Of course not. Breaking up the union is about as serious as things can get. Like matters of war and peace it isn't for a single state to decide on its own.
Let's say that the powers of the states vastly outnumber those of the federal government. It doesn't follow -- nor should it -- that the 10th Amendment gives the states some hidden Easter egg that allows them to bring the entire federal apparatus down at their own sweet will. If states have a preponderance of power within the union there's no necessary reason for them to have the power of walking out on the whole constitutional system, and a look at the way the Founders carefully crafted that system would suggest that they don't have that power.
Madison says: "The powers reserved to the several States will extend to all the objects which, in the ordinary course of affairs, concern the lives, liberties, and properties of the people, and the internal order, improvement, and prosperity of the State." But secession -- breaking up the union -- involves more than the internal affairs of one state. This wasn't so clear in 1788. After the federal government had bought and surveyed and helped settle new territories and set them up as states, built forts and other installations, dredged ports and made other investments it would become even clearer that dissolution of the union was not the affair of one single state.
The federal government had no power or right "to deliver the mails, to maintain federal courts, [or] to collect taxes," outside of the union. Once a State had formally withdrawn from the union, those delegated federal rights were of no effect within the seceded State.
Where does it actually say that in the Constitution? The federal government is delegated those powers, and there's no provision for secession. So long as the union isn't dissolved to the satisfaction of the various parties involved, the federal government is authorized to carry out those functions.
In other words, even Alexander Hamilton thought you were full of it...
Note the words "CONTRADICTORY and REPUGNANT" in Hamilton's paper, and the example he gives: "The third will be found in that clause, which declares that Congress shall have power "to establish an UNIFORM RULE of naturalization throughout the United States." This must necessarily be exclusive; because if each State had power to prescribe a DISTINCT RULE there could be no UNIFORM RULE."
Breaking with the union would be far more serious than establishing a different rule of naturalization. So I don't think you can say that Hamilton would automatically agree with you. You are forever saying that the founders who disagreed with absolute state sovereignty within the constitutional system would accept the assertion of absolute sovereignty by a state if only it broke with the union and the Constitution, but the texts you offer don't support that conclusion. If Hamilton strained at sovereigntist gnats, why would he swallow a secessionist camel?
Actually, my conclusion comes from a fair reading of the historical documents of the time (from the 1600's through the mid-1800's). Your "conclusion," on the other hand, appears to be a more modern fabrication...
I'm looking at history and how it develops. You're ignoring that. You're not asking what the 10th Amendment meant in practice or in the context of the whole Constitution, you're simply assuming that it's your "Get Out of the Union Free" card.
Gosh - I didn't know you were a conspiracy theorist! But I guess you 'found me out' - my goal in life (/sarc), in intimate coordination with Dr. Evil, is "making the conservative movement about secession... the end of conservatism, the triumph of hypocrisy, and the ruination of the country." Too bad you caught me (OOPS - I meant us! Sorry, Dr. Evil!), just inches short of my (OUR!) goal! ;>)
My fault for actually taking you seriously. You certainly seem to take yourself seriously, but you take the out of claiming that your ideas aren't going to convince people anyway, so why bother with them. Why indeed?
A rightful secession requires the consent of the others, or an abuse of the compact absolving the seceding party from the obligation imposed by it.
- James Madison, Letter to Alexander Rives, 1833
That's taking one of Madison's sentences out of context. Look further on in the letter:
It surely does not follow from the fact of the states, or rather the people embodied in them, having, as parties to the constitutional compact, no tribunal above them, that, in controverted meanings of the compact, a minority of the parties can rightfully decide against the majority, still less that a single party can decide against the rest, and as little that it can at will withdraw itself altogether from its compact with the rest.
The characteristic distinction between free Governments, and Governments not free is that the former are founded on compact, not between the Government and those for whom it acts, but among the parties creating the Government. Each of these being equal, neither can have more right to say that the compact has been violated and dissolved than every other has to deny the fact and to insist on the execution of the bargain. An inference from the doctrine that a single state has a right to secede at will from the rest is that the rest would have an equal right to secede from it; in other words, to turn it, against its will, out of its union with them. Such a doctrine would not, till of late, have been palatable anywhere, and nowhere less so than where it is now most contended for.
That's a pretty clear rejection of secession at will. Of course, secessionists would want to argue that a breakdown of the Constitutional system justified states reassuming their sovereignty. I don't know whether Madison would have agreed that such a condition existed in 1860. But Madison definitely disagrees with the idea of secession as a reserved right of the states to be executed whenever they felt like, and says that in his letter.
The problem with that theory that the Constitution had broken down in 1860 is that you have to view slavery as a right and potential threats to slaveholders' rights as violations of the Constitution. Potential threats aren't actual ones, of course, and many post-war Southerners felt ill at ease asserting slave owning as a natural or constitutional right, so defenders of the Confederacy fell back on the belief that Madison clearly rejects in the letter.
