One of the more interesting electoral fights from last Tuesday took place in Colorado. Eleven counties had a proposal on their ballot asking citizens whether their county governments should pursue an effort to secede from Colorado and form a new state. The would call the new state North Colorado. The right-wingers who organized this effort said they did it because the state government ignores them, and they want more voice in government. Personally, I think they were just unhappy that Colorado has been trending Democratic -- and had visions of sending two more ultra-right-wing senators to Washington.Did they win? Partially. Five of those counties voted for secession, and six voted not to secede. Here are the county-by-county results (from The Denver Post):
PHILLIPS COUNTY
Yes...............1,114 (62.2%) *
No...............676 (37.7%)
YUMA COUNTY
Yes...............57 (81.4%) *
No...............13 (18.5%)
ELBERT COUNTY
Yes...............3,810 (42.5%)
No...............5,137 (57.4%) *
WELD COUNTY
Yes...............25,291 (43.0%)
No...............33,460 (56.9%) *
SEDGWICK COUNTY
Yes...............437 (42.9%)
No...............580 (57.0%) *
KIT CARSON COUNTY
Yes...............1,452 (54.2%) *
No...............1,226 (45.7%)
CHEYENNE COUNTY
Yes...............570 (62.2%) *
No...............346 (37.7%)
LINCOLN COUNTY
Yes...............806 (44.5%)
No...............1,005 (55.4%) *
WASHINGTON COUNTY
Yes...............1,115 (58.1%) *
No...............802 (41.8%)
LOGAN COUNTY
Yes...............1,903 (41.5%)
No...............2,676 (58.4%) *
MOFFAT COUNTY
Yes...............1,768 (45.2%)
No...............2,139 (54.7%) *
While this was an interesting political event, it really amounted to nothing more than a teabagger temper tantrum. The counties could not secede and form a new state without approval from the state legislature (or a statewide vote) and the approval of the U.S. Congress -- and those stand a worse chance of succeeding than a snowball has of surviving a summer in the Mojave Desert.
