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YouDebateIt.com -- Is It Better To Be A Divided Nation?
Topic: Is It Better To Be A Divided Nation?

Which do you prefer #1 or #2?
Vote below for the better argument.
Opinion #1
Debater: interested
Divided how? What strengths?
The argument supposes division as jurisdictional and strength as coercive capacity. America is divided as is any nation into philosophical diversities. That is healthy. Diversity is the foundation for benign human interaction.

Juridicial differences are not healthy and would support a difference in rights and duties from one jurisdiction to another. An American could not move from one state to another without having his status as a citizen changed.

That would be unhealthy for any society and would be a de facto condition of an Alliance, not a nation.

Institutions, families. etc. develop, change and evolve. American institutions have done this effectively since the founding of the country. To go back would be reactionary and not conservative. The trick is to maintain a balance. The Soviet Union was a uniform society lacking the diversity of expressed opinion.

A unified nation with the checks that encourage diversity has both physical and moral strength.
Opinion #2
Debater: The Wild Goose
Once again, we must not accept superficial structures as inherent goods.
If this division becomes "the condition of an Alliance, not a nation", then perhaps we must go further than the topic suggests and cease to be a nation at all. As I have said several times, there is nothing inherently good about the states being united in a "Nation"- this unity is, and was conceived as, nothing more than a means to an end. The ends of politics are peace and freedom, and these themselves are not final ends, but mere means to a greater end, which is not political. I must also counter and say that American institutions have NOT effectively "evolved" since the founding of the country. The federal government has "evolved" into a massive, power-hungry, bureaucratic mess, and is fast evolving into a Hobbesian "Leviathan" state. Secession and nullification have protected American liberties many times in this nation's history. Checks and balances that "encourage diversity" do not long survive when the federal government is allowed to define its own power.
Supporting URL[s]:
http://www.lewrockwell.com
http://www.lewrockwell.com
http://www.mises.org
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