"You can check out anytime you like, but you can never leave."

[HereSince1628]

10. We certainly see it that way, now, but I'm not so sure

that's the way it was seen in the antebellum US or during reconstruction.

Consider the motto of the great seal of the State of Illinois..."State Sovereignty National Union."

Originally adopted in 1819, it's been argued that sovereignty merely refers to states authority over things not mentioned in the US Constitution. However, when the redesign was considered in the late 1860's, after the civil war, it involved an attempt to place unity before state sovereignty. And that led to a fight that was lost by those seeking to reorder the motto and significance of its meaning.

The principle of state sovereignty was obviously significant to the state legislature and they protected it.

Only by a clever, some say deceitful, redesigning of the unfurling the banner bearing the motto to read from bottom to top did the advocates manage to change the presentation to achieve a prominent position for national unity above state sovereignty.