imported post
the ninth amendment guarantees:
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.
show me in the constitution where secession is prohibited by the constitution.
in 1861, 11 Southern states ( 13 if you count Kentucky and Missouri, who did in fact secede but their secessions weren't "officially" recognized) exercised this basic human right of self determination, the exact same right excersiced by the founding fathers 85 years previously, and were invaded, subjugated and subjected to a grueling regime of "Reconstruction" for their efforts.
yes, secession is legal, but try to excersice that right, and you'll find out just how free you really are.
"When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security."
[align=right]~Declaration of Independence[/align]
[align=left]Even the tyrant who sought to subjugate the Southern people recognized the legitimacy of their actions:[/align]
[align=left]Any people anywhere, being inclined and having the power, have the right to rise up, and shake off the existing government, and form a new one that suits them better. This is a most valuable - a most sacred right - a right, which we hope and believe, is to liberate the world. [/align]
[align=right]~ Abraham Lincoln
[/align]
that is all I am going to say on the subject, unless provoked.