# What's the most likely candidate for 51st state of America? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [August 11, 2007, 7:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-most-likely-candidate-for-51st-state-of-america/415275 "2007-08-11T19:16:26Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Shecky](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/85e7bf/32.png) [@Shecky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shecky)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2007, 6:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-most-likely-candidate-for-51st-state-of-america/415275/41 "2007-08-13T18:50:17Z")
[QUOTE=BobLibDem] Residents of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula (da yoopers) periodically make noise about seceding from Michigan and forming the state of Superior. Not much will ever come of it but it does make a nice excuse for them to have bake sales to raise funds for it. [/QUOTE] i already memorized the State Song: I’m a yooper You’re a yooper We’re a yooper all. When we get together We do the yooper call! YOOPYOOPYOOPYOOPYOOPYOOPYOOPYOOPYOOPYOOPYOOP ---
**Author:** ![Saint\_Cad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/saint_cad/32/18907_2.png) [@Saint\_Cad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Saint_Cad)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2007, 7:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-most-likely-candidate-for-51st-state-of-america/415275/42 "2007-08-13T19:11:27Z")
[QUOTE=SuaSponte] The Constitution does not designate the city of Washington, D.C. to be the seat of government. The actual language is: Article I, S. 9, Cl. 17. Thus, the Seat of Government can be any size (under 10 miles[sup]2[/sup]). [/QUOTE] [NITPICK] It would be (10 miles)[sup]2[/sup] or “10 miles squared” viz. a square of side length 10 miles. 10 miles[sup]2[/sup] is 10 square miles which could be any shape but in the shape of a square, the sides would be just over 3 miles long. [/NITPICK] ---
**Author:** ![Baron\_Greenback](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/baron_greenback/32/48_2.png) [@Baron\_Greenback](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baron_Greenback)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2007, 7:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-most-likely-candidate-for-51st-state-of-america/415275/43 "2007-08-13T19:33:11Z")
[QUOTE=lalenin] What about England? It has the right cultural background, and I can see that the right government might play up the “join the USA or the EU” angle for political purposes. [/QUOTE] I can’t see Congress voting to allow a new state which would be by some distance the most populous, and by US standards very left-leaning. The Republicans might never see a Presidency ever again. To be honest, I’m not sure that the cultural background is all that similar any more either. ---
**Author:** ![Cat\_Fight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/90ced4/32.png) [@Cat\_Fight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_Fight)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2007, 7:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-most-likely-candidate-for-51st-state-of-america/415275/44 "2007-08-13T19:46:24Z")
Rather than adding states to the U.S., shouldn’t they be letting some become part of Canada? Alaska, Maine, Vermont. They’re pretty much halfway there, anyway. So clean and full of quasi-hippies… ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2007, 8:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-most-likely-candidate-for-51st-state-of-america/415275/45 "2007-08-13T20:03:37Z")
I once saw a pamphlet advocating the formation of a new state of “Cumberland” out of nine counties in western North Carolina, eastern Tennessee and southwestern Virginia. ---
**Author:** ![Giles](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/giles/32/60_2.png) [@Giles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Giles)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2007, 8:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-most-likely-candidate-for-51st-state-of-america/415275/46 "2007-08-13T20:12:27Z")
[QUOTE=Cat Fight] Rather than adding states to the U.S., shouldn’t they be letting some become part of Canada? Alaska, Maine, Vermont. They’re pretty much halfway there, anyway. So clean and full of quasi-hippies… [/QUOTE] And you could give Texas back Mexico, and no one would miss it. ---
**Author:** ![NDP](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ndp/32/55_2.png) [@NDP](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NDP)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2007, 12:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-most-likely-candidate-for-51st-state-of-america/415275/47 "2007-08-14T00:05:19Z")
[QUOTE=Hunter Hawk] People occasionally [make noises](http://www.bizjournals.com/seattle/stories/2005/02/14/daily40.html) about splitting Washington into two states along the Cascade range. I think this is generally thanks to the good hardworking patriotic Republican easterners who (a) think that western Washington gets more state money than it should despite the fact that that’s where most of the population and economy are, and (b) want nothing to do with the commie pinko liberal gay-loving tattooed Democrats in Seattle. To which the commie etc. response is roughly “Hey, look at the numbers. We’re already contributing more than our share in order to support you. You wanna split off, go right ahead…” (Yes, the guy sponsoring the bill was a Democrat; I forget the full backstory, but I think he was tired of hearing the easterners bitching all the time and decided to get the discussion officially on the table. Nobody expects the split to ever actually happen.) [/QUOTE] That reminds of [a thread I saw](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=304024) over two years ago. I don’t see the U.S. adding any new states for awhile. The D.C. representational problem can be solved by just granting it voting rights without changing its unique status or having to redraw its borders. ---
