Why I Support NEIC

Unofficial flag of New England.

New England is that six-state region in the northeastern corner of the United States. It’s clearly defined as consisting of Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont. It is the region I’ve called home for all but one year of my life, and it’s somewhat different from the rest of the country.

The population of New England, as of the 2020 census, was about 15.1 million, spread out over an area of about 72,000 square miles, meaning that the population density is roughly 210 people per square mile. That’s more than enough for a functioning country, and in fact many of the world’s most prosperous nations (such as the Nordics) have fewer people than that. 

As for the geography, it’s also relatively diverse. Far from being one big forest, the region also contains some of the country’s best beaches (even if the water isn’t nearly as warm as in the hellhole known as Florida), as well as mountains that reach a peak of over 6,000 feet above mean sea level. The cuisine is also varied, from lobster rolls to clam chowder to cranberry products.

Of course, there are also cities such as Boston, known as one of the most innovative and progressive cities in the United States. That’s why the state of Massachusetts has a Human Development Index of 0.956. As of 2022, if it were an independent nation, Massachusetts would be tied for 4th in HDI with Hong Kong. Only Switzerland, Norway, and Iceland would rank higher.

As nice as it is in New England, however, we can’t escape the fact that New England is part of the United States. This country elected Donald Trump, convicted felon and power abuser extraordinaire, to be President once again, and for that we cannot be forgiven. During the next four years, Trump is going to take a sledgehammer to all our alliances, persecute the most vulnerable American civilians, and generally make life a living hell for those who oppose him. 

However, Trump is not the only danger. He would only be a 78-year-old demented man yelling on the Internet if not for the fact that half the country was willing to vote for him. And with Project 2025 right around the corner, he’s likely to invade blue states in order to carry out his mass deportations and fire on those who protest his agenda. The Kyle Rittenhouse precedent says you can literally get away with murder under the right circumstance.

Yes, New England is the best region of the U.S., but that’s like saying you have the best-smelling outhouse. Again, we can’t escape the reality that we’re subject to the jurisdiction of the Trump regime…or can we?

It’s for this reason that I’m announcing my support of the New England Independence Campaign, or NEIC for short. This movement advocates for the secession of these six states in order to form an independent nation of 15 million people.

Many will say that this isn’t possible, or that the Constitution prohibits it. First of all, just because the Constitution says something is illegal doesn’t mean it carries any consequences whatsoever. I mean, look at this:

The January 6, 2021 United States Capitol attack, which should have gotten Trump disqualified from running for President in 2024. This shows the Constitution may as well be toilet paper.

Furthermore, many of the Founding Fathers owned slaves, and they sought to enshrine the right to do so in the Constitution. That’s another example of the country being built on white supremacy. If slavery were still de jure legal today, I highly doubt the Thirteenth Amendment would be passed to abolish it. We’re simply too polarized for the parties to agree on anything important enough to justify an amendment. 

This stands in stark contrast to other countries like France. In France, for instance, they amended the Constitution last year to enshrine abortion rights into the country’s legal code. They may not be a perfect country, but I like the idea of the Constitution being a living document that changes with the times when it’s warranted. And New England is in general a less polarized place than the rest of the USA.

Furthermore, Massachusetts abolished slavery in 1783, long before the nationwide abolition. In fact, this was half a century before Great Britain, our former colonizer, abolished slavery in their own empire. (They did so in 1834). The state was also a center of the abolitionist movement and played a key role in the Union’s victory in the Civil War. Speaking of the Civil War, if slave-owning Southern states could secede from the country just because they wanted to keep owning black people as property, New England can do the same for a far more progressive reason.

Now, I’m not going to say New England is immune from the political insanity that plagues America. We still have our fair share of gun violence, as events like Sandy Hook (2012) and Lewiston (2023) remind us all too well. We still have to pay far more than we should for health care - but that’s the rest of the country’s fault, not ours. 

Furthermore, every state swung rightward in 2024, and although Massachusetts went for the Harris-Walz ticket with over 61% of the vote, this was a decrease from the 65.6% Biden won in the state in 2020. But what makes New England saner than the rest of the country is not just because it’s bluer, but also because of ranked-choice voting.

You see, ranked-choice voting has been found to reduce political polarization. This shouldn’t be much of a surprise, since most people who voted for Harris were really voting against Trump. But if people could vote third-party without wasting their precious ballot, this might allow other political parties to form and genuinely compete with the current duopoly. 

Maine already has ranked-choice voting. While Massachusetts voted against it in 2020 (because somehow people became convinced that “ranked-choice is less choice”), I think there’s reason to believe that if more attention were on Maine, voters in other New England states could right this wrong. Moreover, if New England were its own country, and RCV was passed at the national level, that’d be even better.

Before I move on from the topic of polarization, I want to make one thing clear: I’m not saying both sides are the same. That’s clearly not true. But so much of American politics feels like a sporting event rather than a serious conversation about what policies should be passed to benefit people. That’s a culmination of where polarization has driven us - off the deep end of insanity.

Of course, “if New England were its own country” is doing some heavy lifting here. At the time of writing, the New England independence subreddits are still relatively small, though they might grow exponentially if Trump succeeds in many of his horrendous goals. It will take a massive movement for leadership in these six states to even entertain the thought of secession. But the question I have is this: Can we afford NOT to?

In the words of John Lennon: You may say I’m a dreamer, but I’m not the only one. A New England unencumbered by the rest of the shithole that is the United States of America could be the prosperous, successful nation that I know we can become. If Marjorie Taylor Greene wants a national divorce, I’m more than happy to sign the papers.

The time has come. Let’s cast away the USA and build a civilized society.