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Examples of both local and state secession movements can be cited over the last 25 years. Some secessionist movements to create new states have failed, others are ongoing.
There was an attempt by Staten Island to break away from New York City in the late 1980s and early 1990s (See: City of Greater New York). Around the same time, there was a similar movement to separate Northeast Philadelphia from the rest of the city of Philadelphia. San Fernando Valley lost a vote to separate from Los Angeles in 2002 but has seen increased attention to its infrastructure needs (See: San Fernando Valley secession movement). Several towns in Vermont including Killington recently explored a secession request to allow them to join New Hampshire over claims that they are not getting adequate return of state resources from their state tax contributions.
Advocates in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, with off and on intensity, have called for it to become a separate 51st state. Others wanted the peninsula, Minnesota and Wisconsin to combine into the North Star Republic. Similarly some in the Little Egypt region of Illinois want to separate due to what they consider Chicagoan control over the legislature and economy. The mock 1982 secessionist protest by the Conch Republic in the Florida Keys resulted in an ongoing source of local pride and tourist amusement.
In November 2006, the Supreme Court of Alaska held that secession was illegal, Kohlhaas vs. State, and refused to permit an otherwise proper Initiative to be presented to the people of Alaska for a vote.
The Republic of Texas has been quite fractious and one faction generated national publicity for its illegal antics in the late 1990s. There have been repeated attempts to form a Republic of Cascadia in the Pacific Northwest. The Hawaiian sovereignty movement has a number of active groupings which have won some concessions from the State of Hawaii. Founded in the 1983, The Creator's Rights Party seeks to have one or more states secede in order to implement "God’s plan for government" and is fielding political candidates in 2007 around the United States.
Efforts to organize a continental secession movement have been initiated since 2004 by members of Second Vermont Republic, working with noted decentralist author Kirkpatrick Sale. Their second "radical consultation" in November of 2004 resulted in a statement of intent called The Middlebury Declaration. It also gave rise to the Middlebury Institute, which documents the development of this movement.
In November 2006 the same group sponsored the First North American Secessionist Convention which attracted 40 participants from 16 secessionist organizations and was (erroneously) described as the first gathering of secessionists since the Civil War. Delegates included a broad spectrum from libertarians to socialists to greens to Christian conservatives to indigenous peoples activists. Groups represented included Alaskan Independence Party, Cascadia Independence Project, Hawaiʻi Nation, The Second Maine Militia, The Free State Project, the Republic of New Hampshire, the League of the South, Christian Exodus, the Second Vermont Republic and the United Republic of Texas. Delegates created a statement of principles of secession which they presented as the Burlington Declaration.[3]The Second North American Secessionist Convention is planned for October, 2007, in Chattanooga, Tennesee.
In the summer of 2007, an advocacy group called Californians for Independence was formed. Its mission is "the eventual secession of California from the United States of America."
Again, I trust and hope you offer this item a reverent position at your home. But, as you say you do not fly 'the flag' in public ( I suppose out of a sense of shame), I can't imagine how you would respectfully display the iron marker. Perhaps in a back flower bed under some discreet bushes, to further gather rust. Please email me if I can purchase this cross and return it to its intended purpose.
Don,
No, I am not interested in selling you my family's confederate marker.
For the record, I don't publicly 'fly the flag' because it to a lot of people, the CSA represented slavery and racism. Not to people who live 1000 miles away, but the people who live down the street. Why would I want to constantly remind them of that? Call me crazy, but I think the present is more important that the past.
Don,
No, I am not interested in selling you my family's confederate marker.
For the record, I don't publicly 'fly the flag' because it to a lot of people, the CSA represented slavery and racism. Not to people who live 1000 miles away, but the people who live down the street. Why would I want to constantly remind them of that? Call me crazy, but I think the present is more important that the past.
I find a sense of incongruety in your words. On the one hand you say you find the present more important than the past, yet you display a symbol dating back over a hundred years, one not meant for backyard display but one intended for the most solemn setting of a cemetery. Personal backyard display of solemn symbols desecrates both the symbol and the memory of those it was intended to honor. Just my humble opinion.
I think that is is our (Southerners) duty to educate and help others understand rather than simply buying into their mythology of the South. To do otherwise is to roll over and in effect perpetuate the myth. As I've indicated earlier, there are a hundred well documented books out there covering the Southern states, the Confederacy, an analysis of the men and women who lived in the South prior to 1861 and the events leading up to secession and the war.
Let me draw a parallel to point out how I feel about your refusal to honor the flag because of how a neighbor might view it: Let's say you have a very dear black friend, a coworker or friend from early childhood. You guys enjoy each other's company immensely and have had great times together for years, even attending church together, going to ballgames, having an occasional beer after work. But, you won't invite him to your home.
He asks you why not. You explain that the neighbors on both sides of your home have these really solid feelings about mixed relationships and minority assertion of a claim of equality and they're really, really vocal about 'people staying in their place'. "So, you see", you continue, "I would have you over, but I can't....I can't because it would be offensive to my neighbors and the last thing I want to do is offend them....I have to live here".
