it; and the south was beyond listening to anything the north said at this point. (Remember that Lincoln was of the school of thought that wanted to remove all the blacks, just not slaves, back to Africa. He wasn’t the “great emanicipator” that is taught in schools.)

It is a LOT more complicated than a war over slavery. Education does this great struggle a grave injustice by simplifying it to the good north and the bad south. But, the winners get to write history... Moral is: don’t lose.


100 posted on 11/14/2012 3:53:05 PM PST by LaRueLaDue
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