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What Would it Take to Alter State’s Boundaries?
In theory, America believes in self-determination. We have a Federal system that allows people to move from state to state. But we do not seem to have a mechanism for allowing areas of adjacent states to migrate the state boundary.
This is not a hypothetical question. Right now, a total of thirty-three Illinois counties are trying to join Indiana. And if such a thing is truly possible (subject to a supermajority vote by the residents and the growing state), we would see borders change all over the land: 90% of Oregon’s land mass would happily be absorbed into Idaho, for example, to get away from Multnomah County. So would most of California.
So this is a practical question: what does it take to allow borders between states to be adjusted? Assuming we are for it, would we not also allow, say, Alberta to join the US on that basis?
Published in General
News stories suggest the state losing the counties has to agree. But I am not sure why this should be so – if we truly believe in self-determination?
Article IV, Section 3:
https://constitution.congress.gov/constitution/
Why? Because it is the law, and because the states were sovereign originally.
We could let Alberta join the US, but that might make things sticky with Canada. It’s not very likely to happen. Possibility, but not probability.
Arahant, thank you for the citation. Article 4 section 3 shows that both the donor and the recipient state need to agree and calls for neither a supermajority nor even a popular vote on the topic. It would seem straightforward for the 33 Illinois counties’ representatives to get the matter taken up by the Illinois legislature. You would need a beard in Indiana’s.
Heh, now that’s funny. It used to be straightforward enough, but now that Mike Madigan is gone, who all do they have to bribe? And how much?
Thanks, Doc.
To rephrase it very slightly…
Article 4 section 3 shows that both the Legislatures of the donor and the recipient state, and the Congress, need to agree and calls for neither a supermajority nor even a popular vote on the topic.
<edit>I take it back. The Article doesn’t give any procedure at all for a part of a State joining another State.</edit>
<edit>I take it back. If Arahant’s interpretation is correct, then a part of a State joining another State could be an equivalent wording for “a State being formed by” the junction of Parts of a State and a State.”
The wording of the text is perfectly ambiguous: incompetently drafted law.</edit>
The conditions that you describe exists in several distinct areas of America. We Americans have always been divided into two types of people or, at least, two types who subscribe to different belief systems. On this issue, I think they differ, in terms of the majority in each geographical area, into one group that relies preferentially on outcomes and one that relies on process. The process group prevailed, barely, by getting an agreement when the Constitution was ratified to have amendments immediately considered and the Bill of Rights was adopted.
So we started with a government of enumerated but limited powers with powers not so enumerated remaining with the states and the people. We still have the same types of people, some prefer outcomes while others prefer process, but much of the actual governing process has shifted to the federal level and is now well beyond anything thought to have been included in the original Constitution and Bill of Rights.
There are several other elements of belief and behaviors that attach to the members of these two groups and we see that in our many discussions here on Ricochet>. They were for a long time obscured by the so-called UniParty existence within our two party system. We might be experiencing a major change.
Or we could just quote the text right here:
Sounds like, as long as they’re just moving from one state to another, rather than forming a new state, it should be easy-peasy.
But the sad fact is that, for example, 90% of Oregon joining with Idaho wouldn’t affect the Senate, especially. That 90% of Oregon would just be voting for the same two Senators that Idaho already elects. They might feel better about that, but it wouldn’t change the makeup of the Senate. And presumably those Oregon counties already get whatever House representation their population brings them, so shifting whatever that might be to Idaho likely doesn’t change the House, either.
Indeed, the only way to really change things, would be to form one or more new states. Which DOES require the procedure listed.
Moving counties also requires the procedure. That would fall under “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.”
There would be a big effect on which state the natural resources would be in.
It would affect the number of representatives to the Congress in each of those states and would also affect the number of electoral votes in each state- decreasing the electoral vote count of Oregon and increasing the electoral vote count of Idaho.
That still seems to be referring to forming a previously-nonexistent state, rather than counties moving from one existing state to another existing state. Which, again, would not affect the overall composition of either the House or Senate. Forming a NEW state does.
But how would that be relevant to the numbers in Congress? And so, especially since the states were originally supposed to be sovereign, it would seem to be none of Congress’s business if states want to trade parts.
But it affects the election of the President and VP.
But the totals would remain the same. Leaving little room to argue that it’s any of Congress’s business. And could be exactly why that portion refers to FORMING states.
See my previous, since it affects the Electoral College and the Constitutional effect is congressional business.
ibid.
Again, the total numbers are unchanged, and since it’s just dealing between supposedly-sovereign states, it should be – and I think would have been considered at the founding – none of Congress’s business. Which again is why it refers to forming states.
Remember the House had to choose President John Quincy Adams because of an EC tie and that gets spoken of in today’s elections. So the Congress is affected.
I’ve already been over that. The Senate wouldn’t really change at all, and if there is a shift of one or more House seats from State A to State B, it would be pretty much the same people that the population when it was part of State A were already voting for.
At present, the majority of Oregon’s land area, most of the state adjacent to Idaho, is House District 2, represented by Republican Cliff Bentz. If that land area moved to Idaho, and those people were still represented by Cliff Bentz as a district of Idaho rather than Oregon, it makes NO DIFFERENCE. Especially with proportionate EC representation.
The main thing, though, it’s that it’s not “forming” a NEW state. And so it should be left to those states actually involved.
True dat.
Google: 2. informal•US a person who carries out a transaction, typically a bet, for someone else in order to conceal the other’s identity.Ie, Indiana’s legislature has no representatives for the citizens of Illinois, so they would need a person within the Indiana legislature to transact in their behalf. I first heard the term in Woody Allen’s movie Broadway Danny Rose, from which Allen’s protests “I’m just the beard” became a trope in the 1980s
Not the definition of “beard” I’m most familiar with.
Initially they were interested in forming a new state, but procedurally that is near impossible. Officials from our state say they are willing to look at it should the proper actions happen in Illinois.
Some context: for a time, the Indiana Department of Commerce bought billboards in Illinois that showed how much better it was to live in Indiana in terms of taxes and a few other factors. I saw one of these in Chicago. The Illinois government/legislature was not amused and responded with predictable Chicago-oriented scorn of their backwards neighbor state.
Indiana is definitely growing. When I worked at the Statehouse, we had about 5.5 million residents and now it’s close to 7 million. I’m optimistic we can get a Congressional seat back that we lost in the 2000 Census if things continue as is. Real estate agents tell me that about a third of new residents in our area come from Chicago.
Not all of them are happy to be here, and actually both my wife and I moved here from Chicago before we started dating. The difference is we’re from Indiana, we came home and were happy to do so. The unhappiness seems to stem from their loss of the urbane, sophisticated, high falootin’ status. One woman in our neighborhood seemed downright shellshocked after a transfer (company moved their HQ) found her and her husband living in the north Indy suburbs. In her defense, things are sleepy around here, and there are a lot less bullets flying around.
How so? It doesn’t affect the Electoral College any more than populations moving between states affects the Electoral College, and that’s not subject to Congressional approval.
If every single person in the affected Counties in Illinois picked up and moved to Indiana, the change is exactly the same from a political point of view. You’re not adding new Senators, and the House is reapportioned for population changes every ten years.
Indeed. Otherwise someone might as well argue that Illinois has some right to keep people from leaving.
Indiana has already shown its interested.
Now explain West Virginia. Pretty sure the Virginia legislature did not agree to the secession of West Virginia.