Texas Is Like Voltron

If you've ever spent more than a few hours with me, you know of my love for Texas's statutory power to become five states, granted in 1845 as a condition of its admission to the Union. It was reasonable at the time, for most states were tiny ones on the East Coast. One of my friends just passed on the most comprehensive history of Texas politicians' efforts to divide themselves I've yet seen.

There's great stuff here, such as:

Failure to reapportion representation after the Thirteenth Census brought new agitation on the division question in 1914. The growth of the western part of the state made it necessary for more representation from that section, a need the legislature ignored. West Texans were also annoyed because few state institutions were established in their region. The result was the proposal in the Texas Senate for the state of Jefferson, to be composed of the Twenty-fifth, Twenty-sixth, Twenty-eighth, and Twenty-ninth senatorial districts. No more than six senators supported the measure, and other proposals to the Thirty-fourth Legislature were equally fruitless. In 1921 the veto of a bill calling for the location of an agricultural and mechanical college in West Texas revived the whole question. Mass meetings were held in West Texas, but the agitation died down quickly.

And:

In the 1930s John Nance Garner proposed a division that called for the maximum number of states permitted under the law, East Texas, West Texas, North Texas, South Texas, and Central Texas.

The conclusion is obvious: