Americans in rural areas don’t want to be beholden to the big blue blob cities that run their states. People in towns in southern Illinois, eastern Oregon, upstate New York, and rural California (among others) are looking for a statewide divorce that frees their rural communities from the laws imposed on them by their urban majorities. Joe Barrett explains in The Wall Street Journal, writing:
WATSEKA, Ill.—Phil Gioja loves this small city 90 miles south of Chicago with its rebounding downtown, historic homes and welcoming churches. Yet he has been tempted to join the steady exodus of friends and fellow business owners leaving for lower-tax, Republican-controlled states like Indiana and Tennessee.
“If you like where you live, but you don’t like Illinois, what do you do?” asked the 43-year-old owner of a video-production company.
One answer: Help Watseka divorce Illinois.
A burgeoning breakup movement is gaining momentum across Illinois, California and other states where vast swaths of red, rural counties are dominated by a few blue cities. More residents are pushing to break off and form new states. Or as a group called New Illinois State—which has declared itself independent from actual Illinois and last weekend passed the first draft of a new constitution—puts it: “Leave Illinois Without Moving.”
Gioja was among the 73% of voters in predominantly rural Iroquois County who on Election Day backed the idea of forming a new state with every Illinois county except Cook, home to Chicago and more than 40% of the state’s population. The nonbinding resolution also passed in six other counties, bringing the total to 33 of Illinois’s 102 counties.
“There’s a lot of people in Chicago, and I think that they make a lot of decisions that affect people downstate,” said Gioja, who doesn’t expect a New Illinois soon. “It’s just sending a message that, ‘Hey, you know, there’s people that would like to be part of the conversation, and often aren’t.’ ”
The urban-rural divide is a longtime fissure in American life, one that President-elect Donald Trump played up on the campaign trail as he railed against large Democratic-run metropolises—while also making electoral gains in many cities. Now, emboldened separatist groups see the incoming administration as uniquely friendly to red, less populous areas that feel steamrolled by left-leaning urban power centers.
Action Line: Are a series of state divorces the next step in looking for a better America? It would be surprising to see states divorce their urban centers, but in today’s divided times, where politicians treat constituents like piggy banks and use the money to pursue their own political agendas, anything is possible. If you’re not willing to wait for your state to split and you want to find a better America today, begin your search with Your Survival Guy’s 2024 Super States. Then, click here to subscribe to my free monthly Survive & Thrive letter.
