The Brexit got me thinking, can a colony separate from the Federation? Would it take a referendum? Would the referendum be 50% +1? Has any colony separated from the Federation? The Maquis seemed to have long term independence plans and Tasha Yar's colony seemed to be abandoned by the Federation after social order there fell apart.
Can a colony separate from the Federation?
- Thread starter The Overlord
- Start date
I'm sure there are legal procedures in place if a Federation world (or colony) attemps to secede.
Andor did it in the novels. And what's more, they later rejoined the Federation.
I would guess that a colony is under the control of the government which established it, until such time as it declares independence (which I'm also sure there are established procedures for doing so).
This is essentially the plot of Spock's World, by Diane Duane.
I'm certain they can, if freedom and liberty have survived. (Though that, too, is a bit of an open question. Kirk and Picard talk some good lines, but the actual shown behavior of the Federation is far less clear on the matter.) To me, a more interesting question regards what happens to Federation owned resources at that point. Do they pack up a whole starbase, or does it become property of the newly independent polity? How about any ships assigned to the station? Transporter networks? Shield equipment for government and other critical installations (water processing, for instance). And if any of that is left, does the colony receive some sort of bill? And if they're inside territory the Federation has to defend anyway (like say this was Luna we're talking about), would they be billed or otherwise assessed for protection? And if the colony is someplace that just *can't* be allowed independence for reasons of Federation security (again, Luna, for example - too close to Earth to be allowed independence and then to enter a treaty with, say, the Dominion), well, what then?
Something I've felt should have been done a long time is instead of a bunch of "alien" worlds where the natives are just humans with bumpy foreheads, or identical to humans, just make those worlds human colonies. If it's important to the plot that they aren't Federation members, state that it's an independent colony that still has some manner of relationship with the Federation.
Unfortunately, the times Trek did depict a colony independent from the Federation it never worked out. Turkana IV (Tasha Yar's homeworld) turned to pure anarchy, the colonies in the Cardassian DMZ had to form the Maquis and were eventually dealt with by the Dominion.
Unfortunately, the times Trek did depict a colony independent from the Federation it never worked out. Turkana IV (Tasha Yar's homeworld) turned to pure anarchy, the colonies in the Cardassian DMZ had to form the Maquis and were eventually dealt with by the Dominion.
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As Eddington said:
"Because we've left the Federation, and that's the one thing you can't accept. Nobody leaves paradise. Everyone should want to be in the Federation. "
Seriously, though, I'm wondering why any colony (assuming it has not been 'sacrificed' by the Federation, like those colonies in now-Cardassian territory), would want to leave the Federation.
"Because we've left the Federation, and that's the one thing you can't accept. Nobody leaves paradise. Everyone should want to be in the Federation. "
Seriously, though, I'm wondering why any colony (assuming it has not been 'sacrificed' by the Federation, like those colonies in now-Cardassian territory), would want to leave the Federation.
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Pious enlightenment isn't for everyone?
I don't mean it in the sense that I couldn't imagine any reasons why anyone would leave the Federation (the Maquis are just such an example), just wondering what benefits there would be for an isolated colony (that has not been disenfranchised) that would outweigh the benefits of remaining in the Federation.
Truth be told, Roddenberry's ideals be damned, I don't think it's too much of a stretch to believe tat beneath the peace and love and free replicators to all without having to work for a living, there's a dark side to the Federation that makes it a very scary place.
Emphasis mine. "Idle hands are the devil's playground" isn't just a saying, it is often at least metaphorically true. It seems to me that the only explanations there can be for the way we see humans on Trek are:
1. Humans have been genetically or otherwise medically modified to be more cooperative and docile. If genetically, whomever did it also altered all of the records so that doctors like McCoy, Crusher, and Bashir think that the current genome is the natural one. So... Section 31? Vulcan?
