Vermont: Small, But Independent in Politics
Vermont has a strong political history.
— -- Vermont is one small state with a fiercely independent streak that's unafraid to wield its political prowess. The nation's 14th state may be solidly blue today — save Republican Gov. Jim Douglas — but it wasn't always that way.
Its inception into the United States in 1791 was met with much debate, as Vermont wanted to be independent, and today 13 percent of all the state's residents want it to secede from America, according to the University of Vermont Center for Rural Studies. Even one of Vermont's current senators, Bernie Sanders, is an independent .
"Vermont is politically one of the most progressive states in the country. A state that caught on to the disastrous policies of Bush a lot earlier than most of America did," Sanders said.
The Green Mountain State was once one of the most Republican states in the Union, voting against Franklin Roosevelt all four times he ran for office.
"From the Civil War through [the] early 1960s, Republicans won every election in Vermont," said Middlebury College Professor Emeritus Eric Davis.
