Posted on 03/03/2006 11:37:56 AM PST by Rebeleye
The removal of the Confederate flag from Amherst County's official seal has upset Southern heritage groups, who contend residents weren't told of the change. County officials acknowledge the image was quietly removed in August 2004 to avoid an uproar.
(Excerpt) Read more at dailypress.com ...
Southern heritage is not limiting to worshipping at Jeff Davis's grave. To me it is Blues, Hank Williams, butterbeans, great writers like Faulkner, Robert Penn Warren, cornbread, Moon Pies, great ballplayers, Elvis, Chuck Berry, Bessie Smith, historians like T. Harry Williams and Forrest McDonald.
It is an injustice to the people of the South to require alligance to the leaders of the Confederacy. I love the South and despise the leaders of the Confederacy whom I believe condemned the South to a century of unnecessary misery as a result of their actions.
That was the bottom line for the Founders as well as me.
Wrt to my freeper name look in the dictionary under "irony".
Keep on spouting stand you make converts for my side with every lunacy you post.
One of the common misunderstandings is that the Constitution was to limit federal power but, in fact, it was written to limit STATE power while expanding federal power. The only prohibitions on federal power came through the amendments all other prohibitions are on states.
As Hamilton clearly pointed out in his Essay on the National Bank the federal government is limited by direct prohibitions, contrary to the spirit of the document, or immoral. None of the Founders believed that the government was forbidden to act unless that was specified even Jefferson didn't believe that. It is a framework not a detailed plan. Much of the Convention was spent shooting down plans for even more federal power. Even Madison proposed such.
States were only sovereign wrt matters SOLELY within a state. Any other actions which affected other states or the Union were subject to being forbidden or being brought before the federal courts for adjudication. States had never been truly sovereign even under the Articles though certainly more than after the Constitution. Speaking about "the great sovereign state of ...." became little more than political rhetoric.
free dixie,sw
Still waiting for a rational comment from stand. But NOT hoLDinG mY bReatH.
pity that you don't head over to DU to post all that IGNORANT nonsense there. you will NOT be missed on FR.
free dixie,sw
Perhaps you have yet understood that I don't CARE what YOU think. At least until you become capable of rational thought.
Wrong!!!!! The Constitution specifically delegates the powers that the federal government may exercise(Article I - All legislative Powers herein granted ... Article I § 8 - To make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers, and all other Powers vested by this Constitution ...)
Even without a Bill of Rights both Madison and Hamilton argued that such was uneccessary - as the federal government could not exercise any power not delegated. IN particular, Hamilton in Federalist No. 84,
Here, in strictness, the people surrender nothing, and as they retain every thing, they have no need of particular reservations. ...To ensure that the feds wouldn't attempt to twist the meaning of the enumerated powers (as you attempt to do), the ratifying states - separately - as there is no American people aggregated en masse - demanded a Bill of Rights (those proposed amendments put forth by almost every state convention). The proposed amendments known as the Bill of Rights we prefaced by,I go further, and affirm that bills of rights, in the sense and in the extent in which they are contended for, are not only unnecessary in the proposed constitution, but would even be dangerous. They would contain various exceptions to powers which are not granted; and on this very account, would afford a colourable pretext to claim more than were granted. For why declare that things shall not be done which there is no power to do? Why for instance, should it be said, that the liberty of the press shall not be restrained, when no power is given by which restrictions may be imposed? I will not contend that such a provision would confer a regulating power; but it is evident that it would furnish, to men disposed to usurp, a plausible pretence for claiming that power. They might urge with a semblance of reason, that the constitution ought not to be charged with the absurdity of providing against the abuse of an authority, which was not given, and that the provision against restraining the liberty of the press afforded a clear implication, that a power to prescribe proper regulations concerning it, was intended to be vested in the national government.
THE Conventions of a number of the States having at the time of their adopting the Constitution, expressed a desire, in order to prevent misconstruction or abuse of its powers, that further declaratory and restrictive clauses should be added
You are correct though, the amendments limited the federal government, not the states. A position held by the Supreme Court including Chief Justice Marshall in Cohens v. Virginia
States were only sovereign wrt matters SOLELY within a state. Any other actions which affected other states or the Union were subject to being forbidden or being brought before the federal courts for adjudication. States had never been truly sovereign even under the Articles though certainly more than after the Constitution. Speaking about "the great sovereign state of ...." became little more than political rhetoric.
To further ensure that nationalists/quacks would understand that the states, and the people of the states severally (not jointly), possessed ALL powers not delegated, they included Amendment X, '[t]he powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.'
