[Old Teufel Hunden]

"That would seem to make it fall under the 10th Amendment."

The 10th amendment says that any power not given to the federal government is reserved for the states and the state's people. This is not a catch all for everything under the sun. Whenever the word "power" is used in the Constitution it refers to something that the people delegate to a government as a function to perform on their behalf. Examples of this would be schools, welfare programs, military etc... All of these things (yes even welfare) are talked about by the founding fathers. If the states want to have a massive welfare program to feed the poor, that is up to each individual state.

However, nowhere does any founding father talk about the power of the state to secede from this new thing they wanted to form called the United States. Can you point to something where a founding father talked about the states power to secede in the future from the United States? I can give you an example of the opposite. After the war of 1812 the New England states talked of seceeding at the Hartford Convention. Madison (you know that guy who wrote the Constitution) was President at the time, was against this and would not have allowed them to secede.

[An.American.Expatriate]

This is not a catch all for everything under the sun.

- Uh, yes it IS!

Any power not granted to the federal government WAS NOT GRANTED!

All of these things (yes even welfare) are talked about by the founding fathers.

Welfare of whom?

[Onelifetogive]

The 10th amendment says that any power not given to the federal government is reserved for the states and the state's people. This is not a catch all for everything under the sun.

It is not a catch all for everything under the sun, it is a catch all for everything under the sun that is not assigned by the Constitution as a power of the new federal government.

[OneWingedShark]

Actually there is one good paper written on it [secession] by the founders, a federalist paper IIRC, it stated that the compact of the Constitution, having been freely entered into [as a contract would be], was [like a contract] not binding if the other party didn’t “hold up their end of the deal,” and could be voluntarily left.

I’m sorry but it’s a ‘semi-foggy’ recollection and I cannot remember the reference or the author.

[conimbricenses]

Madison (you know that guy who wrote the Constitution) was President at the time, was against this and would not have allowed them to secede.

Madison actually flip-flopped throughout his career on the whole states rights thing - usually as a matter of political convenience. Jefferson, by contrast, was much more consistent and left this statement in his final months of life as advice for the country's future:

"Take together the decisions of the federal court, the doctrines of the President, and the misconstructions of the constitutional compact acted on by the legislature of the federal branch, and it is but too evident, that the three ruling branches of that department are in combination to strip their colleagues, the State authorities, of the powers reserved by them, and to exercise themselves all functions foreign and domestic. Under the power to regulate commerce, they assume indefinitely that also over agriculture and manufactures, and call it regulation to take the earnings of one of these branches of industry, and that too the most depressed, and put them into the pockets of the other, the most flourishing of all. Under the authority to establish post roads, they claim that of cutting down mountains for the construction of roads, of digging canals, and aided by a little sophistry on the words “general welfare,” a right to do, not only the acts to effect that, which are specifically enumerated and permitted, but whatsoever they shall think, or pretend will be for the general welfare. And what is our resource for the preservation of the constitution? Reason and argument? You might as well reason and argue with the marble columns encircling them. The representatives chosen by ourselves? They are joined in the combination, some from incorrect views of government, some from corrupt ones, sufficient voting together to out-number the sound parts; and with majorities only of one, two, or three, bold enough to go forward in defiance. Are we then to stand to our arms, with the hot-headed Georgian? No. That must be the last resource, not to be thought of until much longer and greater sufferings. If every infraction of a compact of so many parties is to be resisted at once, as a dissolution of it, none can ever be formed which would last one year. We must have patience and longer endurance then with our brethren while under delusion; give them time for reflection and experience of consequences; keep ourselves in a situation to profit by the chapter of accidents; and separate from our companions only when the sole alternatives left, are the dissolution of our Union with them, or submission to a government without limitation of powers. Between these two evils, when we must make a choice, there can be no hesitation." - Thomas Jefferson, December 26, 1825