Argue in this. Its a lot closer than we think in todays america. What you base that on . Guest i moved here from canada and went through all this before and i remember how would one point this was something that no one talked about and then a few years later we are having a referendum and nearly passes. Countryn a very divided , in many ways it resembles the country a left and you begin to wonder whether or not we might just be better off with two separate countries. Its not what i want. I feel a little bill of the skunk of the garden party. All these people talking about great president s and here i am talking of a breakup. Ultimately im not arguing for secession. Im saying its a real threat and we should think about that. Maybe turn down the volume a bit. Host a passage from your book, we are less united today than we have been at any time since the civil war divided by politics, religion and culture and all the ways that matter say for the naked force a law. We are already divided into two nations just as much as 1861. Describe what those nations look like and where they are . Guest every morning the Washington Post arrives at my doorstep and it seems to me like a fresh argument for secession. It just drips with contempt on the other side, there is a lot of that. I think whats missing is a tolerance and understanding of people with very different points of view, when you dont have that, when half the country think the other half is deplorable, you have to wonder why should they be in the same country. Book thatsaying your there are the bonds that still hold americans together, they are strained right now but they are there. What are they . Guest maybe they are more strained than ever in a long time in the past. We have a common culture. Its a world culture but a common culture. If americans see each other in a foreign country, in europe, we will recognize each other as americans. We are allowed. We are having fun. Thats very american, i love that. Areat the same time we canceling a lot of our culture, a lot of our history. We are told we are not supposed to be proud, but rather ashamed of our history. That is very divisive. If you want a country, its very important to have the same kind of mythic heroes and forget a lot of the bad stuff. Host what can we follow fall back on . Guest if it ever comes to it, what im hoping would happen would be a realignment of the country in some way. You have to imagine that one state will say this is not working, for example we would like to have National Health, we wont get it from washington. We might get it from sacramento and a Smaller Group of states, we dont think we would like to make America Great again, lets make america small again. And if you do that, then maybe things Like NationalHealth Become possible and then you get a referendum and at that point people have to sit down and talk. And what they may end up talking about is letting different people go their own way but maintaining still a United Country in some respects. A different kind of federalism. Host bigness and smallness come up in your book. The advantages and disadvantages. Smallness being what might happen if american secession happens. What are the advantages and which does the balance favor . This was a big debate for our framers in 1787, nationalists like madison wanted a big country, when i looked at the evidence and look at other countries, what i discovered is bigness is badness generally and small is beautiful and smaller countries are less corrupt, sor, even more prosperous we are comparing the biggest countries in the world to places like denmark. Those are doing pretty well. Host Frank Buckley is our guest. The book is american secession, the looming threat of a National Breakup takes a discussion point for this hour of the washington journal today. You can join us as you have all morning long on the phone lines split up regionally. 2027488000 in the eastern or central time zone. 2027488001 if you are in the mountain or pacific time zones. We will keep that text line open. [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, [no audio]00. 8003. Caller good morning. Threat wee greatest have right now is that we have constitution to reflect the times of the day. The constitution was written by man. Man is fallible. Its not the bible. Its very easy for russia to come in to interfere in our elections for example. We have this Electoral College what we look at seven states that you really have to go and get campaign. To win the presidency. Those states have less educated people. They are very easy to fool or gullible. Not those people are we need a national election, the same rules for every state, we dont need to have this so complicated. The Electoral College was a big topic of discussion back in 1787 with the framers, they thought it was important for states to be represented to give the states a voice. Thats what we have and yes you are right, its virtually impossible to amend the constitutions we are pretty much stuck with it, frankly that was something that a guy called Roger Sherman from connecticut gave us. He should probably be a hero for conservatives because the Electoral College cuts their way. That is just an accident. Thats how its turned out. You know if you want to get a constitutional change, it would probably happen most likely with a threat of secession which would initiate a discussion between the seceding states and the rest of the country. As to how you would divvy things up. A state may want to go its own way with respect to National Health but we may not want to have for example a passport to visit disneyland. So those of the kinds of discussions you have to have. Play it out a bit more as you do in your book about the routes to secession if it were to happen today. You make the ark meant in your book that you think americans today would be less willing to fight to keep the union together like they did. One hope theres no crazy South Carolina out there. I dont think we would see in Abraham Lincoln