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Comment by paidleaf | Hacker News Reader

> But are they really going to put up a border wall, close off economically, form their own military, et al, et al?

Those states already have borders and militaries. Also, why does independence mean "closing off economically"?

> Their prosperity is based in large part on integration into the union.

Canada's prosperity is more dependent on the US than california, ny or texas is. Are you saying canada is not a country?

Also, you are forgetting that texas used to be a country and tried to become a country during the civil war.

American states are structured as independent nations. They have their borders, flags, histories. They have their own executive ( governor ), legislative branch, militaries ( national guards/etc ), etc.

Perhaps a better argument would be canada's first "nations" or our native american "nations" dreaming of independence.

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> why does independence mean "closing off economically"

Because they'd be sitting right in between EU countries. So hard borders all around, no trade deals in place, nothing.

It would be like a no-deal Brexit, but infinitely worse.

> Because they'd be sitting right in between EU countries

EU? The guy was talking about texas, california and ny.

> So hard borders all around, no trade deals in place, nothing.

So they'll just negotiate trade deals?

> It would be like a no-deal Brexit, but infinitely worse.

You gave no reason why it would be worse. Also, post brexit, are you saying britain will never trade with anyone? How did britain trade with anyone before the EU was created?

Trade deals are infinitely less desirable by ordinary people than full legal integration. Imagine having to go through US-style customs every time you want to fly to California.

If two groups of people can live under the same laws, they usually should. Otherwise the legal and regulatory differences impose a 'tax' on every single transaction. California would gain nothing and instead lose an awful lot if it split from the rest of the US.

The UK is a bit of a special case because it's already done an awful lot of work on political devolution. Devolution is a process, not an event, and there's really no reason to make it an event. Dozens of former British colonies quietly and peacefully devolved from the UK and while it's conceivable that California could do the same, the US was practically engineered in order to make it legally impossible. It would require a constitutional amendment at the very least.

> California would gain nothing and instead lose an awful lot if it split from the rest of the US.

I'm not saying it's worthwhile, but I don't think California would gain nothing. California is a net payer to the federal government, so there would be some amount of surplus. California would be able to fully legalize marijuana, and have some other autonomy gains. Required duplication of federal efforts would of course reduce some of the surplus. Continued access to water from the Colorado river would be a major issue, I'm sure. California already pays a tax on every transaction, whether that's from California emissions requirements, or California prop 65 warning stickers on everything (I fully expect to see one on drivers licenses at some point).

California ports process a large majority of the west coast shipping [1], and California produces (and imports) a large amount of food for the nation; the US has a lot to lose if it doesn't negotiate a good trade deal. There's certainly some room for port expansion in the Pacific Northwest, as well as diversion to gulf and east coast ports.

[1] http://www.pmanet.org/port-locations-stats

> Imagine having to go through US-style customs every time you want to fly to California.

Customs is far less onerous than security. Passport control is a pain, but that's easily solved. Germany and France have no such borders, yet are independent countries.

An independent Catalan that's signed up to schengen, the single market, the customs union, etc. would be fine, it just devolves some power from Madrid to Barcelona.

Likewise there is no technical reason that an independent California couldn't join a schengen style passport agreement, customs union, and free trade area, with the rest of the US. Canada could join such an agreement too. It's all doable.

> Likewise there is no technical reason that an independent California couldn't join a schengen style passport agreement, customs union, and free trade area, with the rest of the US.

Other than the fact that the United States would never create such a thing (or, if it did, would never allow a recently exited US state to join it), specifically to prevent encouraging balkanization of the US.

I think devolution is going to become easier over time, but I wouldn't exactly describe it as "doable" at present.

I was still thinking about Catalonia.

But sure, they can and will negotiate trade deals. Ten years later they might have two or three, with not too important countries.

The US, for example, won't feel a huge need to prioritize a trade deal with Catalonia "right now". That would be on the back burner, and somewhen much later it might be finished and ratified.

American states are structured as independent nations. They have their borders, flags, histories.

For most of the states, this is not true. California and Texas have brief histories of declaring independence, and the 13 original colonies were more independent before the USA existed, but most states started off as USA-controlled territory before going through the statehood process. The borders were quite often only finalized during the statehood process.

He isn't referring to the historical peculiarities of any given state's origins - he's referring to the official, literal federation of US states.

> For most of the states, this is not true.

It's true for every state. Every state has borders, flags and histories. Every state has state governor, state legislature and state military.

> but most states started off as USA-controlled territory before going through the statehood process.

I know. What does that have to do with each state being structured as independent nations? Are you saying that wyoming doesn't have a governor, state legislature, state judicial system, state military?

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