alternatehistory.com

One of the things I learned from How the States got their Shapes is that California was permitted to pretty much draw their own borders (claiming the entire gold rush region within the state, for one), because the lawmakers recognized that they needed California (with all its resources) more than California needed them (as DC was so far away).

So what if California remains independent until the end of WW2, and then choses to join the US?
(California spend the War as an Allied nation, if it helps any. Oregon and Washington are the US' Pacific coastline)

Would California have enough leverage to keep its own laws (or at least a chunk of those laws), or have they, by the late 1940s, lost the negotiating advantages they would've had if they'd joined the US pre-War?
Top