2. MOST of humanity was wiped out during WWIII and the Eugenics Wars, and they've actually kept to the population limit on the Georgia Guidestones ever since. (Which should imply that Miles and Keiko needed licenses/permission to have their children, since they were both residents of Earth - but we weren't shown any of that.)
3. Troublemakers who stay in the Federation and push things beyond a certain point are sent for "reconditioning" in New Zealand. What we saw Paris going through when Janeway went to get him was actually the most gentle level of adjustment performed there, merited because of his family connections and a desire not to mess up his Starfleet training.
4. Most troublemakers leave to start their own independent colony. And most independent human colonies end up like Turkana IV with roaming rape gangs and other horrors, or like Tarsus IV under totalitarian regimes or dictatorships. The Federation actually generally finds these useful, since they act as examples of what humanity could do if pushed too far while allowing them to also disavow them as "not us".
I'm confident that a colony could leave the Federation, but the benefits are entirely too great. Who'd want to do that? Or even just to enjoy the kind of relationship that Puerto Rico's had with the USA for so every long, enjoying - in effect - all of the benefits that a State in the union enjoys, in full ... without actually becoming a state. I believe this type of a relationship would actually be preferable to a colony, than to be owned and governed by the Federation, wholesale.
It just occurred to me that if #4 is correct, then independent colonies probably start out with protectorate status if they want it, but have to earn membership in the Federation just like any other world, unless they are sponsored colonies from existing members.
In other words, if the government of Tellar decides it wants to establish a mining colony on a world in another star system, so they send citizens to go establish that but it continues to be governed from Tellar, then it doesn't have independent membership, but it does have membership by being part of the domain of Tellar, which does. Or if Vulcan colonists wanted to go establish a colony on another world but wanted to remain citizens of the Vulcan polity, then that would work the same way.
But if Bob, Joe Bob, Billy Bob, and their extended families leave Alpha Centauri to go establish their independent libertarian wonderland somewhere using their own resources, then that colony would have to earn its way into the Federation if it later decided it wanted that (if Bob's great-grandkids decided he was an idiot, for example). The Federation will provide what protection it can to keep the colony from becoming a Klingon slave wonderland, but that's the limit of their involvement, and that's assuming that the colony welcomes that, or that the Federation was even informed that the colony was being established.
In other words, if the government of Tellar decides it wants to establish a mining colony on a world in another star system, so they send citizens to go establish that but it continues to be governed from Tellar, then it doesn't have independent membership, but it does have membership by being part of the domain of Tellar, which does. Or if Vulcan colonists wanted to go establish a colony on another world but wanted to remain citizens of the Vulcan polity, then that would work the same way.
But if Bob, Joe Bob, Billy Bob, and their extended families leave Alpha Centauri to go establish their independent libertarian wonderland somewhere using their own resources, then that colony would have to earn its way into the Federation if it later decided it wanted that (if Bob's great-grandkids decided he was an idiot, for example). The Federation will provide what protection it can to keep the colony from becoming a Klingon slave wonderland, but that's the limit of their involvement, and that's assuming that the colony welcomes that, or that the Federation was even informed that the colony was being established.
The Federation is all about voluntary communion. Of course you have the freedom to exit. Though it's probably not in anyone's best interest, considering all the proven threats outside the Federation.
If they were like Puerto Rico they'd be financially screwed by specific exemptions just for them and be heavily in debt to Ferengi vulture loans.
If they were like Puerto Rico they'd be financially screwed by specific exemptions just for them and be heavily in debt to Ferengi vulture loans.
I haven't seen many Enterprise episodes either. Was the bolded word a typo?
The Novels say the Mars has a seat on the Federation Council.
Each Federation Councillor is a representative of a distinct empire that may have thousands of worlds to it's credit, or might have invented Warp only a year ago.
The Maquis worlds, Federation Colonies were ceded to the Cardassians when the border moved.
The Maquis chose to become Cardassian citizens rather than be relocated to new Federation worlds, because home is home.
