Fact check: Can states legally secede from the U.S.?
Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley recently said she believes that states should have the right to do what their residents want to do -- even if that means seceding from the United States.
Posted — UpdatedRepublican presidential candidate Nikki Haley recently said she believes that states should have the right to do what their residents want to do — even if that means seceding from the United States.
On the radio show, Haley acknowledged that Texas is not going to secede, but said, "If Texas decides they want to do that, they can do that. … If that whole state says, ‘We don’t want to be part of America anymore,’ I mean, that’s their decision to make."
"What I do think they have the right to do is have the power to protect themselves and do all that," Haley said on CNN. "Texas has talked about seceding for a long time. The Constitution doesn’t allow for that. But what I will say is … where’s that coming from? That’s coming from the fact that people don’t think that (the) government is listening to them."
To address Haley’s initial comment and the internet buzz, we asked constitutional law experts whether a state could secede from the U.S. The consensus was a resounding "no."
The Constitution does not say anything explicitly for or against secession, experts said.
"But it’s pretty significant evidence that during the debates over ratification, when states were deciding whether or not to join this new union, no one said, ‘Well, if you don’t like it, you can always leave,’" said Kermit Roosevelt, a University of Pennsylvania law professor.
Roosevelt said if Haley was making a moral or political argument, she could appeal to the Declaration of Independence as the 11 seceding southern states did at the time of the Civil War.
"But that’s not the Constitution, and the aspect of the Declaration that we consider foundational to America now is more ‘all men are created equal’ than ‘it is the right of the people to alter or abolish’ their government," Roosevelt said. "So Haley is offering a Confederate view of the Constitution that cost us over half a million lives."
If Texas or another state wanted to secede and the state reached an agreement via Congress with the rest of the country, then it might work, said Brian Kalt, a Michigan State University law professor.
However, it’s more likely a secession attempt "would constitute an insurrection against the United States that the central government would be entirely justified in suppressing by armed force, just as Lincoln did the Confederacy," said Frank Bowman, a University of Missouri law professor.
PolitiFact ruling
Haley said, "If that whole state says, ‘We don’t want to be part of America anymore,’ I mean, that’s their decision to make."
Constitutional law experts told us the Civil War’s outcome and Supreme Court precedent say the opposite.
We rate Haley’s claim False.
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