I would disagree with your contention that you are the person tasked with deciding what is Constitutional and what is not.
The Constitution is indeed supreme - over all the branches of government as well as the states themselves. Article III gives the the jurisdiction for interpreting and applying the Constitution to the Supreme Court. The fact that you may disagree with their interpretation does not make you right and them wrong. Nor does it mean that their decisions are in keeping with the intent of the founders in every case. But their decisions are binding. It is an imperfect system but what is the alternative? Hard as it may be for you to understand, not everyone is blessed with the same...unique view of the Constitution as you have. So what do we do? Allow Congress to have 535 interpretations? Allow the states to have 50? Leave it in the hands of the President? Or give it all to you?
Actually, I believe it was Thomas Jefferson who observed that it is each American's right and duty to interpret the Constitution for themselves. And even were it not so, the fact that I hold a personal opinion (which, in fact, is entirely consistent with historical public documentation) in no way disqualifies that opinion.
The Constitution is indeed supreme - over all the branches of government as well as the states themselves. Article III gives the the jurisdiction for interpreting and applying the Constitution to the Supreme Court.
Can you be more specific? I don't see your language in Article III. Nor do I see any prohibition of the States, acting as parties to the compact, "interpreting and applying the Constitution" as the they deem fit.
The fact that you may disagree with their interpretation does not make you right and them wrong. Nor does it mean that their decisions are in keeping with the intent of the founders in every case. But their decisions are binding.
"Binding?" Not necessarily, according to Mr. Madison's 'public' opinion, voiced in his 'Report on the Virginia Resolutions.'
It is an imperfect system but what is the alternative? Hard as it may be for you to understand, not everyone is blessed with the same...unique view of the Constitution as you have. So what do we do? Allow Congress to have 535 interpretations? Allow the states to have 50? Leave it in the hands of the President? Or give it all to you?
"Allow the states to have 50?" Absolutely - that is the right the States as parties reserved to themselves. And what would the result be? A limited federal government, producing 'consensus' legislation, and a federal Republic where 'one size' did NOT fit all (by order of DC bureaucrats), where the citizens could still vote with their feet simply by crossing the State line...