[Ditto]

In other words, some guys got together and said "Let's make our own state, and while we're at it, we'll make ourselves the legislature." The Union Congress was happy to go along with that.

Those 'guys' were the duly elected members of the state legislature from the western counties who refused to go along with treason. The people who elected them fully suported the restored legislature. They didn't want to be associated with the mad men in Richmond defending a handful of corrupt millionaire plantation owners.

[Rowdee]

Your justification rings just as hollow as those here at FR who would tell you that PResident Bush doesn't have to obey the Constitution or even worry about it because bad laws go to the Supreme Court....

[Rowdee]

Matter of fact, The Perverted President and his minions could have uttered that excuse.....and all conservatives would have been condemning them to hell and beyond!

[Aurelius]

Here is Non-Sequiturs version of the story, from his post 42. There is nothing about an election.

Once the war brokeout, a convention was held in Wheeling which formed a breakaway Virginia legislature which they proclaimed to be loyal to the Union. Congress recognized this legislature as the legitimate Virginia legislature. They then voted to partition the state and once Congress approved they reformed themselves as the West Virginia legislature. That is the short version of what happened.