Free Republic

“ … states' rights, states’ rights, states' rights!” — Rick Perry at the Alamo, June 15, 2009 Until you get higher in the hills, Laconia might be considered the vortex of New Hampshire redneck politics, heavy into the Tea Party. The Lakes Region Tea Party is small but might be indicative of how things will go. A straw poll on Nov. 16 gave Newt Gingrich 49 percent while Cain tied with Ron Paul at 15. Romney 12 percent and Rick Perry 0. Similar results in a straw poll at a Republican club in Alabama on Saturday: Newt 45 percent, Cain...

This might seem like a ridicules question from the above average intelligence of one of the Forgotten Men. But is it really? Are you sure conservative and Constitutionalist mean the same? I don't think so. Having followed and been intimately involved in national politics for decades now, in my former years I would have thought that in all cases a Constitutionalist was the same as a conservative. I had my pocket Constitution ready to be pulled out at a moments notice. I even knew a little bit of the Declaration of Independence (though I would often mingle the Preamble of...

Was the Declaration of Independence legal? In Philadelphia, American and British lawyers have debated the legality of America's founding documents.On Tuesday night, while Republican candidates in Nevada were debating such American issues as nuclear waste disposal and the immigration status of Mitt Romney's gardener, American and British lawyers in Philadelphia were taking on a far more fundamental topic. Namely, just what did Thomas Jefferson think he was doing? Some background: during the hot and sweltering summer of 1776, members of the second Continental Congress travelled to Philadelphia to discuss their frustration with royal rule.By 4 July, America's founding fathers approved...

The dubious dream lives on. Two years ago, Texas Governor Rick Perry bruited the idea of a second Texas secession — the state left during the Civil War — to excitable Tea Party audiences. Now bruiting the idea of running for president, Perry has muted his anti-Constitutional proclamations.

The 51st state should be named South California, says Jeff Stone, a Republican on the the Riverside County Board of Supervisors. But the proposed 13 southern California counties that would split off from the Golden State would not include Los Angeles. Stone told the Times' Phil Willon that the ommission is intentional and is part of a plan that would make for a new conservative Californian state.

Accusing Sacramento of pillaging local governments to feed its runaway spending and left-wing policies, a Riverside County politician is proposing a solution: He wants 13 mostly inland, conservative counties to break away to form a separate state of "South California.''

.An effort to turn 13 southern California counties into the nation's 51st state took a small step forward Tuesday but remains an extremely long shot, say experts. Four members of the Riverside County Board of Supervisors agreed Tuesday to allow a fifth member to convene a statewide meeting on the subject in the fall. Each of the four supervisors stated their objections to the secession idea, but went ahead and approved the idea of at least talking about it when Supervisor Jeff Stone said he would “personally see to it” that private funding, not public money, would be used to...

Mines Minister Norman Moore has spoken out about his long-held desire to see Western Australia split from the rest of the nation, citing the carbon tax and Minerals Resource Rent Tax as opportune reasons to secede. In an interview with Channel Ten's George Negus last night, Mr Moore - one of the WA government's most senior members and leader in the state's Upper House - said the federation was broken and needed to be fixed. "We should try and fix up the Federation and in the event the Federation can't be fixed, and I suspect it can't be, then states...

Riverside County Supervisor Jeff Stone, Third District, announced Thursday he will propose a secession from the State of California. Riverside County Supervisor Jeff Stone, Third District, announced Thursday that he will ask leaders in 13 counties to begin discussions about seceding from the State of California. Under the proposal, Riverside, Imperial, San Diego, Orange, San Bernardino, Kings, Kern, Fresno, Tulare, Inyo, Madera, Mariposa and Mono counties would be asked to consider forming a 51st state, the State of South California. Boards of supervisors and city councils within those counties would be invited to meet and discuss the feasibility of secession...

The appeals court ruled today in favor of Obama’s “health reform” The court said Affordable Care Act is a ‘valid exercise’ of congressional power. Here's all you need to know. The United States of America is hanging by a thread. If this abomination of a law is upheld by the Supreme Court, several state legislators will defend the constitutional right of their citizens. The gravity of the decision to come by the Supreme Court cannot be mitigated. If this law stands, there will be secession - and the Keynesian Kenyan will likely not leave well enough alone. Since he came...

