55 States? Petition to Break California Apart Moves to Next Stage

The state of California, vast and heavily populated as it is, is unwieldy, ungovernable, financially unsustainable, and can no longer exist as it is presently constituted. It needs to be broken apart.

This is the basis of a proposal to split up the state of California into six separate states. While failed intrastate secessionist movements are nothing new, this proposal might be something different. California Secretary of State Debra Bowen has given supporters of this proposal the green light to go about collecting signatures with the aim of putting the proposal to voters as a ballot initiative.

The proposal, put forward by venture capitalist Tim Draper, would break California up into a series of smaller states. ABC News reports on the proposed designations for the new states:

San Diego and Orange County would make up “South California.” “West California” would include Los Angeles and Santa Barbara, while Bakersfield, Fresno and Stockton would make up the larger “Central California.” San Francisco and San Jose would be in the new “Silicon Valley.” “North California” would include the Sacramento area, and “Jefferson” would be home to the Redding and Eureka areas.

Draper needs to collect more than 807,000 signatures in the next 105 days in order to meet the deadline to put the initiative on the ballot.

h/t ABC News

[Photo via Wikipedia/Travel Channel]

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