Except, meaningful federalism has been dead since the New Deal. It was twitching a bit during the late 1990s, but the Raich v. Gonzales decision effectively pounded a stake through its heart, cut off its head, and buried it at the crossroads.
If 52% of the populace want Leviathan, there is no getting true federalism back. When you have two sets of people with contradictory conceptions of the end of government, it only makes sense to break it off in chunks that allow the people to “pick a side”. If four years of Obama, including Obamacare, moves the needle the wrong way, and the “small government” party is infiltrated/corrupt enough to give us Dole/McCain/Romney and even “W” as far as small government is concerned, there is no mechanism left to get the whole thing back.
I’d like to see as much interest in repealing the 17th amendment as there is in the secession fantasy.
Without the 17th amendment, the GOP would have a massive majority in the senate.
Actually, true federalism depends on a continuous credible threat of secession. Without such a threat federalism will always tend to devolve into Federal Government supremacy.
In 1771, secession was also a fantasy.