"This man who was raised by leftists in a disfunctional family, despising every principle upon which this great nation was founded is like a culmination of all our national sins, embodied in one very real individual. He has a plan for America and it makes fictional screenplays like The Manchurian Candidate read like Disney." (continued)

The New Barbarians of Secession When secession finally occurs in the first American state, it will come first from the New Barbarians, not from the state house. This article explores the definition of the word “Barbarian,” and how I perceive that secession will be moved forward into reality by the New Barbarians. I am one of the New Barbarians. From Wikipedia: “Barbarian” is a pejorative term used to refer to a person who is perceived to be uncivilized. The word is often used either in a general reference to a member of a nation or ethnos, typically a tribal society...

Whereas, In addition to the well founded causes of complaint set forth by this convention, in reselutions adopted on the 11th March, A. D. 1861, against the sectional party now in power at Washington City, headed by Abraham Lincoln, he has, in the face of resolutions passed by this convention, pledging the State of Arkansas to resist to the last extremity any attempt on the part of such power to coerce any state that had seceded from the old Union, proclaimed to the world that war should be waged against such states, until they should be compelled to submit to...

Steadfast refusal to cooperate with the Democratic majority in their bid to cover the state’s deficit by raising taxes may cost Republican lawmakers their share of the take. California Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg (D-Sacramento) is working on a plan that would focus budget cuts on districts represented by legislators who oppose his Party’s tax hike scheme. The plan to differentiate between districts is the brainchild of State Treasurer Bill Lockyer (D). “Look, if they’re not going to help us extract more money from taxpayers why should they get an equal share of what we do raise?” Lockyer argued....

Never an organization to pass up an attempt at publicity, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals will put up a billboard in Tucson having Pima County become its own state.

One Arizona Democrat is so frustrated with his state's conservative politics that he's pushing a novel solution: secession. Paul Eckerstrom, the former Democratic party chairman of Pima County, has formed a political committee, Start Our State, to look into making Pima the 51st U.S. state. Start Our State says its mission is "to establish a new state in Southern Arizona free of the un-American, unconstitutional machinations of the Arizona legislature and to restore our region's credibility as a place welcoming to others, open to commerce, and friendly to its neighbors." Eckerstrom told MSNBC yesterday that he and others in his...

Texas' secession from the Union was not official until the next day.

Davis was informed the next day.

1861 - The Confederate State of America opened for business when the Provisional Congress convened in Montgomery, Alabama. Seven states that had seceded from the Union were involved.

More than 99 percent of Southern Sudanese voted to secede from the north, a referendum official said Sunday in the first official preliminary result announcement. "The vote for separation was 99.57 percent," said Chan Reek Madut, the deputy head of the commission that organized the referendum, to a crowd in the South’s capital of Juba, according to Reuters. Voter turnout in the South was 99 percent, Madut said. And over 60 percent of Southern Sudanese living in the north turned out to vote, with 58 percent voting to secede, he stated. Mohamed Ibrahim Khalil, chairman of the Southern Sudan Referendum...

One hundred and fifty years after the Civil War began, we're still fighting it -- or at least fighting over its history. I've polled thousands of high school history teachers and spoken about the war to audiences across the country, and there is little agreement even on why the South seceded. Was it over slavery? States' rights? Tariffs and taxes? As the nation begins to commemorate the anniversaries of the war's various battles -- from Fort Sumter to Appomattox -- let's first dispense with some of the more prevalent myths about why it all began. 1. The South seceded over...

Recently the History Channel proved that it is as snarky as those of who watch it thought. To wit: the Georgia Division of the Sons of Confederate Veterans (SCV) wanted to run some ads on the History Channel. These ads pointed out the legal basis for secession and, quite accurately, that the North invaded the newly configured Confederacy (Manassas/Bull Run is, after all, in Virginia). Another pointed out that Northern interests essentially ran the Federal government, frequently to the advantage Northern supporters at the expense of the South. The most accurate ad of all simply stated that ANY STATE had...

