‘New Illinois’ supporters aim to break away from Chicago, Cook County and create new state

“New Illinois,” an organization that wants to create a state separate from Chicago and urban Cook County, drew about 60 people to a meeting Saturday at the Palatine Township Republican Organization office.

Following a brief speech by John Goodman, a Collinsville native intent on filling the seat of retiring U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin, New Illinois Chairman G.H. Merritt of Lake County, board member Tom Kozik of Kane County, and Loyola University finance instructor Bill Bergman spoke to the gathering.

Merritt emphasized that New Illinois is not a partisan organization, and was addressing the urban-rural “divide.”

“Illinois is a failed state that has lost its legitimacy” due to government corruption and fiscal disaster, Merritt said.

“It’s the governmental equivalent of an incurable disease,” she said.

She later told the Daily Herald that 68 Illinois counties have either voted for advisory referendums to establish a new state, are committee members of New Illinois or both. Thirty-three counties reportedly have approved referendums to separate.

She said 13 legislators in Springfield support the establishment of a new state. Founded in June 2018, New Illinois was inspired by the Solidarity movement in Poland started by Lech Walesa, she said.

Merritt said under the establishment of a New Illinois the state’s assets and liabilities would be divided through arbitration between the new and “old” Illinois and the federal government.

New Illinois board member Tom Kozik used the U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights in his argument to separate from Chicago and urban Cook County and create a New Illinois.

Kozik cited such icons as George Washington, Abraham Lincoln and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in his presentation. He focused on a Republican form of government and the Ninth and 10th amendments to the U.S. Bill of Rights regarding people’s rights and the ability to form a new state.

“I’m just wildly optimistic about our future,” Kozik said. “This is really about liberty and preserving it.”

Any separation would have to be passed by the Illinois General Assembly, as well as by the U.S. Congress.

The last successful separation measure was the split of West Virginia from Virginia. West Virginia arrived at statehood in 1863, but its final composition wasn’t determined until an 1871 Supreme Court ruling.

Bergman had to race through his wealth of information due to a final exam at Loyola University. A former economist and market analyst at the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, he attempted to establish whether or not a New Illinois was financially feasible.

Although not arriving at a definitive answer, he did acknowledge that in Illinois and federally, “the bottom line is a huge hole.”

“This is a nonpartisan effort, and I’m afraid we the people have become subordinated to our government. Our government has become our master, in fact it should be the other way around,” Bergman said.

https://www.dailyherald.com/20250503/news/new-illinois-supporters-meet-in-palatine-discuss-urban-rural-divide/