Would You Support Splitting The U.S. Into 13 Commonwealths?

[Harshaw]

There has to be a war with China first. I also do not see the Bureau of Alcohol, Drugs, Tobacco, Firearms and Lasers existing yet.

The whole thing is a silly idea based on not knowing what you're talking about.

 

[Paschendale]

You may be right that interstate conflicts could be somewhat decreased in this scenario, but my guess is that intrastate conflict would increase dramatically, and that places like West Virginia in the new Eastern Commonwealth would have their interests almost completely ignored.

I don't see why that would happen any more than with smaller and less prominent parts of existing states. Aren't there parts of Missouri that get lost in the shuffle? There are certainly parts of New York that are. I'm not specifically saying that 13 groupings is a better idea, just that having all the groupings being the same size would solve a lot of our squabbles.

 

[Anagram]

I don't see why that would happen any more than with smaller and less prominent parts of existing states. Aren't there parts of Missouri that get lost in the shuffle? There are certainly parts of New York that are. I'm not specifically saying that 13 groupings is a better idea, just that having all the groupings being the same size would solve a lot of our squabbles.

Missouri tends to balance itself out with St. Louis and Kansas City versus the rest of the state. And yes there are certainly problems in other states like New York or Illinois where there are large populations that tend to get dominated by even larger ones. But I think any proposal like this would make it so much worse. There's no way you don't end up with a case like West Virginia, which is a huge group of people that deserve representation, yet end up being only about 2% of the new commonwealth. They would have almost no power either federally or in their own commonwealth.

 

[Harshaw]

Divided, inefficient power is preferable for liberty, anyway.

 

[Carjosse]

I don't understand why 50 states are needed for protecting freedom, look at our system the territories all have one seat each and most of the provinces don't have as many seats as the city of Toronto alone. We have our liberties protected with 10 provinces and three territories and ours vary much more widely when compared to U.S. sates, some even speak different languages.

 

[polgara]

Why would it be lower?

I was thinking along the lines of maintaining and staffing 37 fewer locations. However, if the States kept their own governors, staff and buildings, plus the added cost of Commonwealth officials, staff and buildings, it would cost more, so why would anyone be interested in changing what we currently have? What would the benefits be?

Greetings, Harshaw. :2wave:

 

[Harshaw]

I was thinking along the lines of maintaining and staffing 37 fewer locations.

You'd still have to administrate the same territory, though, so I don't see how it would make taxes any less. Case in point: California. It could be and perhaps should have been several smaller states, but it has some of the highest tax burdens in the country. Certainly some of the natural states California could be divided into would have lower taxes, because the level of taxation has a lot more to do with philosophy of the scope of the government than it does the number of legislators, etc. Under the proposed scheme, a low-tax stated like Montana could be grouped in with a high-tax state whose philosophies prevail because of a higher population, and Montanans' taxes would go up.

Greetings, Harshaw. :2wave:

Salutations!

 

[Harshaw]

I don't understand why 50 states are needed for protecting freedom

Who cares?

 

[Phys251]

If you have ever played a Fallout game you must know about the U.S. before the Great War, anyways it was split into 13 commonwealths:

Would you support merging the 50 sates into 13? I think this would be a good idea s it reduces the number of state governments from 50 to 13. I believe part of America's problems stem form the fact it has 50 different states and 50 diffrent governments to go with them aswell.

For anyone curious the flag was changed to this:
[/QUOTE]

Ever read The Federalist Papers? They outline what all could go wrong with splitting up the United States like that.

 

[Carjosse]

Ever read The Federalist Papers? They outline what all could go wrong with splitting up the United States like that.

We do it is outlined by the Ministry of Finance. 10 cents of our federal tax dollars go to healthcare transfer payments.

 

[Lethargic Aptitude]

We do it is outlined by the Ministry of Finance. 10 cents of our federal tax dollars go to healthcare transfer payments.

Well thats great Canada can do whatever she wants. :doh

 

[Carjosse]

Well thats great Canada can do whatever she wants. :doh

**** wrong thread. If someone could delete it that would be nice.