The Cardassian Government promised to treat it's new human citizens like it's regular Cardassian Citizens, and Federation believed them.
Xenophobic hillbillies (on both sides) who don't give two shits about how the Government tells them to think and behave, didn't give two shits about how the government told them to think and behave.
The Maquis (armed by sympathetic corners of Starfleet) were killing Cardassian farmers living on former Federation worlds, and the new Cardassian farmers on former Federation worlds where being armed by black sections of the Cardassian government to kill the Maquis (as well as regular nonmilitant farmers who just wanted to farm) or at least keep the Hillbilly brawl at level where neither side were outmatched, in limited "civilian" engagements.
Then the Maquis started killing Cardassians military/police who were trying to keep order and make sure that murder and war wasn't happening. If the Cardassian Government was fair, they should have been sending both sides of these altercations to penal colonies work camps, and maybe they did, but the maquis argument was that there was bias and only the former Federation Citizens were being punished for at least half the time, only defending themselves.
Because of extradition laws and a formal alliance, Starfleet was honour/legally bound to treat Cardassian criminals as if they were federation Criminals in need of being apprehended.
The Maquis, now like a (small) modern military power (Hillbilly plus) was then zig zagging across the border (when they were not relieving themselves in the Demilitarized Zone) to evade simultaneously and sequentially Starfleet and the Cardassian Union depending on who was chasing them at any given moment.
This was always almost more about murder and theft, since the Maquis had no infrastructure and could not surviving without raiding the crap out of Cardassian interests, more so than politics.
The Hatfields and McCoys in space.
The Maquis denial (rejection?) of the 2267 peace treaty is nothing like Brexit, unless 5 million British refuges armed like a soccer riot, show up in Normandy next week, and decide "fuck it, lets just loot and pillage until the French wimp out and give us Normandy".
Each Federation Councillor is a representative of a distinct empire that may have thousands of worlds to it's credit, or might have invented Warp only a year ago.
The Maquis worlds, Federation Colonies were ceded to the Cardassians when the border moved.
The Maquis chose to become Cardassian citizens rather than be relocated to new Federation worlds, because home is home.
The Cardassian Government promised to treat it's new human citizens like it's regular Cardassian Citizens, and Federation believed them.
Xenophobic hillbillies (on both sides) who don't give two shits about how the Government tells them to think and behave, didn't give two shits about how the government told them to think and behave.
The Maquis (armed by sympathetic corners of Starfleet) were killing Cardassian farmers living on former Federation worlds, and the new Cardassian farmers on former Federation worlds where being armed by black sections of the Cardassian government to kill the Maquis (as well as regular nonmilitant farmers who just wanted to farm) or at least keep the Hillbilly brawl at level where neither side were outmatched, in limited "civilian" engagements.
Then the Maquis started killing Cardassians military/police who were trying to keep order and make sure that murder and war wasn't happening. If the Cardassian Government was fair, they should have been sending both sides of these altercations to penal colonies work camps, and maybe they did, but the maquis argument was that there was bias and only the former Federation Citizens were being punished for at least half the time, only defending themselves.
Because of extradition laws and a formal alliance, Starfleet was honour/legally bound to treat Cardassian criminals as if they were federation Criminals in need of being apprehended.
The Maquis, now like a (small) modern military power (Hillbilly plus) was then zig zagging across the border (when they were not relieving themselves in the Demilitarized Zone) to evade simultaneously and sequentially Starfleet and the Cardassian Union depending on who was chasing them at any given moment.
This was always almost more about murder and theft, since the Maquis had no infrastructure and could not surviving without raiding the crap out of Cardassian interests, more so than politics.
The Hatfields and McCoys in space.
The Maquis denial (rejection?) of the 2267 peace treaty is nothing like Brexit, unless 5 million British refuges armed like a soccer riot, show up in Normandy next week, and decide "fuck it, lets just loot and pillage until the French wimp out and give us Normandy".
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