Admission Into The Union
May 4, 2023 at 10:18 p.m.
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One of the key rights for a state and its residents is being able to be recognized as a state in the first place by the federal government and the rest of the Union. Currently, there are six candidates for statehood: Puerto Rico, District of Columbia, American Samoa, Virgin Islands, Guam and the Northern Mariana’s Islands.?Residents of such territories and the nation’s capital are American citizens or nationals. Five of those candidate states are territories which vote in the presidential primaries but not the general election because of not being in the Electoral College. The District of Columbia has electoral votes, but still no voting representation in Congress.
There have been various other parts of states that at one time or other have considered statehood such as Southern California, Chicago, New York City, Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, Long Island and parts of Florida just to name a few.
Three of the factors limiting entrance of potential new states is the population, size, and GDP of those areas. I believe these factors should not matter down to a reasonable point considering that all states and their residents are considered equal in the U.S. Senate because of Article 1 Section 3 and Article V of the Constitution. This is why regardless of population, size, Gross Domestic Product, your state is equal in vote in the Senate and that your state has real effect on the outcome of a Senate vote whether you are literally the size of an entire country such as Texas (268,597 miles) or a state like Rhode Island (1,212) which is slightly twice as large as our own country of Kosciusko (554 miles), or whether you have the biggest population such as California (39.54 million) versus the smallest population Wyoming (573,720). Wyoming’s population by the way is small than Las Vegas and Oklahoma City.
Which brings me to the following proposal listed below for further reforming the U.S. Senate and statehood.
U.S. Constitution Article 4 Section 3: Original Text & Proposed Amended Text
New states may be admitted by the Congress into this union provided they are no less than the size of Rhode Island and have sufficient population for representation in Congress exception may be granted for the District of Columbia, Minute island territories, tribal reservations, or parts of states by the means of constitutional ammendment so long as representation is adjusted accordingly and an overall even number of senators is maintained in the Senate but no new states shall be formed or erected within the jurisdiction of any other state; nor any state be formed by the jurisdiction of two or more states; or parts of states, without the consent of the Legislature of the States concerned as well as of the Congress.
The next letter on this subject will focus on the creation of the state of West Virginia.
Alexander Houze
Leesburg
One of the key rights for a state and its residents is being able to be recognized as a state in the first place by the federal government and the rest of the Union. Currently, there are six candidates for statehood: Puerto Rico, District of Columbia, American Samoa, Virgin Islands, Guam and the Northern Mariana’s Islands.?Residents of such territories and the nation’s capital are American citizens or nationals. Five of those candidate states are territories which vote in the presidential primaries but not the general election because of not being in the Electoral College. The District of Columbia has electoral votes, but still no voting representation in Congress.
There have been various other parts of states that at one time or other have considered statehood such as Southern California, Chicago, New York City, Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, Long Island and parts of Florida just to name a few.
Three of the factors limiting entrance of potential new states is the population, size, and GDP of those areas. I believe these factors should not matter down to a reasonable point considering that all states and their residents are considered equal in the U.S. Senate because of Article 1 Section 3 and Article V of the Constitution. This is why regardless of population, size, Gross Domestic Product, your state is equal in vote in the Senate and that your state has real effect on the outcome of a Senate vote whether you are literally the size of an entire country such as Texas (268,597 miles) or a state like Rhode Island (1,212) which is slightly twice as large as our own country of Kosciusko (554 miles), or whether you have the biggest population such as California (39.54 million) versus the smallest population Wyoming (573,720). Wyoming’s population by the way is small than Las Vegas and Oklahoma City.
Which brings me to the following proposal listed below for further reforming the U.S. Senate and statehood.
U.S. Constitution Article 4 Section 3: Original Text & Proposed Amended Text
New states may be admitted by the Congress into this union provided they are no less than the size of Rhode Island and have sufficient population for representation in Congress exception may be granted for the District of Columbia, Minute island territories, tribal reservations, or parts of states by the means of constitutional ammendment so long as representation is adjusted accordingly and an overall even number of senators is maintained in the Senate but no new states shall be formed or erected within the jurisdiction of any other state; nor any state be formed by the jurisdiction of two or more states; or parts of states, without the consent of the Legislature of the States concerned as well as of the Congress.
The next letter on this subject will focus on the creation of the state of West Virginia.
Alexander Houze
Leesburg
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