Should America Get Divorced?

This is a transcript from my radio show. You can listen live here.

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Those who spend their time watching cable news and live their lives on social media feel more divided than ever. However, I’ve got to be honest with you. This is a sentiment that is not felt by the people furthest removed from being online. It is a phenomenon almost unique to those who spend their time on social media and watching partisan newscasts. I don't think we're going to get to the point where we actually do break apart. I don't think we can.

Someone pointed out that in New York, several million people voted for Joe Biden, but also voted for Donald Trump. If you seed the left New York largely because of New York City, what do you do with the rest of the state? Do red states get it? Because the state is remarkably red, except in the New York City area. They're just so dominant population-wise, they offset the rest of the state. If you think it is inevitable, you sometimes will take inevitable actions to make it happen, but I don't know that we're going to. I actually have some thoughts on what should or should not happen.

I don't think the United States of America should break apart. There are days where I think it should. I'll be honest. There are some days I think, "You know what? Let's go on and have a divorce," but really, I don't think so. One, I don't think it's practical. Allow me to read you what a friend of mine said on the topic.

A national divorce isn't happening for a host of reasons, the least of which is impracticality and an inevitably bloody process that would make the first civil war look like a short, manageable affair. So we should set it aside except for hypothetical and illustrative purposes. A republic requires a functionally republican citizenry and our republic does not presently have that. At present, we expect our republic to exist with a combination of republican citizens, plus a critical mass of non-republican or even anti-republican citizenry. The critical mass of the latter possesses and is willing to use the mechanisms of violence, and the powers of the state, which means in turn, the republic isn't going to work.

That's true. I can understand that there are those who are ready to break apart the country, but it is neither feasible nor practical. For all of the people who say, "Well, the military's on our side and we got all the guns," okay. The other side has the cities and the supply chains. The cities and the supply chain matter as much, if not more, than the military and the guns, because you may have parts of the military, you don't have it all. In addition, you don't have the ports except maybe the Port of Jacksonville, the Port of Miami, the Port of Savannah. You don't have the Port of Los Angeles, you don't have the Port of New York. You don't have those ports to be able to import goods. In fact, right now, one of the supply chain crises we're having is because of that. But more importantly, you don't have the will of people to do it.

What we need in this country is a real appreciation for federalism in ways neither side possesses. There is this bro culture sentiment on the right that wants to control Washington and imposed conservative values on the country because they believe conservatives have conserved nothing while the left has imposed their values on everyone.

Really, what we should be striving for is radical federalism, where if California wants to have abortions, gay marriage, and drag queen story hour, let them. If Georgia wants to have no abortion and encourage traditional marriage and no drag queens, let them. Georgia will eventually have more kids and breed out California. But the reality is, let California be California, let Georgia be Georgia. At an activist level, both sides right now feel compelled to impose their will on other people in this country, while the overwhelming majority of the people in this country just want to be left alone.

I got to be honest, I think if you live in a city where the majority of the people in the city want to have a drag queen story hour, go do it. I don't have to go and neither do you, but I also think if you live in a city where the majority of people don't think it's appropriate, the city should be able to say, "Nope, sorry. We don't do that here." It should ultimately be at the state level, not the city level because cities are subservient to the states. Ultimately, you have to be allowed to live in an area that reflects your morality.

I live in middle Georgia, and middle Georgia is fairly pro-life. There had been no abortion clinic and one was recently started. There really isn't a lot that can be done to stop it. I think the state of Georgia should be able to pass a law that says, "You can't have an abortion in Georgia." If the left wants to start a nonprofit where a woman who wants an abortion can have the costs of travel covered to get to California to have an abortion, let her do it without Georgia penalizing her. If someone who lives in California is appalled that California is a pro-abortion Godless state, they should be able to pack up and move somewhere else without penalty. That's the way federalism should work.

Did you know up until the passage of the 14th Amendment, and really, even until the 1900s, states had state religions? The federal government under the 1st Amendment was required to be neutral and stay out of it, but states had affiliations. A lot of Southern states had Baptist affiliations while places like Maryland had a strong affiliation with the Catholic church. Part of our problem here is the 14th Amendment. My radical point is that in the 21st century, we might want to get rid of the 14th Amendment.

This whole idea of, “we just need to break apart the country” sounds good to a faction of people who haven't thought out the real consequences of it and how it would work. It would be a very bloody affair. Conservatives would have the rural parts of the country and a lot of guns. The left would have the cities and the supply chains, and they would starve out the right. and it would be a bloody, bloody affair.

If you think the country is going to break apart, if you're really concerned that we're headed towards a national divorce because everybody hates each other, go out into your city and make your city a better place. Get offline and turn off the TV. Get out of politics, get into the culture.

I gave a speech in Delaware this weekend. One of the things that I told him is, the Prophet Daniel in the Book of Daniel, is reading Jeremiah 29, which is one of my favorite passages of scripture. God says, "You're going to be in exile for 70 years." This is the word of God through the Prophet Jeremiah saying, "You know what? Get a house, get married, start a family, grow a garden, live as if you're going to be there. Commit to that location, because you're in exile there. Seek the welfare of the city in which you're in exile, and there you'll find your welfare. Pray for it, and there you'll find your welfare."

I think the people who are committed to the idea of a national divorce are the people who need to go find their battered women's shelter and they need to work there. They need to find their local food bank and go volunteer. They need to go stand in line at the local soup kitchen and serve the homeless, because they've become so fixated on politics and division that they’ve lost touch with what's happening in the real world of America.

People rushed headlong into the civil war. They didn't think of the consequences. Up until 2011 or 2012, the majority of people killed in military conflict in this country were still killed in the civil war. So many people died in the civil war. Entire families were split up. Is that what you really want? Maybe instead of rushing headlong into it and trying to stake out your stand, you should be working to keep the country together. How do you keep the country together? Seek the welfare of the city in which you're in exile and pray for it. There you will find your welfare.

I would encourage the left and the right to understand that while you're at loggerheads over issues, Washington should not matter as much as it does to you. You should be using the 50 states as laboratories of democracy to experiment and see what actually works policy-wise with your ideas. If you don't like what's happening with your state, move.

As everyone fixates on Washington and makes it the be-all-end-all of civilization, we're more and more likely to have these conversations about whether or not we should break up the country. Instead of breaking up the country, we should be working in our communities to help the people in need.