Several counties want to secede from Colorado

cbsnews.com ^

[Sub-Driver]

Several counties want to secede from Colorado

The counties in Colorado that say they want to leave the state / KCNC-TV

Several Colorado counties that strongly oppose increased regulation of the oil and gas industry say they want to form their own state.

They are planning on calling it North Colorado or Northern Colorado, reports CBS affiliate KCNC in Denver.

The counties are frustrated with the new agricultural and energy bills that have recently been signed into law.

"We really feel in northern and northeastern Colorado that we are ignored -- citizens' concerns are ignored, and we truly feel disenfranchised," Weld County Commissioner Sean Conway said.

Conway said the new laws don't support the interests of the northern part of the state, which is rich in agricultural history. Conway said that's why he and others are proposing to break away from Colorado to form a new state.

"This is not a stunt. This is a very serious deliberative discussion that's going on," he said. "There's a real feeling that a lot of folks who come from the urban areas don't appreciate the contribution that many Coloradans contribute."

Parts of Nebraska are also apparently interested in joining in on what would be a new state.

Conway says five of the current 50 states were created through a similar process. He says the proposal is "likely" to end up on a Colorado ballot this fall.

"The whole purpose of doing this is to preserve an agricultural way of life and to protect the energy sector, that we feel is very much under assault," Conway said.

[Steve_Seattle]

"It only took 14 posts before you came up with the correct answer."

Actually it took 18 posts. My first one - based on memory - was wrong. I forgot the final clause which allows subdivision of a state with the approval of the state legislature and Congress.

[Steve_Seattle]

Libs make sarcastic comments about wishing they could excise conservative counties from their respective states, but in real life they would never allow it because it would reduce their sphere of influence, and they absolutely do not want that to happen. A conservative state derived from - say - eastern Washington - would presumably create two new conservative senators, diluting liberal power.

[GoldenPup]

Several counties want to secede from Colorado

Didn't some southern states try that some years back? Didn't turn out too well for them if I recall correctly.

[ROCKLOBSTER]

The socialists would rather give $2B to illegal aliens than support the state school system.

I'd vote to fund neither.

[Dilbert San Diego]

The constitution does not prohibit carving a new state out of another state. The constitution says that creating such a state requires the approval of the existing state, and an act of Congress in Washington, to establish such a new state. It’s a tall order to have both of these events happen.

We can think of other states where people might be interested in seeing splits such as this. Upstate New York could split from New York City and environs. Downstate Illinois could split off from Chicago. Just in general, you can imagine the more rural parts of many states wanting to disconnect from the major cities which dominate the legislatures of those states.

[mountainlion]

The socialists would rather give $2B to illegal aliens than support the state school system

The governor has bought the Hispanic vote and expect to stay in office with it. There is little a person can do to stand up for their rights, that’s the way they designed the system.

[Verginius Rufus]

Back in the early 1970s there was a secession movement in western Nebraska to break away and join Wyoming. They felt neglected by the state government. On the other hand, the Cornhuskers were pretty successful in those years so that may have in the end kept them loyal to Nebraska.

If a new state was formed would it have the resources to finance a major university, and a Division I football team?

[righttackle44]

Tucsonians wanted to break away from the rest of Arizona. Then people began asking them how South Arizona would support THEIR university, THEIR healthcare system, and THEIR highway patrol, department of public safety and department of economic security? And what would they do about all those illegal Mexicans streaming across the border with their blessing?

Not saying their threat is over, but we haven't a peep from them since those questions were posed.

[katana]

Most East Tennesseans were pro-Union, whereas most West Tennesseans were pro-Confederacy

Same situation in Kentucky. Scots Irish Appalachian Mountain people vs. the wealthy plantation and river folk to the west. Kentucky (barely) stayed in the Union. The major reason why the Emancipation Proclamation applied only to States in rebellion (the Confederacy). Otherwise it was feared that all the border slave States would swing.

[CaspersGh0sts]

Agreed. It would be a beautiful thing if public education was done away with and people’s tax dollars were returned to them to buy into their own educational system of choice. I fear that government would no doubt attempt to control curriculums and that the ACLU would attempt to launch a barrage against individual choice in education.

My children will be attending parochial schools. End of story. Thankfully I’m in a financial position where I can do this, and we have a nice school in the area built under a classical Christian model where children are taught to reason and argue as opposed to filling out worksheets all day.

[Steve_Seattle]

"The constitution does not prohibit carving a new state out of another state. The constitution says that creating such a state requires the approval of the existing state, and an act of Congress in Washington, to establish such a new state. It’s a tall order to have both of these events happen."

I corrected my error on #18. In subsequent posts I speculated that libs - despite their "let them [conservative counties] secede "rhetoric - would have good reason to oppose such a development because it would dilute liberal power in the US Senate.

[Dilbert San Diego]

Good point. There is no way that the Democrats in Washington would want to see a new conservative state with 2 GOP senators carved out of rural Colorado.

[JCBreckenridge]

Tell that to Virginia.