Chicago is a city that has a state.
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llinois is a state where a major city runs the show and elects the two U.S. senators. Chicago has the microphone, and the rest of the state is left to pay taxes and talk secession. Let's look at the details:
The blue wave that has delighted so many in the Chicago area has been more complicated for downstaters, many of whom do not align with the ascendent Democratic super-majority in Springfield.
In the midterm election Tuesday, 12 more downstate and western Illinois counties voted to explore seceding from Illinois. These counties are: Coles, Ford, Gallatin, Hamilton, Henderson, Macoupin, McDonough, Monroe, Piatt, Saline, Warren and Washington.
They join 33 counties that have already voted for such an exploration.
With these latest votes, 45 of Illinois' 102 counties, or 44%, have approved referendums exploring separation.
Obviously, this is very far from 44% of our state's residents. The 12 rural counties that voted Tuesday to explore separating from Illinois have a combined population of just over 252,000 people, according to 2025 Census estimates, roughly 2% of Illinois' population. That's a fraction of Chicago's 2.7 million people.
But that doesn't mean individual voters in Saline County should be heard less than the individuals up here in the Chicago area. In Saline County, they were able to separate -- no pun intended -- a national blue wave from single-party politics closer to home.
Incoming Springfield Democrats ignore this sentiment at their own peril. Not because they need these votes -- clearly and demonstrably they don't. But choosing to write off legitimate (and peaceful, we'll add) votes of discontent risks fracturing our state even further.
Well, 44% is not 51%, but Rome wasn't built in a day. The problem is obvious, as we see in Washington and Oregon and elsewhere. A large city runs the state legislature, and candidates for the U.S. Senate just pay attention to urban interests. The rurals get the short end.
I don't see a quick fix. The rurals are a small minority and don't have the votes, no matter how legitimate their complaints are. On a larger scale, I don't see that the "direct election" amendment will be reversed soon so Senator Jon Ossoff will continue to be the U.S. senator from Atlanta rather than Georgia.
In the meantime, the people from the rural counties will continue to accumulate their anger, and the folks in Chicago will write them off. Sooner or later, it will explode, but it will be later rather sooner, unfortunately.
Maybe this is what the Founding Fathers feared when they designed the Senate differently than the House.
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