Posted on 06/12/2003 5:58:28 AM PDT by Aurelius
Wrong. As parts of the constitution, they are amplified by the supremacy clause. The constitution is supreme over federal law by way of that clause, and since the 10th amendment exists in that document, it too is supreme over federal laws that violate it.
Aside from the fact that you completely avoided the issue I had raised, such was not the intention of the founding fathers who sought not to have the government as a ultimate determinant of its own power but rather relied upon an underlying concept of natural law to restrain that power.
Needless to say, the fact remains so: the supremacy clause includes all of the constitution and that means amendment 10 as well. Amendment 10 is therefore supreme to any and all federal laws, meaning that any and all federal laws that violate Amendment 10 are by way of the supremacy clause unconstitutional.
The Supreme Court seems to agree. For example, "The supremacy of the Constitution as law is thus declared without qualification. That supremacy is absolute; the supremacy of a statute enacted by Congress is not absolute but conditioned upon its being made in pursuance of the Constitution. Carter v. Carter Coal Co., 298 U.S. 238 (1936)
Or "...the Tenth [452 U.S. 264, 287] Amendment requires recognition that 'there are attributes of sovereignty attaching to every state government which may not be impaired by Congress, not because Congress may lack an affirmative grant of legislative authority to reach the matter, but because the Constitution prohibits it from exercising the authority in that manner." See Hodel v. Virginia Surface Mining & Recl. Assn., 452 U.S. 264 (1981) and Heart of Atlanta Motel, Inc. v. United States, 379 U.S. 241, 262 (1964)
Not really. I don't believe I have professed any posession of authority here and unlike you, that object is not what I prefer to build my arguments around due to its inherent weakness. By contrast, I am simply asserting a logically inescapable set of conclusions drawn from factually sound premises about the constitution itself. Broken down they are as follows. If you dispute any of this, please say so:
P1. The Constitution is supreme to federal law and supersedes any federal law that conflicts with it.
P2. Amendment 10 is part of the Constitution.
C1. Since the Constitution is always supreme to federal law, amendment 10, which is part of the Constitution, must be supreme to federal law.
C2. Since federal laws that violate the Constitution are unconstitutional, federal laws that violate amendment 10 must be unconstitutional.
Speak up if you dispute any of this. Wlat-speak attempts to turn this into a battle of appeals to authority will earn you no points as they are inherently fallacious.
I think we have to assume that the Supreme Court was cognizant of the 9th and 10th amendments when they ruled --unanimously-- that the president was authorized --under the Militia Act -- to put down the rebellion.
I wonder if the federalists didn't acquiesce in the 9th and 10th amendments knowing they could pass the Judiciary Act of 1789 and the Militia Act of 1792, and immediately make them null.
To give the amendments the power you suggest would be to say there was no government at all.
Walt
That's not what it says.
Walt
And of course, I would have missed marrying my wonderful husband.
Now if we could just get Mrs. rustbucket to agree with my decisions...
[Wlat]: That's not what it says.
Yes it is. Article VI: "This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof...shall be the supreme Law of the Land"
To bad. Sandra Day O'Connor could learn a lot about freedom if she would pull her head out of her backside and apply logical reasoning, rather than emotional bullsh*t artistry, as her guide for interpreting the Constitution.
[Wlat]: That's not what it says.
Yes it is. Article VI: "This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof...shall be the supreme Law of the Land"
Looking at that, how could your first statement be correct?
The -Constitution- is NOT supreme to federal law. The Constitution AND the laws are supreme.
Walt
Regarding an individual seceding from the Union, is that anything like emigration?
Review your elementary school grammar, Walt, and diagram the sentence from Article VI. What does "which shall be made in pursuance thereof" modify?
This Constitution, and the laws of the United States which shall be made in pursuance thereof; and all treaties made, or which shall be made, under the authority of the United States, shall be the supreme law of the land
[Walt] That is easy to do.
[Walt] President Lincoln wasn't a race pimp.
[Walt} "I confess that I hate to see the poor creatures hunted down down, and caught, and carried back to their stripes and unwarranted toils; but I bite my lip and keep quiet. In 1841 you and I had together a tedious low-water trip, on a Steam Boat from Louisville to St. Louis. You may remember, as I well do, that from Louisville to the mouth of the Ohio there were, on board, ten or a dozen slaves, shackled together with irons. That sight was a continual torment to me; and I see something like it every time I touch the Ohio, or any other slave-border. It is hardly fair for you to assume, that I have no such interest in a thing which has, and continually exercises, the power of making me miserable. You ought rather to appreciate how much the great body of the Northern people do crucify their feelings, in order to maintain their loyalty to the Constitution and the Union."
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Just the thought of how miserable this all made Abe feel brought tears to my eyes.
Why, I do declare, the very thought of Old Abe biting his lip brought visions of Clinton to mind. And then I heard Barbra Streisand singing in the background. Could it be? Could it be? Could this just be a Clinton-like bullcrap story?
Let us read the rebuttal of Lerone Bennett, Jr., to this Lincoln legerdemain.
What about ... the famous letter Lincoln wrote in 1855 recalling his anguish at the sight of shackled slaves during a steamboat trip in 1841? "You may remember, as I well do," he wrote to his intimate friend Joshua Speed fourteen years after the event, "that from Louisville to the mouth of the Ohio there were, on board, ten or a dozen slaves, shackled together with irons. That sight was a continual torment to me; and I see something like it every time I touch the Ohio, or any other slave-border" (CW 2:320). This is strong testimony, indicating what seems to be repugnance over "a thing which has, and continually exercises, the power of making me miserable."
But:
In a letter Lincoln wrote to Speed's sister Mary immediately after the event he expressed neither repugnance nor anguish. On the contrary, he invoked the usual racist argument about happy slaves, saying that "nothing of interest happened during the passage" except "vexatious" delays. Almost as an afterthought, he wrote in the next sentence: "By the way, a fine example was presented on board the boat for contemplating the effect of condition [his emphasis] upon human happiness. A gentleman [sic] had purchased twelve Negroes in different parts of Kentucky and was taking them to a farm in the South. They were chained six and six together .... In this condition they were being separated forever from the scenes of their childhood, their friends, their fathers and mothers, and brothers and sisters, and many of them from their wives and children, and going into perpetual slavery where the lash of the master is proverbially more ruthless and unrelenting than any other were; and yet amid all these distressing circumstances, as we would think them, they were the most cheerful and apparantly [sic] happy creatures on board .... How true it is that 'God tempers the wind to the shorn lamb,' or in other words, the He renders the worst of human conditions tolerable, while He permits the best, to be nothing better than tolerable. To return to the narrative ..." (CW I:259-60).
Here, to borrow Lincoln's language, is a fine example for contemplating the effect of racial conditioning on perception. And one should note, before passing on quickly, Lincoln's revealing slip in referring to the slavedriver as a gentleman. As we have indicated, and as we shall see repeatedly in the following pages, Lincoln never got over the poor White reflex of genuflecting mentally to "gentlemen" who separated mothers and fathers from children and deposited them in the deep South where the lash of the gentleman and his overseer was heard all day and all night long. Notice also the direction of Lincoln's concern. He was moved to speculate on the moral condition of the slaves; he was not moved to speculate on the moral condition of gentlemen who bought and sold men, women, and children.
Forced Into Glory, Lerone Bennett, Jr., p.255-7
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