June 16, 1858, Washington DC, USA: In a historically famous speech to the house of representatives of the United States, Senate candidate Abraham Lincoln issued a speech in which he declared: “A house divided against itself cannot stand”. These words echo quite seamlessly into the present situation in the United Kingdom.

For the first time in over three centuries, the United Kingdom is facing the possibility of another state succeeding from the British Empire. This time however, it is a founding nation. In 1603, Queen Elizabeth I died, and in turn the Kingdom of Scotland inherited the throne of England. In 2014, the people of Scotland are likely to vote on the possibility of declaring independence from England. Just like the Americans and our fore-bearers the people of Scotland face a fight to gain that independence from the very state it acquired.

Yesterday I read in the Metro some of the neumerous comments about David Cameron and his unity with Ed Miliband over preventing the succession of Scotland from the United Kingdom. Even going so far as to declare it may be unlawfull for a nation to act in a democratic way to decide its own future.

Let us remember that the Conservative party which David Cameron represents was given just 1 seat by the Scottish people. Given then that the people of Scotland clearly do not wish to be represented by the Conservative party and surely not David Cameron is it any wonder that the possibility of succession should rise. Britain has got involved in various wars over the last few decades to bring “democracy” to those countries. With support for Afghanistan and Iraq and more recently the democratic uprising in the Arab world. Why should be be afraid of democracy coming to home. Allow the people to decide what the people want. This is what the parliament is supposed to be there for.

Europe is a great place with many countries working together towards a common good, such as abolishing slavery and bringing justice to war criminals. Even so far as to try and make national governments responsible for the financial crisis that has hit the world so badly. This was incidentally why Britain vetoed since it would have to stand up and deal with the problem instead of hoping it would go away. I have no confidence in David Cameron nor his governments ability to operate a state where the vast majority of people are voting against him. With 83.256% of Scotland voting against the Conservative party, David Cameron really needs to think twice about interfering in affairs of Scotland.

Should independence happen, we expect Scotland would return to the Scandanavian economic area. This is the area which has the worlds top democratic states: Norway, Sweden, Finland, Iceland. Each of these states has vastly a similar population to that of Scotland. The arguments that Scotland could not survive on its own? If Norway, with less people, and not a great deal higher GDP than the estimated Scottish GDP can become the 2011 worlds best democratic state, is it hard to believe that with our slightly higher population and a vastly liberal outlook on life that Scotland could achieve the same?

References
Metro, Wednesday, January 11, 2012
BBC Election 2010