Ron Paul: Petitions on secession raise 'worthwhile questions'
By Justin Sink - 11/19/12 03:49 PM ET
Former presidential candidate Ron Paul (R-Texas) said in a blog post Monday that secession protests launched in the wake of President Obama's reelection "raise a lot of worthwhile questions about the nature of our union."
Thousands of Americans have signed digital petitions — at least one from every state — on the White House's "We the People" petition website. The administration has promised a response to every petition on the site that collects at least 25,000 signatures within 30 days. At least seven states, including Texas, have hit that mark.
Paul, writing on his congressional website, conceded that he "wouldn't hold my breath" on states, including his own, actually moving to leave the union. But he argues that "secession is a deeply American principle" rooted in the country's Revolutionary War that sought independence from Great Britain.
"There is nothing treasonous or unpatriotic about wanting a federal government that is more responsive to the people it represents," Paul writes. "That is what our Revolutionary War was all about and today our own federal government is vastly overstepping its constitutional bounds with no signs of reform. In fact, the recent election only further entrenched the status quo."
Paul goes on to cite recent state-level efforts to legalize marijuana — and subsequent federal arrests — as an example of what "shouldn't happen in a free country."
"If the Feds refuse to accept that and continue to run roughshod over the people, at what point do we acknowledge that that is not freedom anymore?" Paul asks. "At what point should the people dissolve the political bands which have connected them with an increasingly tyrannical and oppressive federal government? And if people or states are not free to leave the United States as a last resort, can they really think of themselves as free?"
Paul concludes by arguing "if a people cannot secede from an oppressive government, they cannot truly be considered free."
But while the Texas congressman sees clear ability for states to secede, the legal actuality is considerably more murky. There is no constitutional mechanism by which states can leave the union, and the federal government responded forcibly when states attempted to secede during the Civil War.
Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia actually addressed the question in a letter obtained by The Wall Street Journal, in which the conservative justice said the "answer is clear."
"If there was any constitutional issue resolved by the Civil War, it is that there is no right to secede," Scalia wrote.
The secession move also does not seem particularly popular among large swaths of the population. According to a YouGov poll released Friday, more than half of all Americans opposed seeing their state secede, with 42 percent strongly opposing the idea. Only 22 percent said they supported secession.
Secession: Are We Free To Go?
Is all the recent talk of secession mere sour grapes over the election, or perhaps something deeper? Currently there are active petitions in support of secession for
all 50 states, with Texas taking the lead in number of signatures. Texas has well over the number of signatures needed to generate a response from the administration, and while I wouldn't hold my breath on Texas actually seceding, I believe these petitions raise a lot of worthwhile questions about the nature of our union.
Is it treasonous to want to secede from the United States? Many think the question of secession was settled by our Civil War. On the contrary; the principles of self-governance and voluntary association are at the core of our founding. Clearly Thomas Jefferson believed secession was proper, albeit as a last resort. Writing to
William Giles in 1825, he concluded that states:
"should separate from our companions only when the sole alternatives left, are the dissolution of our Union with them, or submission to a government without limitation of powers."
Keep in mind that the first and third paragraphs of the Declaration of Independence expressly contemplate the dissolution of a political union when the underlying government becomes tyrannical.
Do we have a "government without limitation of powers" yet? The Federal government kept the Union together through violence and force in the Civil War, but did might really make right?
Secession is a deeply American principle. This country was born through secession. Some felt it was treasonous to secede from England, but those "traitors" became our country's greatest patriots.
There is nothing treasonous or unpatriotic about wanting a federal government that is more responsive to the people it represents. That is what our Revolutionary War was all about and today our own federal government is vastly overstepping its constitutional bounds with no signs of reform. In fact, the recent election only further entrenched the status quo. If the possibility of secession is completely off the table there is nothing to stop the federal government from continuing to encroach on our liberties and no recourse for those who are sick and tired of it.
Consider the ballot measures that passed in Colorado and Washington state regarding marijuana laws. The people in those states have clearly indicated that they are ready to try something different where drug policy is concerned, yet they will still face a tremendous threat from the federal government. In California, the Feds have been arresting peaceful medical marijuana users and
raiding dispensaries that state and local governments have sanctioned. This shouldn't happen in a free country.
It remains to be seen what will happen in states that are refusing to comply with the deeply unpopular mandates of Obamacare by
not setting up healthcare exchanges. It appears the Federal government will not respect those decisions either.
In a free country, governments derive their power from the consent of the governed. When the people have very clearly withdrawn their consent for a law, the discussion should be over. If the Feds refuse to accept that and continue to run roughshod over the people, at what point do we acknowledge that that is not freedom anymore? At what point should the people dissolve the political bands which have connected them with an increasingly tyrannical and oppressive federal government? And if people or states are not free to leave the United States as a last resort, can they really think of themselves as free?
If a people cannot secede from an oppressive government, they cannot truly be considered free.
