The Scottish referendum on independence in 2014 was supposed to be a once-in-a-generation event. That was the one thing that then-British Prime Minister David Cameron and then-Scottish First Minister Alex Salmond agreed on: Even a one-vote majority would settle the matter for a generation.
In fact, the majority to stay in the United Kingdom was close to half a million. It couldn't have been a clearer outcome. There was none of the obfuscation for which Quebec's referendums on independence from Canada were famous (like the 106-word question in the 1980 referendum that did not even mention the word "independence").
The referendum in Scotland simply asked: "Should Scotland be an independent country" — and the Scots said "no" by a 55 percent to 45 percent majority. But only 30 months later, the next generation of Scots must already have arrived.