Rural voters in Illinois, Oregon push to leave their states

As President Donald Trump floats ideas like reacquiring the Panama Canal and taking over Greenland, thousands of rural residents of Illinois and Oregon are promoting geopolitical change of their own: They want to break away from their states, and perhaps unite with Indiana and Idaho.

Proponents say they have more in common with their rural brethren across state lines than they do with urbanites in Chicago and Portland, Oregon. They contend the Democratic-led cities have so much clout in state government that rural, Republican voices get drowned out.

In the last five years, voters in 33 Illinois counties have been asked if they want to consider separating from Chicago’s Cook County to form a new state. Each time, a majority said yes.

Some politicians in neighboring Indiana seem up for the idea. The state’s House of Representatives recently advanced legislation that would welcome Illinois counties into Indiana’s fold. 

It has been over 150 years since entire counties have shifted states, since West Virginia separated from Virginia to stick with the Union during the Civil War. 

Despite the local momentum, there are major obstacles to rejiggering state lines within the U.S. For starters, the states relinquishing counties would have to agree to it, which is a long shot. Congress would have to approve, too.

State boundaries have changed at least 50 times throughout U.S. history, according the National Center for Interstate Compacts at The Council of State Governments. Many changes have been relatively minor, accounting for shifting rivers or reestablishing markers from long-ago surveys.

But organizers in Illinois and Oregon hope to capitalize on the current political environment.

“With this polarization,” said G.H. Merritt, chair of the pro-breakaway group New Illinois. “I don’t know, man, it might just reach a tipping point.”

At least three organizations are pushing for some reconfiguration of Illinois counties to separate from Chicago and its closest suburbs.

Cook County contains about 40% of the state’s population, including the majority of Black, Asian and Hispanic residents, and is known for its cultural treasures, deep pension debt and a history of crime. Democrats dominate Chicago-area legislative districts, while Republicans represent most other parts of the state.

To Merritt, the problem is that ever since the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 1964 that all legislative seats should be allocated based on population rather than counties, Chicago has had all the political clout.

“What we experience in Illinois is very similar to what the founders in Colonial times were complaining about,” she said. “We have taxation without representation.”

The ballot measures voters favored would allow officials in each county to work with those from other counties to form a new state. But the proposals stop short of declaring independence.

Indiana lawmakers responded to those votes by advancing a bill that could start state-level talks.

“Instead of seceding, we think we have something to offer over here,” Indiana House Speaker Todd Huston, a Republican who sponsored the measure, said in an interview. He noted that his state has lower taxes and higher economic growth than Illinois.

But don’t count on Illinois being receptive: Earlier this year, Gov. J.B. Pritzker, a Democrat, called the Indiana legislation “a stunt” that would never amount to anything.



(AP Photo Brian Casella/Chicago Tribune via AP)