Should America abolish state lines?

“States are a relic of the past. It's time to get rid of them.”

“The United States of America: We use the phrase all the time but rarely think of what the words actually mean. In 1776, when this country officially became the United States of America, the words signified a bold idea. Geographic neighbors had formed alliances previously in history to form nations, of course, but these united states shared a vision and philosophy that was literally revolutionary.

The coming together of 13 disparate colonies was itself a historic achievement; never before, perhaps, had a collection of diverse, often contrarian regions merged to create a country whose leaders so vigorously rejected the political and religious doctrines of the times. (The people were not as enthusiastic.) We tend to forget how difficult a process the uniting of the original states was, as the cultural boundaries of the 13 regions persisted after the Founding Fathers joined forces to form a federated republic.

But times have changed, and we need to rethink the notion of the "United States of America." Our states are no longer culturally diverse regions with their own respective identities; rather, they are artificially constructed geographic entities that certainly would not be formed today. Borderlines between states are especially nonsensical. Pensacola, Fla., is a lot more like Mobile, Ala., than Miami. Upstate New Yorkers are less than happy about being in the same tax pool as Manhattanites.

In fact, despite all the attention to divisions within the country based on geography (or race, gender, class or any other demographic measure, for that matter), Americans share a remarkably similar way of thinking and acting. (The so-called red-vs.-blue-state divide is a crude, media-driven concept that looks great on maps but has little basis in reality.) Regional differences have drastically dissipated over the course of the past 240 years, turning the once radical proposition of the "United States" into an anachronism that now has little or no real value.

State governments are expensive to run and taxpayers are forced to foot most of the bill. We can't afford them anymore — and we don't need them. State affinities will likely never completely disappear, and there is no reason that the University of Florida or the New York Jets could not keep their names (even if the latter plays their games in New Jersey). But it's time we start thinking of ourselves as one people — Americans — who live in real, local communities rather than as 50 kinds of people living in imaginary regions.”

Full article - https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/in-theory/wp/2016/11/15/states-are-a-relic-of-the-past-its-time-to-get-rid-of-them/