Historical April–May 2020 article. Dates, prices, services and contacts describe the source period; current availability has not been established.
As a City resident, I recognize that Better Together had a good idea. It’s also hard to argue against the Freeholders planning to create inter-government synergy. Dr. Google notes that St. Louis City contributes $28.5 billion dollars to MO’s economic output and St. Louis county generates $71.6 billion; think of what they could do together! Alas, despite my exclamation mark, the mistake that Better Together and the Freeholders are making is that they’re thinking too small. Forget undoing the 1876 City-County divorce. Think BIG.
The City of St. Louis should become a state.
The State of St. Louis has lots of potential. Think out of the box; out of the state. There’s nothing magical about 50 states.
It was 13 so why not 51? Yep, St. Louis could be the fifty-first state in the Union. For this to happen, the residents of St. Louis would have to vote for it, the remainder of MO would have to agree, and then the folks in the other 49 states would have to approve. Believe me, these steps would be a no-brainer. Of course we City folk would be in favor of this. Wouldn’t it be nice for Chesterfield to be in another state and for us not to have to pay when the Missouri River overflows again? Plus, we’d get to have our own state flag. How cool would that be?
All of MO west of Skinker would be happy to eject us, I’m sure. And we could simply attach this legislation to some federal Republican bill to reduce taxes on gazillionaires and no one would even notice. Our 61 square miles would be the smallest state in the Union, just a little less than Delaware’s 2,489, but Delaware doesn’t have the City Museum, a major league sports franchise, or Skinker-DeBalivere, so it’s about even.
As the state of St. Louis, we’d get one U.S. Congress person and two U.S. Senators for our population of 318,069. Yeah, three congress people just for us.
This representation is set out in the U.S. Constitution, and there’s sort of precedent for it.
After all, the population of Wyoming is 580,000 and they send two senators and one rep to congress. Who the U.S. Representative should be is obvious. First district Democratic congressman Lacy Clay (who used to live in Skinker-DeBaliviere) can keep his job.
He currently represents 711,000 people, so he would be happy, I am sure, to have fewer letters to kiss and babies to sign. Determining the two U.S. Senators for the State of St. Louis could be challenging but it wouldn’t be difficult to do better than our current twosome, Roy Blunt and Josh Hawley.
They used to be Republicans but have switched to become Trumpians. How else to explain their protection of The Donald as he bartered Ukraine funding in exchange for some dirt on a political opponent? No, we wouldn’t want spineless people from The Party of Donald to represent us. Instead, we need visionaries who will move our fifty-first state forward. Joe Edwards would be a natural U.S. senator. Sure, his Loop Trolley hasn’t turned out so well, but everyone’s entitled to a mistake or three. And in a decade or so when the trolley is part of Metro and expanded, everyone will think it’s a tremendous community resource. Joe’s record for creativity and energy, from creating Blueberry Hill to making the Delmar Loop one of the top 20 streets in the USA, cannot be denied. Plus, it would be fun to see him in a suit and tie. Welcome to D.C., St. Louis Senator Joe Edwards! Our other new U.S. Senator has had a relatively low profile but he’d bring the gravitas to get legislation passed that would benefit our state. Yep, I’m thinking of Ted Drewes. Granted, Ted isn’t active locally and he doesn’t say much beyond his 30-second commercials, but think of the impact of Ted Drewes on Capitol Hill. Avarice fuels congress and every senator and representative would be clamoring for Ted’s frozen custard, so he’d be able to leverage these calories to advance the State of Saint Lou. Within a year or two, we’d be awarded an expansion NFL team, the new Smithsonian Museum, dedicated to microscopic life forms, would be built here, and St. Louis would become a major international exporter of toasted ravioli. Hooray for St. Louis Senator Ted Drewes.
But there are other advantages to forming the State of St. Lou. Unlike our parsimonious state of MO, the feds spread greenbacks.
In 2013, the U.S. Government provided 37.4% of Montana’s state funding and contributed over $10,000 in benefits to each citizen of North Dakota. Our City is cash-poor, so imagine how the State of St. Louis could benefit when we step up to the trough with the other 50 state feeders! Senators Joe and Ted would bring home the bacon, and I don’t mean
feral pigs.
With that additional state revenue, we could repair potholes, improve schools, pick up trash more regularly, and do away with parking meters. And we’d no longer have those suburban county leaders – the same ones who turn their backs on our homeless problem – clamoring and conniving to get their hands on our airport. Featuring a State Slogan of Fifty-one Is Fun, it’s clear that the State of St. Louis will have a lot going for it. Keep your eyes out for the St. Louis Statehood petition in a future issue of The Times of Skinker-DeBalivere.
Originally published in The Times of Skinker-DeBaliviere, April–May 2020.
Read this article in the original newspaper issue.
Original source: SD_Times2020_04.pdf, printed page(s) 12; PDF page(s) 12.
