The states are now "protected" if at all be the people themselves of the respective states. Why this is not just as effective, if at all, as state legislative election of US Senators does not seem immediately obvious.
Are you some sort of fan of Alexander Hamilton??? His Federalist Party was effectively dead before he was. Its successor, the Whig Party did not last long. The Republican Party came next and abandoned the Lincolnian tyranny soon enough to survive although the old Hamiltonian temptation is threatening the GOP yet again. Whenever the Hamiltonian impulse arises against the interest of the general public, the general public kills off the Hamiltonian Party du jour. "Suffer to the max so that the rulers may prosper personally" is not very salable politically in a democratic republic such as ours.
AND, history is not easily amended to sanitize Hamiltonianism.
What section granted it?
The Constitution was to make the Articles of Confederate more perfect, and those Articles were perpetual.
When the States agreed to the Constitution, they knew it was a permanent deal and that was acknowledged even by its opponents, such as Patrick Henry.
The Tenth Amendment limits federal powers to those explicitly granted in the constitution. I have looked and looked and never seen anything to the effect that, if a state should secede, the fedgov may send the army to murder, rape, loot and pillage the civilian populations of such states. Where is that???
If a State attempts to secede, it is in violation to its obligations to the other states and in a state of Rebellion.
Now, since nothing has been done since to the Constitution to specifically forbid secession, you must still think that the right exists.
No government would give the right for parts of it to leave without a legitimate grievance.
That would not be a nation, that would be a coalition of sovereign nations, which the United States never was.
There was never a time when (with the exception of Texas) any State ever existed by itself and operated separately as a sovereign nation.
Even in the secession, it was a unified effort that immediately attempted to form another nation.
This act was expressly forbidden in Art.1, sec 10, the forming alliances with other states.
Now, if secession had been considered a viable option by the Founding Fathers, they would not have forbidden States to unite together against other states.
The CSA Constitution had the same restriction in it.
The states are now "protected" if at all be the people themselves of the respective states. Why this is not just as effective, if at all, as state legislative election of US Senators does not seem immediately obvious.
Not quite sure what you mean by this.
The reason that State Legislature's electing of Senators was an important defense of Federalism, was that the State Legislatures put the Senators in place as the State Representative.
Thus, the Senator always knew that he was representing that State.
Much like a Congressman is directly representing his own district. Direct Election of Senators removed that restriction and the Senators now can make direct appeals to the people of the State without taking the States best interest to heart.
It makes the Senate a more 'democratic' Body when it was to be the 'aristocratic' one, detached from the whims and shifting moods of the people.
Are you some sort of fan of Alexander Hamilton??? His Federalist Party was effectively dead before he was. Its successor, the Whig Party did not last long. The Republican Party came next and abandoned the Lincolnian tyranny soon enough to survive although the old Hamiltonian temptation is threatening the GOP yet again. Whenever the Hamiltonian impulse arises against the interest of the general public, the general public kills off the Hamiltonian Party du jour. "Suffer to the max so that the rulers may prosper personally" is not very salable politically in a democratic republic such as ours. AND, history is not easily amended to sanitize Hamiltonianism.
And Hamiltonianism is not so easily dismissed either.
Hamilton was concerned with the stability of the nation, and rightfully so.
The United States did not have to suffer through the traumas that racked the French and Russian revolutions.
Both Hamilton and Jefferson sought to protect individual liberty, but each simply leaned in a different direction, Hamilition toward stability which meant a stronger Federal Government.
As Jefferson himself stated in his first inaugural address,
But every difference of opinion is not a difference of principle. We have called by different names brethren of the same principle. We are all Republicans, we are all Federalists. If there be any among us who would wish to dissolve this Union or to change its republican form, let them stand undisturbed as monuments of the safety with which error of opinion may be tolerated where reason is left free to combat it.
http://www.bartleby.com/124/pres16.html