Editor’s Note: A guest post from Scott Winston Dragland – an Army veteran, West Point graduate, and the author of Let My People Go: Why Texas Must Regain Its Independence. He can be reached at scott@letmypeoplego.me.  

The American people are in serious trouble.

We are at the mercy of a President who attained power by means of a rigged presidential election, which was shielded from scrutiny in the courts, including the U.S. Supreme Court.

He has opened the U.S. border to mass, uncontrolled immigration.

He has ordered millions of Americans to get an experimental medical intervention that could cause heart damage or kill them.

He has persecuted American oil and natural gas producers.

He has weaponized federal law enforcement agencies against parents who are unhappy about the transgender propaganda being taught to their children.

He has attempted to prevent the States from enforcing basic election integrity measures.

He has supported the abolition of the filibuster.

He has held American citizens as political prisoners.

He has accused his political opponents of being “domestic violent extremists” who are enemies of “our democracy,” and therefore makes them possible targets of the politicized Intelligence Community.

In brief, Joseph R. Biden is an unmitigated disaster for our constitutional Republic.

At what point should the free people of a sovereign State decide that they will no longer submit to these abuses? There ought to come a point when enough is enough. To quote the Declaration of Causes, approved by the Second Continental Congress in 1775, “Honour, justice, and humanity, forbid us tamely to surrender that freedom which we received from our gallant ancestors, and which our innocent posterity have a right to receive from us.”

If we want to live in a free and prosperous country, which we can pass on to our children and grandchildren, then we have to acknowledge our present reality. It is a mistake to believe that we can redeem the Federal Government. Any attempt to drain the swamp, however valiant, is doomed to failure. In 2017 and 2018, the Republicans held the House, the Senate, and the White House. Were they able to restore the Federal Government to its proper, constitutional boundaries? Why should we imagine that they will do any better the next time they are in power?

If we are interested in reviving America’s founding principles of Limited Government, Unalienable Rights, and the Rule of Law, then we should consider the possibility of the red States freeing themselves from the Federal Government. Many conservatives might be concerned that this cannot be accomplished peacefully. The word “secession” is loaded with negative connotations due to the war that followed the secession of the southern States in 1861. In the 1860s, people were willing to go to war for their beliefs. In our present times, though, circumstances are different. Modern Americans would rather sit on their couches and eat Cheetos, rather than go to war to preserve the Union. It is likely that modern secession would be no more violent than when the United Kingdom left the European Union.

Many conservatives also believe that secession is illegal. They are mistaken. As a matter of law, the Union is not perpetual. The doctrine of perpetuity derives from Article XIII of the Articles of Confederation, which ceased to be law in 1789. By contrast, the U.S. Constitution makes no mention of perpetuity. In fact, Article VII provided that the Constitution could go into effect with the ratification of only nine States. As a result, Rhode Island and North Carolina were entirely independent States, outside of the Union, for a short time after the new Constitution went into effect in March 1789. This means that the Union was no longer perpetual—neither in law, nor in fact. An appeal to the perpetuity of the Union is an attempt to resurrect a moot legal document which was displaced by the U.S. Constitution.

Another objection will be raised on the grounds of the supposed “sanctity of the Union.” The Union is not sacred. It is a man-made institution. Like all other man-made institutions, it is corruptible, and it will not last forever.

Everything ends. The deterioration of the United States has recently accelerated at an alarming rate. We ought to devote our attention to the revival of America’s founding principles—Limited Government, Unalienable Rights, and the Rule of Law. This is what really matters. If we must free ourselves from the federal regime, that we may “secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity,” then so be it.