[You Dirty Rats]

You mean if the Ohio River diverts 20 miles north I'll end up in Kentucky? That's a scary thought!

I'm still trying to understand how West Virginia was able to become its own state without the approval of Virginia. Not that Virginia would want it back!

[Congressman Billybob]

You might recall that Virginia was in revolt against the Union at the time West Virginia was admitted as a new state. So Virginia was not legally around to object to the creation of W.Va. And when Virginia was readmitted to the Union after then end of what my Southern Grandmother referred to as "the late unpleasantries," the creation of W.Va. was a fait accompli which Va. had to accept as a done deal.

John / Billybob

[GOPcapitalist]

I'm still trying to understand how West Virginia was able to become its own state without the approval of Virginia. Not that Virginia would want it back!

Lincoln essentially bestowed official recognition of the Virginia state goverment to an unrepresentative rump convention meeting at Wheeling in the panhandle (the only part of the original south that is north of the mason dixon line). That rump convention, which consisted of the overwhelmingly unionist panhandle counties and a few others to their immediate south, then decided to act as the Virginia legislature (even though they had no authority in their own right) and called for a "statewide" referendum to create a new state. That state was to consist of them and another 20 or so counties to their south that had absolutely nothing to do with them and in fact favored Virginia's earlier secession (i.e. the Wheeling convention simply claimed them as their own territory). The referendum was held on one of those Saddam Hussein style 99% to 1% votes where Wheeling thugs controlled access to the ballot boxes, sent to Lincoln's government, and "accepted" as the "consent" of Virginia to divide itself.