**Author:** ![An\_Gadai](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/d6d6ee/32.png) [@An\_Gadai](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/An_Gadai)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2007, 12:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-most-likely-candidate-for-51st-state-of-america/415275/48 "2007-08-14T00:23:10Z")
[QUOTE=lalenin] What about England? It has the right cultural background, and I can see that the right government might play up the “join the USA or the EU” angle for political purposes. [/QUOTE] I’m not sure if you’re joking here but I’ll give it a shot. The chances of the United Kingdom (of which England is a part) deciding to enter explicit political union with the United States seems unlikely to me. Although many people in the UK are I suppose anti-EU, below the upper echelons of government I doubt they’re much more pro-USA. Although they are swamped with the cultural products of the USA they still cling onto their regional and national identities. There’s also the monarchy to be sorted out. There’s the distance from the “mainland” USA (although I’m not sure whether Hawaii is further from the contiguous 48 than Britain is). Could Britain benefit from such a union? The United Kingdom is already rich by world standards. Perhaps when the United Kingdom dissolves, Scotland or Wales or Cornwall or Yorkshire might nail their colours to the American mast. ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2007, 3:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-most-likely-candidate-for-51st-state-of-america/415275/49 "2007-08-14T03:22:56Z")
[QUOTE=An Gadaí] There’s the distance from the “mainland” USA (although I’m not sure whether Hawaii is further from the contiguous 48 than Britain is) [/QUOTE] Looking it up on wiki.answers. com, I see that New York to London is 3458 miles, while Los Angeles to Honolulu is 2560 miles. ---
**Author:** ![jayjay](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jayjay/32/6765_2.png) [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2007, 3:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-most-likely-candidate-for-51st-state-of-america/415275/50 "2007-08-14T03:41:50Z")
The important question about the situation of DC ceding the parts of the city that aren’t directly involved in the federal government is, does Maryland WANT to take on what is mostly a poverty-stricken population in some very high-crime neighborhoods? ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2007, 8:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-most-likely-candidate-for-51st-state-of-america/415275/51 "2007-08-14T08:17:55Z")
[QUOTE=Diomedes] Another key factor is the fact that there needs to be a constitutional amendment to allow DC to become a state; Puerto Rico would jsut need to pass a referendum. . [/QUOTE] Right. The answer has to be Puerto Rico, as they are the only dudes that can vote themselves in. As for Texas, they’d still need the Permission of Congress to split. Now, the deal allowing them to potentially split into five states is still somewhat valid, but all it is is “Legislative Intent”, which could sway a vote or two, but doesn’t force Congress to allow Texas to split. So, although Snopes is technically right that such a clause _exists,_ the clause doesn’t over-rule the Constitution. ---
**Author:** ![Martini\_Enfield](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/martini_enfield/32/11123_2.png) [@Martini\_Enfield](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martini_Enfield)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2007, 8:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-most-likely-candidate-for-51st-state-of-america/415275/52 "2007-08-14T08:35:40Z")
[QUOTE=Cat Fight] Rather than adding states to the U.S., shouldn’t they be letting some become part of Canada? Alaska, Maine, Vermont. They’re pretty much halfway there, anyway. So clean and full of quasi-hippies… [/QUOTE] I’ve heard of a semi-serious plan for Canada to take on one of the Anglophone island territories in the Caribbean as a new Province; Bermuda perhaps? Somewhere like that, anyway. ---
**Author:** ![Koxinga](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/4af34b/32.png) [@Koxinga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Koxinga)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2007, 9:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-most-likely-candidate-for-51st-state-of-america/415275/53 "2007-08-14T09:16:45Z")
Nope, you’re all wrong: [Lawsuit seeks to declare Taiwan residents as U.S. “nationals”](http://www.opednews.com/articles/genera_michael__070810_lawsuit_seeks_to_dec.htm) Do you think China would mind? ---