office. We were going through in the earlier hour a list of the best and worst president s in very near the bottom was james buchanan. The president just before Abraham Lincoln. A lot of things wrong with buchanan in an era full of racists he was about the most racist of all. But he said something that made a lot of sense to me. He was talking about South Carolina trying to secede and what he said was this does not make sense. We are prosperous, we are doing well, you have no right to secede and you have no reason to secede because you want slavery. Slavery is nowhere better protected in the world and america at this point. Only you still want to secede and what i my supposed to do, and my supposed to send in the troops. I think if we cant keep our country together by ordinary bonds of affection, we are not going to keep it together by sending in the army. James madison said the same thing. He said of the federal government invaded the state, the compact between the states would be over. Wasyet when my alexandria invaded it was federal troops. Dont get me wrong, the civil war usefully, thankfully ended slavery. But we dont have those issues today so i can see is civil war over slavery but i dont see is civil war on transgender bathrooms. Host the caller talked about those people when he was talking about another state, i want to go back to gary gallagher, author and historian who gave a speech last year talking about northern and southern perceptions of each other. What they thought about each other and whether perception is reality in the years leading up to the civil war. [video argue either clip] often overlooked in this debate is the fact that substantial number of white northerners and white southerners believed that there were profound differences. In any circumstance, perception usually trumps reality indicating behaviors because people act according to what they perceive to be the truth. However that might differ from reality. But even the civil war, many a societys saw fundamentally and many wouldve said pernicious lady shaped by the presence of slavery. For their part, innumerable white southerners thought northerners and antagonist and meddling people determined to undermine the south slavery based social system. It matters little whether a real chasm separated people in this way. The new york daily tribune put it well in the spring of 1856. The truth is though we are but one nation, we are two peoples, we are a people of e quality and the people of any quality. These two peoples are united by a bond of Political Union but whenever a collision comes which brings out the peculiar characteristics of the two, they are seen to be as unlike as almost any two civilized nations on the face of the earth. That same year in 1856, a young north carolinian, a cadet at west point, offered the southern viewpoint, our manners, feelings in education are as if we were different nations he wrote. Indeed, everything indicates plainly a separation written are we two nations today or do you think we are more different or do we think we are more different than we are. Guest in many ways we are two nations. Pick up the washington washington your reading stories by people very different from people of the other parts of the country. I think we could still get along but i think the speaker just now hit on some very important, namely that its very psychological, there was a convention of the states in 1860 want to try and patch it together. They thought its crazy. We dont want to go to war, let us work things out. Remarkably the northerners offered to put slavery in the constitution. The most antislavery people said we will make it so slavery will always be part of our u. S. Constitution, Abraham Lincoln said he would go along with that. But it didnt work. One of the southern delegates said thats not enough. You also have to respect us. You have to respect their slavery. In the northerners said no, we cant do that. That need for respect is always there. And never more than today. And i think it fuels a lot of the frankly nastiness of the politics. The willingness of people to go to either extreme. Host the book is american secession, phone line split up regionally. Shelley in utah. Good morning. Caller thank you for taking my call. I just want to say respect is very important and also the fact that we have a president that bullies everybody all the time, that does not help our common denominator of getting this altogether. Havee great grandma and i 18 children great grandkids. I truly believe there is a better life for them but the way the direction we are going, the middle class is being gone and we are having just the rich and the poor. Happyneed to find a medium line, we need more middleclass than we do the rich and the poor. Thank you for taking my call. Those were good points and congratulations on all the kids. I think what youve done is describe both why people like and why people dislike donald trump. I dont want to get the politics , you are talking about the basic issues that help elect trump. At the same time youre talking about the way in which a lot of americans, half of americans think its about the worst thing that happened. Way, in 1972,his Irving Kristol said the culture wars over. Left kind of the got a wakeup call, maybe they didnt win the culture war after all. Was a992 to 2016 there broad consensus that we wont shake things up much, will now we are and with trump. And that is helped to produce the divisions im talking about so im not to take sides, i am just saying though divisions are there. Host one of the biggest cyst what are the biggest Secession Movements today . Guest there is something called calexit california. There are Secession Movements hampshire,as, new vermont, oregon. So they are small now, they start small but they can build up quickly and surprising. If it happens this time i think there would be politically correct, what do you mean . Guest rather than defending rlavery it might be the wokeie states in the union saying we