Madison was in a tough place when he wrote this letter. He couldn't repudiate the Virginia Resolutions and his earlier defense of them. But in fact, he comes pretty close to doing so. He had learned something over time about what the Constitution was and how it worked. Now that's the problem with your approach. You can argue that what the Founders wrote in 1788 was authoritative, but what happens if one of those Founders lived longer and reconsidered, learned and changed his mind? Do you simply dismiss his later opinions?
Your citing a sentence from the letter to imply that Madison shared your view when he actually didn't indicates how fraudulent and farcical the arguments on these threads are. You believe what you want to believe and you drag out anything you can to support what you want to believe and simply dismiss opposing opinions out of hand. You're not really engaging my views and we're not really going anywhere, simply negating each other's opinions. So what's the point of continuing with this nonsense?
x: Of course not. Breaking up the union is about as serious as things can get. Like matters of war and peace it isn't for a single state to decide on its own.
"Of course not?" So you are stating that the right if State secession falls in the "few and defined" category? Where exactly is the power to prohibit State secession "defined", sport?
;>)
Let's say that the powers of the states vastly outnumber those of the federal government. It doesn't follow -- nor should it -- that the 10th Amendment gives the states some hidden Easter egg that allows them to bring the entire federal apparatus down at their own sweet will.
What planet are you from? IT'S NOT HIDDEN: with regards to State secession, you need only refer to the terms of the Tenth Amendment; and with regards to any inclination (apart from secession) the several States might develop "to bring the entire federal apparatus down at their own sweet will," they can do it any time they so please, under the terms of Article V (read it & weep)...
WIJG: The federal government had no power or right "to deliver the mails, to maintain federal courts, [or] to collect taxes," outside of the union. Once a State had formally withdrawn from the union, those delegated federal rights were of no effect within the seceded State.
x: Where does it actually say that in the Constitution? The federal government is delegated those powers, and there's no provision for secession. So long as the union isn't dissolved to the satisfaction of the various parties involved, the federal government is authorized to carry out those functions.
I love you 'union at any cost' types - your arguments are usually about two orders of magnitude outside the sphere of rational discussion. This one is no different. Under your sorry excuse for a rational argument, the federal government has the power or right "to deliver the mails, to maintain federal courts, [or] to collect taxes," in the Bahamas, or Honduras. After all, "[w]here does it actually say... in the Constitution" that the federal government doesn't possess those rights? Let's add in in Ireland - I hear they're making money over there, and the Constitution, as you argue the case, does not prevent the collection of US taxes in Ireland...
Hamilton: "The third will be found in that clause, which declares that Congress shall have power "to establish an UNIFORM RULE of naturalization throughout the United States." This must necessarily be exclusive; because if each State had power to prescribe a DISTINCT RULE there could be no UNIFORM RULE."
x: Breaking with the union would be far more serious than establishing a different rule of naturalization. So I don't think you can say that Hamilton would automatically agree with you.
"Far more serious?" Where was that standard established? I thought it was "CONTRADICTORY and REPUGNANT?" Did I misread Mr. Hamilton? What terms of the Constitution did State secession 'CONTRADICT?' Hmm? Or to what specific written terms is State secession "REPUGNANT?"
In fact, you prove my point - Article I, Section 8 declares, in writing, that Congress shall have the power "[t]o establish an uniform Rule of Naturalization, and uniform Laws on the subject of Bankruptcies throughout the United States;" where does the Constitution declare, in similar terms, a federal power to prevent the departure of a member State, using military force?
Ante up, sport.
I'm looking at history and how it develops. You're ignoring that. You're not asking what the 10th Amendment meant in practice or in the context of the whole Constitution, you're simply assuming that it's your "Get Out of the Union Free" card.
Thanks for your opinion - that, and a couple of bucks (and a couple of Tums to deal with the heartburn your idiotic opinions give me), will get me a cup of coffee in Peach Springs or Fort Washakie...
That's taking one of Madison's sentences out of context. Look further on in the letter... Your citing a sentence from the letter to imply that Madison shared your view when he actually didn't indicates how fraudulent and farcical the arguments on these threads are.
Actually, I would suggest that your arguments are "fraudulent and farcical" - you simply ignore Mr. Madison's comments regarding "an abuse of the compact" as grounds "absolving the seceding party from the obligation imposed by it." And then you ignore Mr. Madison's (and Mr. Jefferson's) public, written, comments regarding the right of the States (as parties to the compact) to make such determinations for themselves.
Knock yourself out - you're obviously a 'cherry picker' when it comes to the historical record. Your refusal to address the citations I posted from The Federalist Papers proves my point.
(If you post a reply, and I don't get back to you immediately, don't worry - I'm visiting three States over the next four days. As you noted in your Post 1743, I need to "get out more"... ;>)