§ The map · West Virginia
West Virginia was admitted to the Union in 1863.
Seceded from Virginia in order to stay in the Union. The only state made by leaving one.
Asked how many people in the other party support political violence, West Virginia residents put the figure at 51.3%. Asked the same people whether they themselves support it, the answer comes back at 14.7%. The distance between what is believed and what is true is 36.6 points, across 895 respondents in West Virginia.
A gap this wide is not an opinion. It is a measurement, and it is the ground the novels stand on.
Ratification votes and dates from the United States Senate Manual. Statehood dates from the National Archives. Where sources disagree, this map follows the Senate Manual and says so.
America's Political Pulse, Polarization Research Lab. Weekly from September 2022 to March 2026. 162,000 respondents nationally.
Answer the same question yourself — six seats, from the world down to you, and then you see where every other reader landed.
All fifty-one cards on the map
Divided Houses, Book One of the Union Trilogy