We were shocked to hear that your capital city of Columbia, nearly four years after 9/11, has just now opened a Homeland Security Office. Coming on the heels of reports of people in your state now dying of West Nile virus, the recruitment of Steve Spurrier as USC football coach, and sharks taking bites out of swimmers in Myrtle Beach, the Homeland Security thing was the absolute last straw.
We hate to break it to you this way, but we North Carolinians have decided to take action to save you. As luck would have it, we have discovered that your state is bogus. It turns out that when the territory of Carolina was split up into North and South Carolina, the whole arrangement was illegal. We’ll send you an e-mail later with all the details, but in the meantime you need to know that your state, which we’ve called “Other Carolina” for years (did you know that? Seems funny now, huh?), is being annexed into North Carolina. In order to keep our own citizens from rejecting this move, the new, larger state will go by the name of “North Carolina.” We’re sure you’ll understand.
Your new governor (the Honorable Michael Easley, for the 80 percent of you who don’t know there’s anything outside the Palmetto [former] State), has dissolved the legislature in Columbia which means next month’s big Statewide Liquored-Up Cockfighting Tournament has been canceled, and black people in your environs will be allowed to vote again without being hassled.
To help with this joyous albeit unexpected transition, the North Carolina legislature and Gov. Easley have enacted the following rules, which are to go into effect posthaste. Wait, first thing, look up “albeit” and “posthaste” in the dictionary. No offense, we just want to be sure you know what’s going on here. Thank you. Now here are the rules:
1. Speed limits on rural roads and in towns under 50,000 population are hereby increased by 15 miles per hour. We expect you step things up a bit, so please remember that North Carolinians use the official speed limit as a minimum.
2. In order for Rule No. 1 to be more easily implemented, the longtime South Carolina tradition of driving tractors on public roads is hereby banned.
3. Until further notice, you may not refer to any pork dishes served in the area formerly known as South Carolina as “barbecue,” either on menus or even in private conversation. A lengthy and difficult course in the proper ways of preparing pork barbecue will soon be offered and will be mandatory for all restaurant cooks in your (former) state.
4. A formula will be figured out and raises in pay announced in order to bring your average wages up to a respectable North Carolina level.
5. You will soon begin paying higher taxes, but you’ll be happy about it when you eventually notice the dramatic drop in the number of cases of ringworm and pellagra.
6. Primary education in the area formerly known as South Carolina will be revolutionized beginning next year, with real buildings and desks and everything else. Therefore it will no longer be acceptable for your children (or you) to learn reading and arithmetic via the Hardee’s drive-thru menu.
7. Due to improvements in your wages, healthcare and educational system, your state motto will no longer need to be “Thank God for Mississippi.”
8. We hereby acknowledge the superiority of your beaches and peaches, as well as that of Charleston restaurants. I mean, let’s be real — those are three reasons we looked into this whole annexation thing to begin with.
9. Stop with all the Civil War stuff already and get rid of that silly Confederate battle flag on your former statehouse grounds. Do you just want to constantly get on everybody in the world’s nerves? Oh yeah, we forgot — you do.
10. In recognition that both state anthems are currently so boring people fall asleep before the second verse, the new state song for the united areas will be “Double Shot of My Baby’s Love” by the Swinging Medallions from Greenwood, (formerly) SC. We thought you’d like that.
11. If Charlotte somehow doesn’t come away with the official NASCAR museum, the Darlington racing museum will be moved, lock, stock and carburetor, to the Queen City.
12. The Carolina Panthers will no longer pander to Jerry Richardson’s homebase in Spartanburg and will now be called the Charlotte Panthers. Training camp will be moved to Mecklenburg County.
13. In the interest of keeping politicians of similar antiquated beliefs together, you will dig up John C. Calhoun and Strom Thurmond and send them to Raleigh, after which they will be reburied in Jesse Helms’ backyard.
14. You will no longer refer to the giant hills in your part of the new state as “mountains,” as they are not up to North Carolina mountain standards. From now on you will simply call them “giant hills.”
15. Schools will begin teaching that South Carolina’s Susan Smith has nothing on North Carolina’s husband-poisoning Velma Barfield when it comes to killing family members. Get a clue, folks — Velma was actually executed! Can you say the same about Ms. “A black guy stole my kids”?
Those are all the new rules, for now. Tax collectors from the Honorable Michael Easley’s government will be contacting you soon about all the back taxes owed since 1776.
Thank you for your cooperation.
And thanks for the inspiration to the writer of the widespread internet gag, “Notice of Revocation of Independence.”
This article appears in Sep 7-13, 2005.