The Civil War is about to loom very large in the popular memory. We would do well to be candid about its causes and not allow the distortions of contemporary politics or long-standing myths to cloud our understanding of why the nation fell apart. The coming year will mark the 150th anniversary of the onset of the conflict, which is usually dated to April 12, 1861, when Confederate batteries opened fire at 4:30 a.m. on federal troops occupying Fort Sumter. Union forces surrendered the next day, after 34 hours of shelling.

Exactly 150 years after South Carolina became the first state to leave the United States, a group whose purpose is to preserve Confederate history is holding a dance in Charleston. The NAACP plans to protest Monday night's "Secession Ball." Leaders of the civil rights group have said it makes no sense to honor men who committed treason in order to maintain a system that kept black men and woman in bondage as slaves. But organizers of the ball say their intention is to honor men who were willing to die to protect their vision of states' rights and what this...

Called to the difficult and responsible station of Chief Executive of the Provisional Government which you have instituted, I approach the discharge of the duties assigned to me with an humble distrust of my abilities, but with a sustaining confidence in the wisdom of those who are to guide and to aid me in the administration of public affairs, and an abiding faith in the virtue and patriotism of the people.

Event marks war's anniversary CHARLESTON -- The shots are solely verbal -- and expected to remain that way -- but at least one Civil War Sesquicentennial event is triggering conflict. The Sons of Confederate Veterans plan to hold a $100-per-person "Secession Ball" on Dec. 20 in Gaillard Municipal Auditorium. It will feature a play highlighting key moments from the signing of South Carolina's Ordinance of Secession 150 years ago, an act that severed the state's ties to the Union and put the nation on the path to the Civil War. Jeff Antley, who is organizing the event, said the Secession...

On the honorable island nation of North Dumpling, Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield of Ben & Jerry’s preside as Ministers of Ice Cream, while other notables hold such titles as Minister of Brunch and Minister of Nepotism. North Dumpling has its own constitution, issues its own visas, and prints its own currency, which bears the likeness of its most famous (OK, only) resident. But while his very private island off the coast of Connecticut may have its whimsies, renowned inventor Dean Kamen wants to show the world the fun in functionality. He’s created the most carbon-neutral kingdom on the planet...

n my youth there was a popular song entitled: “Save Your Confederate Money, Boys… the South Is Gonna Rise Again!” I began thinking about it as I watched a group of talking heads discussing the future of America, as a single entity comprised of 50 states. The consensus was -- America will not survive as a 50-state nation. It is a conclusion, which I, unhappily, arrived at years ago. I am convinced we Americans are being lied to by our government. I am also convinced our economy is on the verge of collapse. Maybe it is just my natural paranoia,...

We see plans like Cap and Trade and know that it will result in more and more property flowing from the people to the government via fines and increased energy rates. We see ObamaCare and know it is less about helping people get treatment and more about consolidating power in Washington.The right has been watching from the sidelines for decades. But we have had enough.This is the New Right. We will no longer sit idly by and watch the left turn this country into a socialist utopia. The Tea Party movement is standing across the Bridge to Dependence like Gandalf...

[by Assemblyman Chuck DeVore (R-Irvine, CA), re-published with his permission] For years I have admired Congressman Ron Paul’s principled stance on spending and the Constitution. That said, he really damaged himself when he blamed President Lincoln for the Civil War, saying, “Six hundred thousand Americans died in a senseless civil war… [President Abraham Lincoln] did this just to enhance and get rid of the original intent of the republic.” This is historical revisionism of the worst order, and it must be addressed. For Congressman Paul’s benefit – and for his supporters who may not know – seven states illegally declared...

In federal lawsuits, defendants may answer litigation filed against them with a counterclaim against the plaintiff for damages or other relief. The Constitution of the United States mandates at Article 4: "The United States shall guarantee to every state in this Union a republican form of government ... that the United States shall protect each of them (the states) against invasion and ... against domestic violence." (Emphasis added) "Republican form of government" is defined as a republic that is a system of government in which the people hold sovereign power and elect representatives to exercise that power. To "guarantee" means...

