Reply #37: sigh.... [View All]

Two countries could have been divided and picked off one by one by the Axis in WW2 (remember, even being one united country, WW2 was touch and go for years), which certainly wouldn't have left us "better off"....

And had Lincoln allowed it, what was to keep other states from seceding? Consider the Western states; the Federal government chased the Indians off their land, chased outlaws off their land, spent cast sums to build irrigation projects and roads, gave them favorable below-market rates for mining and ranching, only to have a sizable faction of "Reagan Republicans" demand that the "Federal government get off their backs." What would keep them from seceding?