It is an alliance and you certainly can leave. It's like EU. You think rest of the EU countries are going to send their armies to invade Portugal if it chooses to leave the EU?
Where was Earth's Leader?
- Thread starter Bry_Sinclair
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It is an alliance and you certainly can leave. It's like EU. You think rest of the EU countries are going to send their armies to invade Portugal if it chooses to leave the EU?
If Earth wants to leave the Federation it's one thing, but what if it's just Earth's moon who wants to leave the Federation or even the United Earth?
Doctor Evil for President of the Moon.
Luna isn't a separate member. It's under United Earth control.
As for UE: It may be a special case, as most of the Federation headquarters is located there.
I know that that was my point.
A Moonsian Declaration of independence would be followed by an overwhelming and violent military response form Earth.
The jolly butt hurt about somewhere as small as Luna, just 3 million people, is that the Federation can give these idjits their own penal colony on the border of Cardassian space with ease. Just pick them up and freight these wannabe expats out to the boondocks where they can be independent where no one cares.
A Moonsian Declaration of independence would be followed by an overwhelming and violent military response form Earth.
The jolly butt hurt about somewhere as small as Luna, just 3 million people, is that the Federation can give these idjits their own penal colony on the border of Cardassian space with ease. Just pick them up and freight these wannabe expats out to the boondocks where they can be independent where no one cares.
Because a federal district can have its laws and budgets overturned by the federal Congress if it feels like it; a state cannot.
Perfect example: Congress trying to stop the District of Columbia from using D.C. taxpayer money from subsidizing abortions for the poor in D.C. Why should some asshole from Arizona or Colorado get to vote on an internal D.C. matter like that? It's not like anyone gets to tell Arizona what to do with its internal affairs.
D.C. statehood is the only way to stop that kind of interference with its internal affairs.
And that's to say nothing of the fact that the people of the District of Columbia want to be a state and do not want to be part of Maryland. When more people than populate the State of Wyoming want statehood, that should be a determining factor, too.
And there's absolutely nothing wrong with that.
ETA:
Book, actually. The canon established that Mars was colonized, but it was the novels that have established that the Martian polity became independent of Earth and then joined the Federation as a separate Member later on.
Specifically, ENT: The Romulan War: Beneath the Raptor's Wing established that the Confederated Martian Colonies was formed after the War of Martian Independence in 2105 -- 25 years before the founding of United Earth in 2130 (Articles of the Federation). Presumably, the CMC fought for independence against one of the pre-Unification sovereign states on Earth, or against an Earth corporation.
Mars's date of Federation Membership in the novels is unestablished. The reference book Star Trek: Star Charts, which the novels are sometimes selectively inconsistent with, refers to the United Martian Colonies as having joined the Federation as a charter Member in 2161; this contradicts Articles, which established Earth, Vulcan, Andor, Tellar, and Alpha Centauri to have been the only founding Members. One might reconcile this to a point by presuming that the Confederated Martian Colonies joined later that same year.
The Federation has exercised all of the powers and authorities of a sovereign state; it's not just an alliance.
But the Federation is a sovereign state built upon the idea of mutual consent and a democratic mandate. It would almost certainly put into place a procedure for a Federation Member to democratically chose to peacefully secede.
I'm sure that the Federation has a procedure in place both for constituent polities of Federation Members to accede to their own separate Federation Membership, and for Federation Members or their constituent polities to secede and become completely independent, sovereign states.
Why?
Who wants to keep the buzzkills around if they want to leave the party?
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The people are irrelevant.
But if they take the moon?
That's unacceptable.
Have you played Future Risk?
There's a separate board for the Moon.
You take rockets up there and then rain nukes on the stupid terrans.
If you let these hypothetical malcontents declare independence only to find that 6 weeks later that they're trying to decide if they should join the Dominion or the Romulan Star Empire, it all just sounds too much like the Cuban Missile Crisis in Space to me.
No money.
No property.
Everyone lives where they're told, or petitions to live where they want and live where they're told until the local government confirms or denies their "request" to live where they want. I suppose if some turk vintner could make a good enough argument, like that all the Picards on earth are dead (did the wife survive?) that they should occupy Chateu Picard and rebegin production. The only thing stopping that is that Picard saved the Federation a couple times.
If the federation felt uncomfortable with the Lunal population they could disperase all 3 million to a hundred outter colonies, and restaff the moon with agreeable loyalist.
But if they take the moon?
That's unacceptable.
Have you played Future Risk?
There's a separate board for the Moon.
You take rockets up there and then rain nukes on the stupid terrans.
If you let these hypothetical malcontents declare independence only to find that 6 weeks later that they're trying to decide if they should join the Dominion or the Romulan Star Empire, it all just sounds too much like the Cuban Missile Crisis in Space to me.
No money.
No property.
Everyone lives where they're told, or petitions to live where they want and live where they're told until the local government confirms or denies their "request" to live where they want. I suppose if some turk vintner could make a good enough argument, like that all the Picards on earth are dead (did the wife survive?) that they should occupy Chateu Picard and rebegin production. The only thing stopping that is that Picard saved the Federation a couple times.
If the federation felt uncomfortable with the Lunal population they could disperase all 3 million to a hundred outter colonies, and restaff the moon with agreeable loyalist.
Please. An independent Luna would still be dependent on the Federation for its national defense -- it's not like a threat to Earth wouldn't be a threat to Luna, too -- and would be dependent on Federation good will to keep its shipping lanes open. The Federation would easily be able to prevent rival powers from setting up shop on Luna, and would certainly be able to obtain treaty guarantees of Lunar neutrality or alliance.
Think less "Cuba" and more "Republic of Ireland."
America eventually had to airlift everything into West Berlin because the Eastern Block was just being ridiculously difficult with the road blocks, tariffs and health and safety inspections.
I think that this would basically be it.
Unless they were in some fashion separated from Earth officially, they would be a part of "Earth." Other star systems that are linked to Earth (colonies, etc.) would also be a part of "Earth."
That would be an official separation. As long as there wasn't a adversarial relationship ("how dare you leave us") things should be fine. Now if Mars as a sovereign state choose to be independent okay, but if they joined another interstellar organization besides the Federation (which would be their right) things could get messy.
The United Kingdom might be a better example than Portugal, since as a population they are currently discussing separation from the EU.
I don't think the Federation would have a "the door locks behind you" rule.
Oh certainly. Portugal was just a randomly chosen EU country; I didn't intend to imply that they were likely to leave.
