An entertaining read: http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB109287099182195412,00.html?mod=article-outset-box Austin Powers By VASAN KESAVAN and MICHAEL STOKES PAULSEN August 19, 2004; Page A12 What would you say if we told you we have a way to add as many as eight new Republican senators to Congress. We could also add eight right-leaning votes to the electoral college? It's simple, it's fun, and it's perfectly constitutional: Texas should divide itself into five states. Art. IV, Sec. 3 of the U.S. Constitution says that new states may be created out of existing ones, but only with the consent of "the States concerned as well as of the Congress." These days, partisan Congress would never agree to a Texas carve-up, since any resulting new states would surely be politically conservative. But Congress need not take any action at all today: It granted its consent to Texas's potential subdivision 159 years ago. This made sense, as those had been the terms that Texas, a sovereign nation at the time, had negotiated for entering the Union. One provision of the 1845 Joint Resolution for Annexing Texas, passed by Congress and signed into law by President John Tyler, reads as follows: New States, of convenient size, not exceeding four in number, in addition to said State of Texas, and having sufficient population, may hereafter, by the consent of said State, be formed out of the territory thereof, which shall be entitled to admission under the provisions of the federal constitution. The "New States of convenient size" provision is the constitutionally required consent of Congress to carving a new state out of an existing one. And it is still in effect: There is absolutely no reason to believe that this provision -- a U.S. statute -- expires on its own without being repealed. So all that remains is for Texas to say "Yes" and act to divide itself into five. This will necessitate some Texas politicking, but probably not much more than the redistricting drama of 2003. Then, Democratic legislators holed up in Oklahoma and New Mexico in a failed attempt to stymie a GOP redistricting plan that eliminated a decade-old pro-Democrat distortion. But wouldn't it be kind of sad to see the Lone Star State dismembered, merely for political fun and profit? We've all met Texans who think that there's something "national" and sacred about Texas being, well, Texas. But sentimental schlock shouldn't prevail over rugged western realism (not to mention self-interest). Texas has grown too big for its britches (in a good way). The ironic consequence is that Texas is woefully underrepresented in national politics. The Constitution's requirement that each state have equal representation in the U.S. Senate means that huge Texas -- the nation's second largest state in both people and land -- has the same representation in the Senate as puny Vermont. "Jumpin' Jim" Jeffords can throw control of the Senate by shifting party loyalties, as he did in 2001. How anti-democratic is that? Texans could prevent such Yankee chicanery by wielding their proper weight in the nation's councils. So what are y'all waiting for? Can anyone think of a good reason why we shouldn't mess with Texas? For the good of America, for the good of Austin, for the good of the GOP, now's the time for Texas to become five Texy-Tots. Yee-haw! Mr. Kesavan is a recent graduate of Yale Law School. Mr. Paulsen is professor of Law at University of Minnesota Law School. This is adapted from a recent issue of the Texas Law Review.
Uh, didn't we already divide somewhat during annexation? http://www.bchm.org/wrr/war/pnl4cw-14.jpg http://wwwdb.glo.state.tx.us/central/arcmaps/ArcMapsDetail.cfm?intCounter=76253 Oops, guess not...technically. Apparently we settled for $10 million to settle border disputes (which became parts of COlorado and New Mexico) http://www.snopes.com/history/american/texas.asp (also addresses multi-State issue)
heh...yea, we could make the entire DFW Metorplex a foreign country...it already seems like it is outside Texas as it is.
Actually, you'd probably have at least one democrat-friendly state if the most southern part (Brownsville, Laredo) was made its own state. Furthermore, you wouldn't get any more electoral votes by doing this. Nice satire in any case.
Leave it to the GOP to come up with something this underhanded to try to increase their political advantage. It would be poetic justice if this happened and the voters decided to swing away from the hard right politics of the GOP these days. I agree that I would rather see Texas secede.
No kidding. I am not from Texas, but I got here just as fast as I could. I am fiercely proud to be a Texan and it is nauseating to me that some so-called Texans would support such a move for political gain. The Senate was created so that no one state, no matter the size or population, didn't have too much sway over the entire Congress. The House is where we get proprtional representation and the GOP (or at least this one GOP writer) seems to think it is just fine to try and skew those numbers.
Well, if you think this is anything other than a tongue-in-cheek suggestion, you need to put the Kool-Aid down.
I really hope that is the case, but it is hard to put anything past the GOP today. I used to think that I would vote Republican until the day I died, and I wish it were still true. Unfortunately, the GOP has shown me that they are not conservative anymore, especially where it counts: fiscal policy. FYI, I would need to put the Mountain Dew down. Sugar alone doesn't do it for me, I need caffeine, too.
Just say NO to succession. I mean who wants that crappy GWB as President of Texas? We finally got rid of him as governer. DD
Add me to this list. And then lets take back that portion we sold off that ran throught the center of colorado all the way to wyoming so we can do some good snow skiing in the new "Republic of Texas."
Trader J finally made me peek. This is a facinating subject, that we have every right to do, under our treaty with the United States. I may add more later. I gotta run.
We had to do a project in 7th grade Texas History class where we split the state up into five separate states. We had to give a presentation as to why we split it up the way we did. Even through college, that was one of the most entertaining projects I ever had to do.
