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The Prairie State

Illinois is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. It is the 6th-most populous U.S. state and 25th-largest state in terms of land area, and is often noted as a microcosm of the entire United States. With Chicago in the northeast, small industrial cities and great agricultural productivity in northern and central Illinois, and natural resources such as coal, timber and petroleum in the south, Illinois has a diverse economic base and is a major transportation hub. The Port of Chicago connects the state to other global ports around the world from the Great Lakes, via the Saint Lawrence Seaway, to the Atlantic Ocean; as well as the Great Lakes to the Mississippi River, via the Illinois Waterway on the Illinois River. The Mississippi River, the Ohio River and the Wabash River form part of the boundaries of Illinois. For decades, Chicago's O'Hare International Airport has been ranked as one of the world's busiest airports. Illinois has long had a reputation as a bellwether both in social and cultural terms and politics.

Geographical type: Territory

Latitude: 40° N — Longitude: 89° W

Area: 149,932 km²

ISO 3166-2 code: US-IL

Other Places

Birthplace of

Randy Barnett, Randy Evan Barnett, in Chicago, on 5 Feb 1952
Ray Bradbury, in Waukegan, on 22 Aug 1920
Doug Casey, Douglas Robert Casey, in Chicago, on 5 May 1946
Garet Garrett, Peter Garrett, in Pana, on 19 Feb 1878
Frank Knight, Frank Hyneman Knight, in McLean County, on 7 Nov 1885
Paul L. Poirot, on 23 Jul 1915
Ronald Reagan, Ronald Wilson Reagan, in Tampico, on 6 Feb 1911
JoAnn Rothbard, in Harvey, on 17 Sep 1928
John Stossel, John Frank Stossel, in Chicago Heights, on 6 Mar 1947
Aaron Swartz, in Highland Park, on 8 Nov 1986
Gordon Tullock, in Rockford, on Feb 1922
Leland B. Yeager, in Oak Park, on 4 Nov 1924

Deathplace of

Gary Becker, in Chicago, on 3 May 2014
Voltairine de Cleyre, in Chicago, on 20 Jun 1912
Frank Knight, in Chicago, on 15 Apr 1972
George H. Smith, in Bloomington, on 8 Apr 2022
George Stigler, in Chicago, on 1 Dec 1991

Measures of Freedom

Freedom in the 50 States 2015-2016 | Illinois | Cato Institute
2014: Overall rank: 44, fiscal policy rank: 48, regulatory policy rank: 40, personal freedom rank: 19, economic freedom rank: 44
LP State-by-State Membership Numbers [PDF], Libertarian Party News, Apr 2006
31 Dec 2005: Number of Members: 576

Articles

Political Plundering of Property Owners, by James Bovard, Nov 2002
Details the effects of local government land and property seizures allegedly for urban renewal purposes, for improving "blighted" neighborhoods or for the benefit of sports team owners
The city government of Marion, Illinois, announced that the entire city — including farmland inside the city limits — was blighted ... The city of Wheaton, Illinois, enacted an ordinance that allowed the city government to declare as blighted (and eligible for eminent domain) any parcel of land that had "vacancies in all or part of any building." Thus, almost any commercial building with vacant space became a candidate for seizure. (An Illinois court overturned the ordinance as excessively vague.)

The introductory paragraph uses material from the Wikipedia article "Illinois" as of 31 Oct 2018, which is released under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share-Alike License 3.0.