I suppose the big problem is that they had to have the public perception of serving a ‘Scottish’ HE populace, which didn’t exist in any legal way, and so resorted to the residence system which was always used for HE education funding.
Unsurprisingly there’s a Wikipedia article on the topic of who is and isn’t a “natural born citizen.” I remembered reading previously about the questions surrounding Goldwater’s eligibility and about McCain’s eligibility during the campaign. No way to know what would have happened if a Texan stood for election since it didn’t happen and now of course it can’t.
It may make sense but it can’t happen without a Constitutional amendment.
True. But I doubt if the UK Parliament would vote to join another country where its citizens did not enjoy full political rights from the start.
It is not whether or not you are Scottish, merely whether you reside in Scotland. I am English as are all my family. My children qualify for free University education as do other Scottish residents whether Scottish or not. I also qualify for free social care as I deteriorate through old age. :eek: None of which we would qualify for if we lived 2o miles away in England!
Hey, this doesn’t have to just be a hypothetical. “If ya can’t tax 'em without representation, join 'em” is what my grandmother always used to say.
I think everyone’s missing something: the U.S. used to be a colony of the U.K., so it’s not we that would be adopting your laws, but you that would be adopting ours.
This post might make more sense if we knew where you live.
(You’re in the U.K., right?)
However linked our two nations’ histories happen to be, I don’t see how the past matters here. The OP asked to speculate on what would need to change in the U.K. if it joined the U.S. as a new state. Most or all of the changes discussed would apply to any existing nation, whether or not we ever shared a government with them — like Sweden, for instance. Sweden too would have to revoke their monarchy (so as to be a republic), leave the EU, switch from the kroner to the dollar, etc.
Whoosh!
Next time, I won’t delete the smiley.
Incidentally, I don’t know if this is of any interest, but I’ve been playing around with re-apportioning the U.S. House of Representatives. (I wrote a little Python script to implement the apportionment algorithm, and am using U.S. 2000 census data for the state populations. The program’s results check with the actual breakdown of the House, so I think it’s working correctly.)
Assuming the House stays fixed at 435 seats, and that the UK has a population of 59,834,900 (that’s according to its own 2001 census), then the UK as a state would have 76 seats. If instead we take its population to be 60,609,153 (that’s a 2006 estimate from the CIA World Factbook), then the number of seats increases to 77. In either case, California — now the second-most populous state — shrinks in representation from 53 to 43 seats.
Assume again that the House doesn’t grow. If the four countries of the UK joined as separate states, then, using their populations from the 2001 census, their representations in the House would be: England 64, Scotland 6, Wales 4, and Northern Ireland 2.
If we want to enlarge the House so that the representations of the North American states relative to each other don’t change too much, then you’d have to add over 90 seats — to keep California’s number pegged at 53, for example.
Assuming the House is increased to 530 seats, UK’s representation would be 93, California’s 53. If the UK countries joined as separate states, their representations would be: England 78, Scotland 8, Wales 5, Northern Ireland 3.
Well, that was a good morning’s work. Time for lunch.