Judicial activism is pushing America to the breaking point. This week, a federal judge blocked key provisions of Arizona's immigration law, thwarting the will of the people. The decision was ominous and will reverberate for years to come. Judge Susan Bolton, appointed by former President Bill Clinton, is a liberal elitist who believes judicial imperialism trumps democracy. Her ruling states that local police cannot check the immigration status of people arrested or stopped for violations of the law. In her view, that would amount to an abuse of civil liberties and unduly burden the federal immigration system. She also stipulated...

World court rules for Kosovo. Adviser to Parti Quebecois likens decision on unilateral declaration to 'right to strike' By KEVIN DOUGHERTY, The Gazette July 28, 2010 7:36 AM QUEBEC - A World Court ruling that Kosovo's unilateral declaration of independence from Serbia did not violate international law means Quebec also has the right to declare its independence unilaterally, a senior Parti Quebecois strategist said Tuesday. Louis Bernard -noting the 1998 Supreme Court of Canada ruling that if there is a clear vote for secession in a clear referendum, the federal government must negotiate with Quebec -said the World Court decision...

In a recently published book, 'Nullification,' author Tom Woods maintains that states have a power to nullify laws that exceed the powers of Congress to enact. This claim has a long history, some of it distinguished–as in the case of Wisconsin’s resistance to the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850–some of it not. But is the claim warranted? Last week, I was on Freedom Watch, Judge Andrew Napolitano’s new show on Fox Business Channel to discuss the matter. Judge Napolitano blurbed Woods’s book and the segment was devoted largely to him making his case. I got to make 2 statements to...

The average American "celebrates" July 4 by barbecuing, drinking a beer or two, and watching fireworks. I am convinced most Americans have NEVER (since high school, anyway) read this most amazing, audacious, inflammatory and revolutionary document. Everyone should pull it out, read it, and give friends printed copies when they come over. Most of the document is a set of gripes, but the really "meaty" sections are paragraphs one and two, and then the last one. Some of the more salient points of this jaw dropping, in your face statement of defiance are below: 1) Governments derive their just powers...

Acts of rebellion which promote moral and political change must be nonviolent. And one of the most potent nonviolent alternatives in the country, which defies the corporate state and calls for an end to imperial wars, is the secessionist movement bubbling up in some two dozen states including Vermont, Texas, Alaska and Hawaii. These groups at least grasp that the old divisions between liberals and conservatives are obsolete and meaningless. They understand that corporations have carried out a coup d’état. They recognize that our permanent war economy and costly and futile imperial wars are unsustainable and they demand that we...

Open Message to Mr. Beck (self proclaimed historian). Tonight on your TV show you said that you read the Confederate Constitution and I paraphrase "it had slavery written all over it, all about slavery blah blah blah". You are incorrect sir, I did a word search on the document and the word slavery appears "one" time. Everyone can try it for themselves at the link provided below.CS ConstitutionCan never trust a Yankee, even a goofy entertaining one.

I write a political column in my hometown newspaper. I am writing a column next week proposing that a Texas secession is the only solution to Barack Obama's massive Government expansion. I would like some feedback on the potential positives and negatives of a Texas secession. I really value your critical opinions and want to make sure I am not overlooking any critical aspect of this issue.

A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 28% of Adults believe it is at least somewhat likely that some states will try to leave the United States and form an independent country over the next 25 years or so.

In 1861 America fought a civil war over slavery, States’ rights and economic differences between North and South. The opening shots of a second civil war were fired one hundred years later. War began on college campuses with rebellion against academic and civil authorities. Hostages were taken, buildings occupied. There were riots and bombings. Students and police were killed and wounded. Anarchists joined civil rights activists and so-called “peace” activists in violent anti-war, anti-capitalism riots. In common was the attack on society and the Constitution in favor of an ill-defined “just” society to be created. Civil society suppressed the foul-mouthed...

