Ryan Griffiths, professor of political science and author of The Disunited States: Threats of Secession in Red and Blue America and Why They Won't Work, was recently featured on the Prof James Ker-Lindsay podcast.

He discusses the history of secession in the U.S., the constitutional and legal barriers to secession, the forces driving today's red-versus-blue divide in the U.S., why calls for a “national divorce” have become more prominent, and whether secession is a realistic solution to America's political crisis. 

“If leaders come in and they seem to be particularly partisan...if they really lean into that partisanship and they begin to forget their larger purpose is that ‘I represent all Americans and not just my party’ then that creates that pendulum effect and it keeps energizing both sides, and that's very dangerous,” says Griffiths. “The way around that is the United States political establishment needs to work on the dynamics that are creating this kind of polarization.”