Secession, a term used in political science to signify the
withdrawal of a state from a confederacy or composite state, of
which it had previously been a part; and the resumption of all
powers formerly delegated by it to the federal government, and
of its status as an independent state. To secede is a sovereign
right; secession, therefore, is based on the theory that the
sovereignty of the individual states forming a confederacy or
federal union has not been absorbed into a single new
sovereignty. Secession is a right claimed or exercised by weaker
states of a union whose rights are threatened by the stronger
states, which seldom acknowledge such a principle. War generally
follows the secession of a member of a union, and the seceding
state, being weaker, is usually conquered and the union more
firmly consolidated.  The history of Europe furnishes several
examples of secession or attempts to secede: in 1309 the Swiss
cantons withdrew from the Empire and formed a confederacy from
which, in 1843-1847, the Catho