Brother Gregory -- the "Brother" is more of a nickname than an occupational title -- ministers from the Oregon desert where he lives with his wife, some of his grown children and grandchildren. Like other conservative Christians in this growing movement, Brother Gregory believes that Christianity has strayed too far from its roots, and has given its role in people's lives over to the government -- as with welfare programs or health care. ... "Christians should be looking for a way to take care of one another without forcing their neighbor to contribute to their welfare. In essence that's coveting...

Rush Limbaugh on an Arizona-California "Civil War"Link to video

The American writer Lawrence Auster had a debate with his readers regarding the possibility of splitting the USA along ideological lines. According to reader Tim W, modern Left liberalism is a universal totalitarian ideology, not a “live and let live” concept. The goal of its adherents is a world government from which no one can escape. Leftists “need conservatives but conservatives don’t need leftists. To be blunt, they can’t let us go. We’d be happy to be rid of them, because to us they’re nothing but parasites and/or oppressors. But they can’t get rid of us because we do most...

A widely regarded Southern symbol of pride and states' rights is standing in the way of would-be Marines in their quest to serve their country – a Confederate battle flag. Straight out of high school, one 18-year-old Tennessee man was determined to serve his country as a Marine. His friend said he passed the pre-enlistment tests and physical exams and looked forward with excitement to the day he would ship out to boot camp. But there would be no shouting drill instructors, no rigorous physical training and no action-packed stories for the aspiring Marine to share with his family. Shortly...

Christians rightly square everything with the principles and precepts of the Holy Scriptures. So, is there Biblical approbation and authority for State secession? Before answering the Biblical question, let me briefly touch upon the Christian reaction to State secession both here in America and overseas. First, overseas. I doubt that there are many Christian pastors and churchmen who would be willing to denounce, denigrate, or declare as illegitimate the nation-state of Norway today. What Christian would advocate cutting off trade or diplomatic relations with Norway? Where is the Christian denomination or Church that would not recognize the right of Norway...

The following letter was written by the author in response to a column in The Covington (Ga.) News on May 6, 2009 (http://www.covnews.com/news/article/6961/) : Mr. Shipp, I believe you’re right. If Mr. [Rick] Perry and Mr. [John] Oxendine have explored the notion of seceding from the United States, they are rebels and traitors. And their names should become synonymous with others who are or were like-minded: Jefferson, Washington, Franklin, Adams. You used several names to demagogue those who have even suggested secession: “wacko,” “nuts,” “crazy,” “troublemakers,” and “haters.” Similar terms might have been used by more articulate Tory columnists about...

The website TexanToTexan.com debuts calling itself “A network of Texans committed to doing whatever it takes to secure Texas Sovereignty”. The site goes on to describe who and what it is: “TEXAN TO TEXAN is a group of Texans banded together to do whatever it takes to protect the Sovereignty of Texas. It’s not an organization, but a think tank composed of a diverse group of people across the state of Texas ....

The state of Long Island would be bigger than Rhode Island, while the official bird of West Kansas would be the pheasant. Frustrated citizens are trying to redraw borders, add new states and lower taxes. Michael J. Trinklein on how to succeed at seceding. Long Island's latest quest to split from New York and become its own state had a promising start last year. Legislators in Suffolk county, upset over a new payroll tax to fund New York City's subways, voted 12-6 in favor of a secession plan. It seemed viable: In terms of square miles, Long Island is bigger...

The Revolt of the States By Alan Caruba President Obama, his weird circle of advisors (czars), and the ideologues within the Democrat Party led by Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Majority Leader Harry Reid only have a few months left to completely destroy the separation of powers between the States and the federal government. A major battle is looming over the Tenth Amendment which declares that “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.” Almost everywhere one looks today, the States...

On this day in 1865, John Wilkes Booth, an actor and Confederate sympathizer, fatally shoots President Abraham Lincoln at a play at Ford's Theater in Washington, D.C. The attack came only five days after Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrendered his massive army at Appomattox Court House, Virginia, effectively ending the American Civil War. Booth, a Maryland native born in 1838, who remained in the North during the war despite his Confederate sympathies, initially plotted to capture President Lincoln and take him to Richmond, the Confederate capital. However, on March 20, 1865, the day of the planned kidnapping, the president...