In the illustration just presented, your black friend is the victim or the ill-founded attitudes and ignorant prejudices of your neighbors, and you have perpetuated it since you will not assist in reversing it.
Your early statement was that you would not display a Confederate flag because of the way your neighbor or someone down the street would or might react. There's no difference in your feeling and the scenario I laid out. Both could benefit from education...........not placing one's head into a sandpile.
Don,
No, I am not interested in selling you my family's confederate marker.
For the record, I don't publicly 'fly the flag' because it to a lot of people, the CSA represented slavery and racism. Not to people who live 1000 miles away, but the people who live down the street. Why would I want to constantly remind them of that? Call me crazy, but I think the present is more important that the past.
To each his own on the issue, but to my way of thinking, the quickest way for the Confederate Battle Flag to be dishonored and associated exclusively with hate groups is for decent Southerners to let them claim exclusive rights to it by default. Personally, I welcome the opportunity to explain to transplanted northerners or perhaps a minority who may see it negatively, my reasons for displaying it. And I can honestly say, in the vast majority of cases, the person has come away, if not necessarily agreeing with me in all ways, at understanding and accepting that most Southerners intend nothing obnoxious and/or hateful by it.
So far as the present and past goes, I see no reason we can't live fully in the one yet honor and learn from the other!
To each his own on the issue, but to my way of thinking, the quickest way for the Confederate Battle Flag to be dishonored and associated exclusively with hate groups is for decent Southerners to let them claim exclusive rights to it by default.
I don't believe that keeping the flag off my house or car is causing the flag to be associated with hate groups.
My point is - independent of hate groups, the media, or other irrelevance - the black folks that live in my neighborhood think the Confederacy was a bad thing, not a good thing. I value my day-to-day interactions with them more than I value the confederacy as a part of history.
Quote:
Personally, I welcome the opportunity to explain to transplanted northerners or perhaps a minority who may see it negatively, my reasons for displaying it. And I can honestly say, in the vast majority of cases, the person has come away, if not necessarily agreeing with me in all ways, at understanding and accepting that most Southerners intend nothing obnoxious and/or hateful by it.
I can understand your point of view. My experience, in this thread and in 'real life', is that people are not open-minded about the confederate flag.
A symbol is meant to communicate to other people. If others are interpreting the symbol in a different way than I intend it, then that is a problem to me.
I find a sense of incongruety in your words. On the one hand you say you find the present more important than the past, yet you display a symbol dating back over a hundred years
I think it's perfectly logical. The past is important. That's why I have the marker in my backyard. The present is more important - that's why I refrain from offending the people around me. Everybody wins.
Quote:
..one not meant for backyard display but one intended for the most solemn setting of a cemetery. Personal backyard display of solemn symbols desecrates both the symbol and the memory of those it was intended to honor. Just my humble opinion.
Humble opinion?
OK. Well, you can display yours however you like. I don't know where my ancestors gravesites are, nor do I want the marker to get stolen. So it's most relevant to me in the backyard, stuck in the ground in a pinestraw bed. I can see it every day, and I know it's not going anywhere.
Quote:
Let me draw a parallel to point out how I feel about your refusal to honor the flag because of how a neighbor might view it: Let's say you have a very dear black friend, a coworker or friend from early childhood. You guys enjoy each other's company immensely and have had great times together for years, even attending church together, going to ballgames, having an occasional beer after work. But, you won't invite him to your home.
He asks you why not. You explain that the neighbors on both sides of your home have these really solid feelings about mixed relationships and minority assertion of a claim of equality and they're really, really vocal about 'people staying in their place'. "So, you see", you continue, "I would have you over, but I can't....I can't because it would be offensive to my neighbors and the last thing I want to do is offend them....I have to live here".
In the illustration just presented, your black friend is the victim or the ill-founded attitudes and ignorant prejudices of your neighbors, and you have perpetuated it since you will not assist in reversing it.
Your early statement was that you would not display a Confederate flag because of the way your neighbor or someone down the street would or might react. There's no difference in your feeling and the scenario I laid out. Both could benefit from education...........not placing one's head into a sandpile.
No, I don't agree that your analogy accurately compares the two situations.
I don't think the hypothetical neighbors, in this case, have a legitimate claim. In reality, I think that black folks have a perfectly legitimate claim to be offended by the confederate flag.
Well, gentle friend; who are you to judge the inacceptability of my comments? And if you have 'never seen the union flag displayed' I would only bring to your attention that it has been displayed on most every flagpole in America for the past three hundred years, notwithstanding the conclusion of the war of northern aggression. "Not acceptable indeed".
Are you suggesting that the American flag is the flag the Union used during the civil war? You seem much more intelligent then to believe that.
As for "who are you to judge my comments..." We can discuss and disagree with topics, BUT we are required to treat each other with respect.
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why am I not suprised?
