Quote · Up First from NPR
The growing movement to secede from Illinois and become the 51st state
Where this was said
Race, Class, and the Urban-Rural Divide
At 22:31 · chapter starts 20:50
Ford's analysis of New Illinois is the most layered in the episode. He rejects the north-south framing entirely: the real divide, he says, is between haves and have-nots, and working-class people across the state face the same problems — food deserts, inadequate healthcare — regardless of whether they live in Chicago or rural Illinois. But he's honest about the racial dimension too. While he doesn't think race is the dominant driver of New Illinois, he acknowledges that resentment toward Black Chicagoans occasionally surfaces as fury over 'wasted tax dollars.' And drawing on his own experience as a Black man in a minority, Ford finds an unexpected note of empathy for rural conservatives who feel politically powerless. His solution — a progressive tax on the wealthy — is a non-starter for conservatives who are, as O'Neill puts it, 'allergic to taxation.' The impasse holds. An Illinois historian called the state's condition schizophrenia; another compared it to conjoined twins. Neither metaphor suggests a clean resolution.
LaShawn Ford doesn't see racial animus as the dominant force in New Illinois, but he won't deny it's there — racial resentment toward Black Chicagoans sometimes surfaces as fury over 'wasted tax dollars.' The movement denies racism, but the subtext is hard to ignore.
The conditions for political violence in the United States exist right now. Historian Dr. Kenneth Owen won't say it's likely, but he won't say it isn't either. Rebellions don't happen by plan — they happen when a spark lands in the wrong place.