cant take it anymore. Host good morning. The haves and the havenots telling them what they need. We have a big problem in mississippi because the whole thing that holds america together is holding down black people. Controlling those particular groups of people. We are the people that brought said that he that is last shall be first. We moved to the first position, black people started looking out for one another. Given themselves everything they need on a white man to give it to them. Its the have trying to tell the havenots what they need and this is where the problem is in black people this is whether states that it here incause i live mississippi, the flag is never talked about. We miss use fear and we ignore it, we worry about illegal immigrants, iraq, iran and everywhere else. Host got your point. Guest you are making good points, although i disagree. The goal actually a think should be for all of us to be treated equally. No priority to anybody. That means may be looking more carefully at people who have been hard done by. , the messages got to be we are well count in the same way. Host who is Don Livingston . Guest he is a secessionist. He is a philosopher, a student someone from, and a philosophical perspective likes the idea of secession. There are people out there. He lives in South Carolina, he is not a racist in any way, shape or form. He is somebody who is talked up secessionf southern and southern distinctiveness. Ofis a good example for me the people who want secession. Host out of port charlotte, florida, good morning. Caller earlier when you first started your broadcast you mentioned the Washington Post. Your reason is what exactly . What youre reading when you pick up the Washington Post. You are going to bid in and out. Guest for the last couple of years there has been a not just slantded antitrump mostly slant the tents to commute to get the people who support trump are kind of less than human and that bleeds over from the front page to see the opinions to the sports section even. I havent seen in the weather section but its premuch all over the paper. Host do you have a followup question. Caller im surprised you would say that about a newspaper that is historically been reporting facts and historical accuracies. Opedw section from their are two separate things and your use of the word deplorables just goes back to see what your bias is. You are obviously conservative and are you hoping for secession . Is that what youre hoping for . Host not at all guest not at all, it was written in opposition to secession. I just said its out there. And there are things we should do now to remove that thread. One of those things is to talk things down. I stand by what i set about the Washington Post. I think in many ways to great which but its a paper underwent a real change with its , the New York Times for example tries i think to be more moderate in its views. But lets not get into the post. Host randy in michigan says it seems your guest would like everything fast food style in our government and thats not how it works. Its a and slow and frustrating but its our american way. We allow contentious debates but when push comes to shove we come together as americans. Guest well i hope he is right. He is right about all of that. The structure of government is made to prevent bad things from happening, you have to go through a bunch of hoops, its not like that in the parliamentary system. Providesays the system better results i think, what our system lacks is a reverse gear. You get bad stuff enacted and then it cant be amended. What does brexit and the Scottish IndependenceMovement Mean first secession in america . Guest not anything. People tend to look for europe for this, that or the other thing. We dont have to look abroad. Brits, brexit was a form of regulatory reform. When i think about it. There are all these people here who might welcome secession. They include people who want to go their own way with respect to National Health, but there also a lot of people who think they are in a regulatory mores that we are being ruled by unelected regulators and what they are talking about is the federal regulations and the alphabet soup mix in washington. People mightf prefer a smaller country. With less of washingtons regulations. Host out in california, the morning. Believe that capitalism and trump go together and every man is capitalism will trump is in office. Theres one other thing. In this i reluctantly have to say as for immigration there comes a time in every nation, all nations when you no longer want immigrants to come into the country, you just have too many and when you are paying them instead of them working to make the country better, its just doesnt work. Guest well i agree with a lot of what you just said. We are straying from the topic a little bit. Im an immigrant myself. There is always a tendency for immigrants we get in here and pull the ladder up. But immigrants are a source of value to americans, the immigration debate i think should center around whether or bringing in her making nativeborn americans better off. Thats a different debate. Host what is secession light . Guest what i was think might be a solution to our problems. Secession light i describe as a greater grant of authority to the states or to a group of states over a whole bunch of issues. Its what the brits offered ireland in the 1880s, its the way in which all of the former british colonies have left peacefully, gained their independence. Its a form of selfrule. So may be rather than just breaking of the country, maybe the thing to do is keep the country together but allow the pieces in different parts of it to have greater control over what they want to do. Host is that legal under the constitution . Guest everything is legal under the constitution if you amend it. Something to get the game going which would be inactive secession and then that begins a discussion. No state has the right of secession, no state had that right in 1861 and they dont have i