HJ0016 104TH GENERAL ASSEMBLY

HJ0016 LRB104 12413 MST 22695 r

HOUSE JOINT RESOLUTION

WHEREAS, The State of Illinois is often regarded as having two distinct regions, the urban Cook County area and downstate Illinois; and

WHEREAS, Even communities north of Chicago are considered "downstate" because their needs, interests, economies, and cultures have more in common with rural southern and central Illinois counties than they do with urban Cook County; and

WHEREAS, The majority of residents in downstate Illinois disagree with urban Cook County on key policy issues; for example, 61 downstate Illinois counties, from the Wisconsin state line to the Kentucky state line, have approved resolutions to become sanctuary counties for gun owners, while the City of Chicago has some of the strictest gun laws in the country, and 100 of Illinois' 102 state's attorneys opposed the 2021 SAFE-T Act; and

WHEREAS, The divide between urban Cook County and the rest of Illinois is frequently manifested in electoral results, such as the 2010 gubernatorial election in which the winning candidate carried only four out of 102 counties and, in fact, did not need to carry any other counties to win because of the margin of victory in urban Cook County; and

WHEREAS, The U.S. Supreme Court ruling Reynolds v. Sims (1964) removed any geographic element from districting for the state senate, and as Illinois' U.S. Senator Everett Dirksen warned, this caused power to be concentrated in Chicago and resulted in rural areas losing their voice in State government; and

WHEREAS, Article IV Section 4 of the U.S. Constitution guarantees a republican form of government, meaning government of the people, by the people, and for the people, but the people of rural, small town and suburban downstate Illinois do not experience this and instead experience a grossly disproportionate lack of power; and

WHEREAS, This concentration of power in Illinois' largest urban area opened the door to extreme gerrymandering and further decreased the voice of downstate Illinoisans, and gerrymandering has enabled one county, with 40% of the state's population, to dominate the other 60%; and

WHEREAS, Article IV, Section 3(a) of the Illinois Constitution requires districts to be compact, but both state and federal districts have shapes resembling snakes, dinosaurs, gloves, jaws, and a lightning bolt, earning these maps a grade of "F" from the Princeton Gerrymandering Project with The Economist called one Chicago area district one of the most strangely drawn and gerrymandered congressional districts in the country; and

WHEREAS, Article I, Section 1 of the Illinois Constitution Bill of Rights declares that all men are by nature free and independent and have certain inherent and inalienable rights among which are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; to secure these rights and the protection of property, governments are instituted among men; and

WHEREAS, The Declaration of Independence says that government derives its just powers from the consent of the governed; and

WHEREAS, The General Assembly is dominated by one county, and the people of downstate Illinois have experienced legislation, taxation, and regulation without representation, and without representative government, there is no consent of the governed; and

WHEREAS, The lack of representative government has decreased accountability, allowed corruption to flourish, and has led to Illinois being rated the third most corrupt state and Chicago the most corrupt city in the nation; and

WHEREAS, This lack of accountability has led to Illinois ranking among the worst of the states in financial health and debt, having the worst credit rating and ranking 50th in fiscal stability, while giving the people of Illinois one of the greatest collective state and local tax burdens of the 50 states; and

WHEREAS, Amendment XIV of the U.S. Constitution guarantees equal protection under the law; and

WHEREAS, The City of Chicago is frequently treated as a separate region of the state and has often been exempted from major legislative initiatives the General Assembly enacts into law because of this fact; and

WHEREAS, Laws are passed that are in the best interests of urban Cook County but not rural, small town, and suburban downstate Illinois; for example, the $15 minimum wage signed into law in 2019, and the gas tax was doubled in 2019, making it one of the highest in the country, and disproportionately impacting downstate residents; and

WHEREAS, The divide between rural, small town, and suburban Illinois and the City of Chicago spans the 200-year history of the state, and there have been several attempts in the past to split Illinois into two states; and

WHEREAS, The City of Chicago passed a resolution in 1925 to form the State of Chicago; and

WHEREAS, In 1971, west central Illinoisans declared their region the Republic of Forgottonia; and

WHEREAS, In 1981, Democrat State Senator Howard Carroll of Chicago filed a Cook County state split bill, which passed in the state senate; and

WHEREAS, Organizations such as New Illinois, Illinois Separation, and The State of Southern Illinois continue pushing for the formation of a new state truly representing the rural, small town, and suburban residents of Illinois; and

WHEREAS, From 2020 to 2024, an advisory referendum for the creation of a new state appeared on the ballots in 33 counties and in each county won by a substantial margin, averaging a landslide of 74%; and

WHEREAS, Article IV, Section 3 of the Constitution of the United States provides in part: New States may be admitted by Congress into this Union; but no new State shall be formed or erected within the Jurisdiction of any other state; nor any State be formed by the Junction of two or more States, or Parts of States, without the consent of the Legislatures of the States concerned as well as of the Congress, and that five states in the Union have been formed by separating from other states, most recently West Virginia; therefore, be it

RESOLVED, BY THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES OF THE ONE HUNDRED FOURTH GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS, THE SENATE CONCURRING HEREIN, that we urge the United States Congress to take action to declare the 101 counties of downstate Illinois, along with outlying areas of Cook County wishing to be included, the 51st state of the United States of America and separate it from the rest of Illinois; and be it further

RESOLVED, That suitable copies of this resolution be delivered to all Illinois Constitutional Officers, the Speaker and Minority Leader of the Illinois House of Representatives, and the President and Minority Leader of the Illinois Senate.