Jack of Harts

One of the more interesting aspects of the various State divorces that occurred during the Second Great Depression concerned the matter of infrastructure. Many cities were vastly powerful concentrations of industry and knowledge, but most of them relied on the rural areas around them to survive. And not just for food. That is a common trope that is not entirely true. Many cities also require power stations to survive that are outside their borders. Nuclear power plants. Major hydroelectric dams. Coal plants. Power made the cities bright and shiny, and they relied on power transmission lines traveling sometimes hundreds of miles over farms and ranches. City folk drove from place to place on highways built in the middle of territory once owned by middle class Americans. Most cities required major installations outside their own borders to survive, and they did not take kindly to said installations seeking to leave them behind. Many cities took to the courts to stop the secessions. Others took more direct action. Those situations rarely ended with everybody happy or, far too often, alive. It would be decades before all the ramifications of those various actions and disagreements came to light.