{"id":248,"date":"2011-03-02T22:58:27","date_gmt":"2011-03-02T22:58:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.pauljjhansen.com\/?p=248"},"modified":"2011-03-31T00:29:40","modified_gmt":"2011-03-31T00:29:40","slug":"state-form-a-new-small-state","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.pauljjhansen.com\/?p=248","title":{"rendered":"State, Form a New Small State"},"content":{"rendered":"

Splitting Arizona: Support grows for 51st state<\/strong>
\n<\/a>
\nby Derek Sheriff<\/a><\/p>\n

As originally posted on:<\/em> Tenth Amendment Center Blog<\/a>
\nFebruary 27, 2011<\/em><\/p>\n

Outraged over efforts in the Arizona State Legislature to nullify<\/a> unconstitutional federal commands and prohibitions, a growing number of Pima County residents and even a few of their state legislators are proposing that they be permitted to break away from the rest of Arizona in order to form their own state<\/a>. If they are eventually successful, Tucson would almost certainly be it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s capital city.<\/p>\n

I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve been saying that this is what needs to happen for more than a decade. Perhaps a majority of the people who reside in what is known to be the more left-leaning, southern parts of our state, have long been fed up with the north\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s social and fiscal conservatism. Now they are completely outraged over our movement to nullify<\/a> every last federal act that a majority of our state legislators deem to be unconstitutional, but which they consider to be perfectly within the sphere of legitimate federal power.<\/p>\n

A similar situation<\/a> existed in the late 1850\u00e2\u20ac\u00b2s, when southern outrage reached a crescendo over northern states\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 successful nullification of the Fugitive Slave Act. The south, for the most part, thought that the act was perfectly constitutional, whereas states\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 like Wisconsin maintained that the act allowed for what amounted to illegal acts of kidnapping, since those accused of being fugitive slaves were denied a jury trial and other legal protections guaranteed in the Bill of Rights. Considering it to be nothing more than an illegitimate act of usurpation (in spite of the fact that it was upheld by the Supreme Court in Abelman v. Booth<\/a>), Wisconsin\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s people, backed by their state government officials, successfully resisted<\/a> the federal government\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s attempts to enforce the Fugitive Slave Act within the borders of their state.<\/p>\n

This was an important factor in several southern states\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 decisions to secede from the Union. The question of leaving the Union is not explicitly addressed by the Constitution, probably because it was just assumed by those who ratified the Constitution to be an inherit power retained by every sovereign state. In today\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s situation involving Pima county however, the south (of Arizona), does not wish to withdraw itself from the compact among the states, but simply wants to be re-admitted to the Union as a new one. Is there anything irrational, or wrong with that? I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t think so. In fact, I think every Arizonan and every American should support their movement and help to foster similar movements, wherever disharmony and irreconcilable differences exist around the country.<\/p>\n

There is a very specific, constitutional process<\/a> by which the people who inhabit a portion of an existing state may petition their state and federal government to form a state of their own, after which they may be admitted to the Union on equal footing with every other state. Sure it would create some problems, but it would solve a lot more problems. The entire world has been undergoing a process of political decentralization for many years. Now, thankfully, it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s looking like the United States is no exception. Like any political solution, it won\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t be perfect or trouble free, but in my humble opinion, the solution to problems created by decentralization, is almost always more<\/strong><\/em> decentralization.<\/p>\n

Derek Sheriff [<\/em>send him email<\/a>] is a research analyst for the Tenth Amendment Center. His articles have appeared in various publications, and he writes regularly for the Center on issues related to state sovereignty and nullification. His blog and podcast \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Principles of \u00e2\u20ac\u02dc98\u00e2\u20ac\u00b3 can be found at <\/em>http:\/\/www.PrinciplesOfNinetyEight.Com<\/em><\/a>. View his Tenth Amendment Center blog archives <\/em>here<\/a>, and his article archives <\/em>here<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

—
\nPosted By The Public Eye to Truth to Power<\/a> at 3\/02\/2011 04:38:00 PM<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Splitting Arizona: Support grows for 51st state by Derek Sheriff As originally posted on: Tenth Amendment Center Blog February 27, 2011 Outraged over efforts in the Arizona State Legislature to nullify unconstitutional federal commands and prohibitions, a growing number of … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[18],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.pauljjhansen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/248"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.pauljjhansen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.pauljjhansen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.pauljjhansen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.pauljjhansen.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=248"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.pauljjhansen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/248\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":249,"href":"http:\/\/www.pauljjhansen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/248\/revisions\/249"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.pauljjhansen.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=248"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.pauljjhansen.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=248"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.pauljjhansen.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=248"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}