**Author:** ![DMark](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e68b1a/32.png) [@DMark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DMark)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2007, 9:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-most-likely-candidate-for-51st-state-of-america/415275/54 "2007-08-14T09:35:50Z")
Haven’t you heard? Iraq. That is the current exit strategy. Make Iraq the 51st state and we never have to leave. ---
**Author:** ![Spoons](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spoons/32/3141_2.png) [@Spoons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoons)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2007, 2:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-most-likely-candidate-for-51st-state-of-america/415275/55 "2007-08-14T14:04:54Z")
[QUOTE=Martini Enfield] I’ve heard of a semi-serious plan for Canada to take on one of the Anglophone island territories in the Caribbean as a new Province; Bermuda perhaps? Somewhere like that, anyway. [/QUOTE] It’s Turks and Caicos Islands. [Cite.](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turks_and_Caicos_Islands#Proposed_union_with_Canada) Note that the idea has been proposed, but the legal and political problems of admitting these islands to the Canadian Confederation seem difficult. Admission of the islands as a province would require a constitutional amendment which nobody seems to want to do; admission as a territory might be a little easier, since that only requires a federal law; Nova Scotia has offered to allow the islands to join it (so they wouldn’t be admitted as a province but as part of an existing province, which could make things easier still), but no headway has been made on any of these ideas. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2007, 4:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-most-likely-candidate-for-51st-state-of-america/415275/56 "2007-08-14T16:33:04Z")
Believe it or not, there is a minor political party called the [Expansionist Party of the United States,](http://members.aol.com/XPUS/) dedicating to annexing any territory which can be fit into the American polity by any conceivable argument, culminating eventually in a world union. It has pages on Canada, the UK, the Philippines, etc. ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2007, 4:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-most-likely-candidate-for-51st-state-of-america/415275/57 "2007-08-14T16:40:10Z")
[QUOTE=An Arky] Taxation without representation - that thing that is one of the primary reasons for the revolution that preceded the very existence of this nation, is what’s happening here. [/QUOTE] Hey buddy, it’s the United STATES of America, not the People’s Republic of America. The entire system of government is based on semi-sovereign states under a federal government. DC isn’t a state, therefore no Senators or Representatives. Giving DC representation like a state would negate the [Connecticut Compromise](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Connecticut_Compromise), and screw things up. Sucks, but if you don’t like it, move to a state! ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2007, 5:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-most-likely-candidate-for-51st-state-of-america/415275/58 "2007-08-14T17:04:27Z")
[QUOTE=bump] Giving DC representation like a state would negate the [Connecticut Compromise](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Connecticut_Compromise) . . . [/QUOTE] 😕 How? ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2007, 6:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-most-likely-candidate-for-51st-state-of-america/415275/59 "2007-08-14T18:00:05Z")
[QUOTE=An Gadaí] Perhaps when the United Kingdom dissolves, Scotland or Wales or Cornwall or Yorkshire might nail their colours to the American mast. [/QUOTE] Great. Just what we need is to give a bunch of coal miners, shepherds, and pirates\* the right of unlimited travel and settlement here. Right now we have the INS to keep the riff-raff out, but then they’d be part of the voting public, though they can’t even read the ballots. And with Mexicans we can demand they speak English but people in the UK claim they already do, though you wouldn’t know from listening to them. Didn’t we learn our lesson when we let in all those Irish in the 19th century? 😉 They may not even have to wait until the UK dissolves. Quoting a fictional Lord Mayor of Cardiff, and paraphrasing probably every politician more than 50km from London, “We’re in Cardiff. London doesn’t care. The South Wales Coast could fall into the sea and they wouldn’t notice.” - - Yes, everything I know about those places I learned from _How Green was my Valley, Lassie Come Home, All Creatures Great and Small,_ and _The Pirates of Penzance._ How’d you know? ---
**Author:** ![Baron\_Greenback](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/baron_greenback/32/48_2.png) [@Baron\_Greenback](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baron_Greenback)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2007, 6:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-most-likely-candidate-for-51st-state-of-america/415275/60 "2007-08-14T18:10:30Z")
[QUOTE=dropzone] - - Yes, everything I know about those places I learned from _How Green was my Valley, Lassie Come Home, All Creatures Great and Small,_ and _The Pirates of Penzance._ How’d you know? [/QUOTE] Hey, none of those is set in Scotland! I’d recommend _Brigadoon_. 😛 [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-most-likely-candidate-for-51st-state-of-america/415275.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-most-likely-candidate-for-51st-state-of-america/415275.md?page=4)