After Obama Win, Calls For Secession Pour In (Again)

Confederate flag superman bro<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/pixxiestails/171226590/">pixxiestails</a>/Flickr

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.

Well, President Barack Obama won reelection. And by quite a lot, actually.

The options for despondent conservatives are somewhat limited at this juncture: They can pout. They can turn on each other. They can keep their heads and plot a 2016 comeback. They can call for impeachment hearings.

Or they can play the secession card.

In the days since the election, the White House website has been inundated with secession-related petitions on its “We the People” page, with concerned citizens requesting the “peaceful” secession of more than half of the country’s states. The Louisiana petition has received over 28,000 signatures, and Texas’ now has over 25,000. Per the “We the People” rules, these petitions now have enough signatures to merit an official response from the White House. “None of the petitions explicitly cite Obama’s reelection as a reason for independence, but all were created after last week’s elections,” Politico‘s Byron Tau reported on Monday. “Most of the petitions simply quote the Declaration of Independence in their request to depart the country.” Via his press secretary on Monday, Texas governor (and former 2012 Republican presidential candidate) Rick Perry came out against secession while emphasizing his continued “frustrations” with the federal government. (It appears Perry’s tone has softened since 2009.)

Nearly identical secession petitions have also been created for over 30 states. Here’s an example of one petition asking the federal government to, “Peacefully grant the State of New York to withdraw from the United States of America and create its own NEW government.” It’s important to note that this petition was created by “C R” in Grand Forks, North Dakota, not by anyone in New York. It cropped up on November 10, and currently has upwards of 11,000 signatures:

The White HouseThe White House(A minor backlash to these on “We the People” includes a counterpetition titled, “Deport Everyone That Signed A Petition To Withdraw Their State From The United States Of America.”)

Though the “We the People” petition page is a nice enough idea, it frequently unleashes spates of White House-sanctioned trollmageddon. If the parade of lazily crafted secession entreaties aren’t enough for you, here’s the Obama administration’s response last year to two separate petitions demanding answers regarding an X-Files-style alien cover-up. There was also that one petition asking the White House to start taking these petitions more seriously.

Meanwhile, down in southeast Texas, Peter Morrison, a treasurer of the Republican Party in Hardin County (897 square miles, population 55,200, 90 percent white), wrote a column in a local tea party newsletter shortly after Obama’s 332-206 Electoral College win. The op-ed pretty much summed up how hard he took election night:

We must contest every single inch of ground and delay the baby-murdering, tax-raising socialists at every opportunity. But in due time, the maggots will have eaten every morsel of flesh off of the rotting corpse of the Republic, and therein lies our opportunity…Texas was once its own country, and many Texans already think in nationalist terms about their state. We need to do everything possible to encourage a long-term shift in thinking on this issue. Why should Vermont and Texas live under the same government? Let each go her own way in peace, sign a free trade agreement among the states and we can avoid this gut-wrenching spectacle every four years.

Morrison goes on to rail against “many” members of minority groups as “simply racist against the party most white people happen to vote for,” taking special exception to (overwhelmingly) Democratic-leaning Asian American voters who “[should be Republicans] as they earn more money and pay more in taxes than white Americans.” He describes his proposal as an “amicable divorce” from the rest of America.

When asked about Morrison’s highly emotional newsletter, Hardin County Republican Party chairman Kent Batman (Kent. Batman.) responded with this statement:

Wow.

Okay, well….I guess I need to start taking a look at his newsletters…I don’t think a lot of people [in Texas] are saying we ought to leave the Union.

In response to Morrison’s venting, Hardin County’s GOP posted this statement to their website:

Republican Party Republican Party of Hardin County

 

The sheer volume of “Barack Obama is president! Time to reenact 1860“-type pronouncements that have poured out over the last four years is remarkable. These recent examples won’t be the last, and certainly weren’t the first. Here’s a look back at some secession-happy highlights during Obama’s first term:

Obama isn’t the first Democratic commander-in-chief who’s had to deal with this kind of loose secession talk. You only have to look back as far as the ’90s, when Bill Clinton took his fair share of secession-hate over episodes like Waco and Ruby Ridge.

For a broader look at American secession movements, check out our interactive map of contemporary separatist groups—from the League of the South to stoner homeland “Ganjastan”—that want to ditch the United States and go it alone:

 

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with the Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with the Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate