The 51st state

A group of conservative Californians (yes, there are many) on Monday formally embarked on a quest to separate the mostly rural counties from the urban coastal regions and form a 51^st state called New California.

Citing its authority under the Article IV, Section 3 of the U.S. Constitution, the group issued what it called its “Declaration of Independence” and stated its intent to petition the state legislature for its approval. It would then submit a plan to Congress.

The chances of this endeavor succeeding are slimmer than none. While the ruling elite of those liberal bastions doubtless hold the inhabitants of the state’s conservative regions in great contempt and would like nothing better than to be shed of them – much like the northern and coastal elite would prefer to be relieved of the “backward, anti-science racist” inhabitants of so-called “flyover country” – they know that the middle class residents of those areas are the state’s prime revenue generators and least users of state financial resources.

And people in almost all age and income brackets are fleeing California in droves. The state is seeing an influx of people aged 34 and under, but that’s more than offset  by the loss of people in all age groups from 35 up. And the only income bracket to show a net gain was the $50,000-$75,000 range.

“After years of over taxation, regulation, and mono-party politics the State of California and many of its 58 Counties have become ungovernable,” the group said in a statement, according to media reports, citing a “decline in essential basic services” including education, law enforcement, infrastructure and health care.

“Well, it’s been ungovernable for a long time. High taxes, education, you name it, and we’re rated around 48th or 50th from a business climate and standpoint in California,” said founder Robert Paul Preston.

“There’s something wrong when you have a rural county such as this one, and you go down to Orange County which is mostly urban, and it has the same set of problems, and it happens because of how the state is being governed and taxed,” Preston said.

Governor Moonbeam’s progressive “soak-the-rich” policies have driven up tax rates to the point that California has the highest taxes in the nation. It’s also deep in debt and has the nation’s highest poverty rate.

According to Article IV, Section 3:

New States may be admitted by the Congress into this Union; but no new States shall be formed or erected within the Jurisdiction of any other State; nor any State be formed by the Junction of two or more States, or parts of States, without the Consent of the Legislatures of the States concerned as well as of the Congress.

But in the unlikely event that California’s legislature ever approved the separation; the national Democrat Party would never let it get through Congress. Democrats will never surrender 55 sure Electoral votes.

The Founders made it more difficult for states to split than they did for states to leave the union. Secession was an understood course of action prior to the tyrant Abraham Lincoln’s assault on the South.

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