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To: Onelifetogive; central_va

No secession doesn’t fall under ANY amendment and is NOT legal there is no right to secede. Just check what Washington, Madison and Hamilton said about it. Or any of the major founders.

The constitution was written to create a “more perfect Union” and since even the Confederation declared the Confederation to be “perpetual” there is no LEGAL way out but through a constitutional amendment.


76 posted on 08/05/2010 7:16:34 AM PDT by arrogantsob
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To: arrogantsob
No secession doesn’t fall under ANY amendment and is NOT legal there is no right to secede.

It's this attitude that ensures there will be a CWII, that maybe a good thing, better to fight on two feet than kneel to statism. Keep it up, please. Your screen name is perfect.

83 posted on 08/05/2010 7:22:10 AM PDT by central_va (I won't be reconstructed, and I do not give a damn.)
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To: arrogantsob
No secession doesn’t fall under ANY amendment and is NOT legal there is no right to secede. Just check what Washington, Madison and Hamilton said about it. Or any of the major founders.

How about Jefferson. Is he major enough? Cause he indisputably supported the right of secession. He said it should always be a last resort, but one the states should not hesitate to take if conditions become bad enough to justify it.

"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

387 posted on 08/07/2010 9:23:05 AM PDT by conimbricenses (Red means run son, numbers add up to nothing.)
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To: arrogantsob
No secession doesn’t fall under ANY amendment and is NOT legal there is no right to secede. Just check what Washington, Madison and Hamilton said about it. Or any of the major founders.

Did they singlehandedly ratify the Constitution or were they perhaps outvoted by their colleagues? Consider the ratification of New York [Link]:

Ratification of the Constitution by the State of New York; July 26, 1788.

WE the Delegates of the People of the State of New York, duly elected and Met in Convention, having maturely considered the Constitution for the United States of America, agreed to on the seventeenth day of September, in the year One thousand Seven hundred and Eighty seven, by the Convention then assembled at Philadelphia in the Common-wealth of Pennsylvania (a Copy whereof precedes these presents) and having also seriously and deliberately considered the present situation of the United States, Do declare and make known. ...

That the Powers of Government may be reassumed by the People, whensoever it shall become necessary to their Happiness; ...

... Under these impressions and declaring that the rights aforesaid cannot be abridged or violated, and that the Explanations aforesaid are consistent with the said Constitution ... We the said Delegates, in the Name and in the behalf of the People of the State of New York Do by these presents Assent to and Ratify the said Constitution.

What did they know, right? Hamilton and Jay were members of that ratification convention, and Marshall and Madison were members of the Virginia ratification convention that said something similar. If they felt otherwise, they got outvoted.

Hamilton is also on record in that NY Ratification Convention as saying:

It has been well observed, that to coerce the States is one of the maddest projects that was ever devised. A failure of compliance will never be confined to a single State. This being the case, can we suppose it wise to hazard a civil war? Suppose Massachusetts or any large State should refuse, and Congress should attempt to compel them, would not they have influence to procure assistance, especially from those States which are in the same situation as themselves? What picture does this present to our view? A complying State at war with a non-complying State; Congress marching the troops of one State into the bosom of another; this State collecting auxiliaries, and forming, perhaps, a majority against its federal head. Here is a nation at war with itself! Can any reasonable man be well disposed towards a Government which makes war and carnage the only means of supporting itself -- a Government that can exist only by the sword? Every such war must involve the innocent with the guilty. This single consideration should be sufficient to dispose every peaceable citizen against such a Government.

390 posted on 08/07/2010 10:41:07 AM PDT by rustbucket
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