Scotland’s future hangs in balance with independence vote today

EDINBURGH, Scotland – For Scots, Wednesday was a day of excitement, apprehension and a flood of final appeals before a big decision. Today, they will determine whether Scotland leaves the United Kingdom and becomes an independent state.

A full 97 percent of those eligible have registered to vote – including, for the first time, 16- and 17-year-olds – in a referendum that polls suggest is too close to call.

A phone poll of 1,373 people by Ipsos MORI, released Wednesday, put opposition to independence at 51 percent and support at 49 percent, with 5 percent of voters undecided.

That means neither side can feel confident, given the margin of error of about plus or minus 3 percentage points.

Former Prime Minister Gordon Brown, himself a Scot, told a No campaign rally that the quiet majority of pro-Union Scots “will be silent no more,” while pro-independence leader Alex Salmond urged voters to seize a democratic opportunity 307 years in the making.

In its final hours, the battle for Scotland had all the trappings of a normal election campaign: “Yes Scotland” and “No, Thanks” posters in windows, buttons on jackets, leaflets on street corners and megaphone-topped campaign cars cruising the streets blasting out Scottish songs and “Children of the Revolution.”

But it is, both sides acknowledge, a once-in-a-generation – maybe once-in-a-lifetime – choice that could redraw the map of the United Kingdom.

The gravity of the imminent decision was hitting home for many voters as political leaders made passionate, final pleas for their sides. More than 4.2 million people are registered to vote in the country of 5.3 million people.

Cathy Chance, who works for Britain’s National Health Service in the Scottish capital, Edinburgh, said she would leave Scotland if it became independent.

“I don’t want to live under a nation that’s nationalistic,” she said. “I don’t think the world needs another political barrier.”

On the other side, Yes campaigner Roisin McLaren said she finally was letting herself believe independence might be possible.

“My family has campaigned for independence for a long, long time, and it’s always been a pipe dream,” the Edinburgh University student said as she knocked on doors in a last-minute effort to convert wavering electors. “Just in the last few days it’s seemed possible, within reach. I can almost taste it.”

Brown, Britain’s former leader, told supporters that the patriotic choice was to remain within the U.K.

“The vote tomorrow is not about whether Scotland is a nation – we are, yesterday, today and tomorrow,” he said. “The vote tomorrow is whether you want to break and sever every link” with the rest of the country.

Salmond, energetic leader of the Yes campaign, said Scots would seize “a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to take the future of this country into our hands.”

Despite gains in support for independence in recent weeks, Salmond said his side remained the underdog.

“However, as we know in life, in politics and certainly in this festival of democracy, underdogs have a habit of winning sometimes,” he said.