The states were sovereign, the union is not God and create itself, nor did the union create the states. The states pre-existed the union, and the Constitution acknowledges that nine of the former 13 states would be sufficient to form a new union - leaving 5 in the dust heap of history. Regardless of whether or not the vernacular of addressing a state has changed, that in no way is sufficient legal authority to transfer sovereignty from the people of the state. Regarding adjudication of matters by the federal government, Amendment XI prohibits suits against a state by citizens of a different state. That is NOT a case of matters solely within a state.
btw, since you've been on FR, i cannot remember a SINGLE post of yours that required:
a. knowledge of the WBTS period,
b. use of original sources/documents,
c.the use of research tools,
d.critical thinking on ANY subject and/or
e. an "IQ above room temperature".
all you do is post simplistic,silly,hate-FILLED,SELF-righteous, arrogantly ignorant, fact-FREE personal opinions (which are evidently based on NOTHING factual!) AND then you complain about anyone, who points out the vacuity of your uninformed opinions & arguments.
those are the FACTS.
free dixie,sw
And that there's a U-Boat on display in Galveston.
but don't confuse him/her with FACTS.
it's like trying to teach a hog to sing opera. it frustrates you & annoys the hog.
free dixie,sw
Hamilton's later writing in the Essay on the National Bank greatly expands the concept of permissable federal powers and Washington agreed as did the Congress. There clearly are powers which are not specified such as the power to guard the borders (not mentioned) or the power to purchase Louisiana. Almost anything can be tied to the exercise of the specific powers mentioned which makes this a much greater grant than you are willing to acknowledge. And all the Founders (and Jefferson) agreed there were implied powers.
In fact, the Union did predate the States and they came into being after the Continental Congress asked them to write constitutions and become states. Before that they were just colonies. The Articles of Association came into being October 20, 1774 over a year before ANY state was created. The United Colonies 1st Congress convened in Sept of 1774 BEFORE any states were created. There was never a truly sovereign state except Texas. All were colonies bound to Britain then part of the Union before any state called itself a state.
Double your IQ and it is still 50 points short of mine.
Ridiculous. When the people ratified it, it was in their role as citizens of the United States acting within the borders of Virginia. Where else should they have voted? Pennsylvania?
The basic unit of polity in the United States is the People of a State. That's how we ratify changes to the Constitution, and it's how we elect the constitutional officers of the United States, the President and the Vice-President.
You can take it farther and say that the basic political unit is a county or a town. Both those have officers elected by the people. The fact that the people's voice on matters of constitutional change is expressed through their legislature is a matter of convenience. The Constitution makes it clear that an alternate route for approving an amendment is by the people themselves assembled in convention. If states alone ratified the amendment then why include that clause?
As for the President and Vice-President do you really want to get into that whole Electoral College thing?
And that is why King George III recognized our States as free States and our People as their sovereigns: State by State, People by People seriatim, calling the roll all through the Treaty of Paris.
What King George said or did while we were operating under the Articles of Confederation is meaningless. We are now governed under the Constitution, and it does not recognize the states as sovereign in the same manner that you seem to.
But we've been over all this. I'm surprised to see you trying to berate 4CJ over all this, after you've been so thoroughly refuted.
Oh you mean like now? In your dreams!
Why that it is clear from Lee's letter that he did not believe that the founders intent was for secession at will, that he did not consider secession legal, and that your claims to the contrary is false.
You tell me. I copied the letter from Freeman's biography of Lee. Are you saying that Freeman is biased?
Until granted they are not states. So they are, in effect, created by the other states by a vote in Congress.
...they are on equal footing, unless you can demonstrate that the Constitution says otherwise.
No, they are entitled to all the rights and subject to the same restrictions as the other states. And the original 13 states accepted the same restrictions as those state being admitted later. And regardless of what they may have believed in their ratification documents, those documents do not supercede the Constitution. And unilateral secession is not a power granted to the states.
Perhaps you should ask the Great Karnak why the founders chose certain words, it was simply so that specific states would not be enumerated. Secondly, as Justices Thomas, Scalia, Kennedy and Rehnquist noted in US Term Limits, Inc., et al. v Thorton et al. noted above, there is no provision for the people en masse of the "United" States (plural) to act - ever.
Madison noted in Federalist No. 46, '[m]any considerations, besides those suggested on a former occasion, seem to place it beyond doubt, that the first and most natural attachment of the people will be to the governments of their respective States.' Later he notes that states would be at odds with the federal government,
On the other hand, should an unwarrantable measure of the Foederal Government be unpopular in particular States, which would seldom fail to be the case, or even a warrantable measure be so, which may sometimes be the case, the means of opposition to it are powerful and at hand. The disquietude of the people, their repugnance and perhaps refusal to co-operate with the officers of the Union, the frowns of the executive magistracy of the State, the embarrassments created by legislative devices, which would often be added on such occasions, would oppose in any State difficulties not to be despised; would form in a large State very serious impediments, and where the sentiments of several adjoining States happened to be in unison, would present obstructions which the Foederal Government would hardly be willing to encounter.He continues, stating that states could resist forced military intrusions by the federal government,
Extravagant as the supposition is, let it however be made. Let a regular army, fully equal to the resources of the country be formed; and let it be entirely at the devotion of the Foederal Government; still it would not be going too far to say, that the State Governments with the people on their side would be able to repel the danger.The states joined severally and independently - a union of states, they did not become a single mass of people.
If so then the Constitution should read "Ratification of nine States, shall be sufficient for the Establishment of this Constitution..." Instead, as Chief Justice Marshall pointed out, the people of the United States, meeting in conventions held in their respective states, ratified the document.
Wrong. As the Constitution states, '[t]he Ratification of the Conventions of nine States [not one consolidated state or people], shall be sufficient for the Establishment of this Constitution between the States so ratifying the Same [meaning more than one party].' The people of New York could not ratify for Georgia nor vice versa. The people were not amalgamated into one body politic - they were independent of each other.
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