Posted on 06/25/2012 12:13:28 PM PDT by Bob Ireland
Dear Arizona;
As Justice Antonin Scalia has just written, the SCOTUS opinion against the state of Arizona concerning immigration problems has made the phrase 'sovereign state' of no further effect.
The primary function of government is to serve the people it represents. One primary function under that obligation is to protect the population it serves. The SCOTUS opinion states that - if the United States Federal Government has statutory mandate to fulfill that obligation - then the state has no right to supersede the Federal Government when the Federal Government refuses to extend that protection.
The effect of the SCOTUS opinion today is to eliminate states' rights' in a major area of the states' statutory mandate. Put another way, the Federal Government can establish rules that eliminate states' rights under historical common law.
This author therefore suggests that the state of Arizona call a Constitutional Convention of interested states - to potentially include Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Alaska and perhaps the Carolinas [and any other state wishing to bind itself under such restrictions as herein mentioned] - pursuant to forming a new sovereign nation established under the auspices of the original Constitution of the United States.
Such Declaration of Independence should include a rejection of an imperial presidency which reserves unto itself the right to establish and enforce laws as it best sees fit without legislative oversight. The Declaration should reject all laws and regulations that establish a socialist, communist or dictatorial interpretation of states' rights or citizen's rights.
Such a federation or commonwealth should recognize in perpetuity the right of any member state to withdraw from the union when the said union jeopardizes the rights, liberties or the pursuit of happiness of said member state and its citizens. It should recognize the responsibility of the Executive Office as lawfully established to enforce laws properly passed by the legislature of representatives of the people, and to be interdicted against reinterpreting the meaning of such legally passed laws or refusing to enforce said laws.
The convention of agreeable states should establish such legal standards as were envisioned by the Founding Fathers of the United States, and should carefully protect states' rights and individual citizen's rights.
It is impossible to see any other alternative for states and citizens wishing to protect their Constitutional rights in the face of a runaway Federal Government of the United States, and its various organs, that has all but suspended the founding intent of the original Constitutional Convention.
LET FREEDOM RING!!!
You bring up a good point and one I have been ringing an alarm on for some years. Such laws as the 55 mile-an-hour speed limit had one limitation: the states did not have to abide by it, but they would lose federal funding for roads.
All these federal agencies can dictate to the states because they have the power to cut off federal funding for roads, housing, food stamps, welfare, health care, etc., etc.
The problem inherent there is that the federal govt. is taking too much $$$ out of our local communities so that we cannot provide the services we need by raising local taxes - Taxed Enough Already!
In the end it all comes back to the same issue: a federal govt that is run-away with all freedom and liberties.
...like john Roberts?
My point is simply that it is power, not reason, that ultimately decides such questions.
Secession is legal only to the extent that force allows it to succeed. Had the South won, it would have been “legal.” Because it lost, it was “illegal.”
This has been true throughout history. Peaceful secession is almost unheard of.
The Feds will just print what they don't steal. That isn't going to work.
That fits Venezuela and it almost fit Chile. I suppose the minority could just accept that as their fate and let liberty be taken because after all, it is what the majority wants. Does failing to effect a massive change in how people think mean we must accept tyranny? I'm all for changing peoples minds but you do reach a point where you say my liberty is more important than their comfort.
Exactly what the left has always wanted.
Doesn’t matter how many Illegals they arrest - the never-to-be-sufficiently-cursed President has ordered ICE not cooperate with AZ Law Enforcement on illegal aliens.
Bring it.
“The constitution merely changed the form of government of the union declared ‘perpetual’ by the Articles.”
Huh? No it didn’t. It replaced the Articles wholly, and illegally at that. Yeah, okay, so preamble says “a more perfect union,” but not I notice a more perfect perpetual union. If it wanted to remain perpetual, why didn’t it say so? What other phantom passages from the Articles are incorporated by the Constitution without it saying so? You and I know that the union that was supposed to be perpetual was specifically the union as outlined by the Articles.
This other union, the one we live in now, was not envisioned by the states when they agreed to the Articles. I know it was a new union because they had to agree again. Why go through the process of ratification if the states had sacrificed their sovereignty to the Articles and it was perpetual? Becuase for a new government to supercede the Articles the states had to agree, because they were still sovereign. In the exact same manner, they could agree to another new union different from the one according to the Constitution if they saw fit, because they are still sovereign.
To think they could shuck off one constitution, the Articles—and use their sovereignty to do so—and not another, the Constitution, is bonkers. I suppose you’ll say it was different than a seperate state or a group of states that isn’t all the states forming a new union because it’s all the states together as a union that’s the perpetual thing. You can organize them, shuffle them back and forth, make left right and up down, and change the form of government all you want, so long as they’re all still one union? That’s bunk. Know why? Because you resorted to asking the states’ permission on the pretext that they are sovereign. And you still call them sovereign. If by their sovereign power they can change the form of government of the union, then they can choose to be independent or link up with any number of states within or without the union.
The states came before the union. The union did not make the states. This whole idea that the union is the thing, that it is forever, and that the states can mold it any way they want but can’t escape it is Lincolnian nonsense. It is after the fact rationalization because you’ve lived within the union all your life, think it’s natural, and can’t imagine the states without it. But they didn’t have to link up, didn’t have to seek independence together, and don’t have to stay united. That they did is an accident of history. It does not have to stay that way.
By the way, even if the Articles said they were for a perpetual union, it still says, and it also says in the Constition, that the states are sovereign, no? The Articles created a confederation of sovereign states, as I understand it. What does it mean to be sovereign except that the states reserve the right to leave the union? You can’t be sovereign if you’ve given up your sovereignty. That makes no sense.
“Conditional ratification (the ability to rescind a ratification) was widely discussed at the state ratification conventions for the Constitution. The most direct comment came from the letter Madison wrote to Hamilton on the occasion of the NY state convention where the antis had Hamilton momentarily stymied. The constitution had already been written.”
I don’t really understand your point here. But let me say, conditional ratification wouldn’t have to be written into the Constitution. The tenth amendment didn’t have to be written, either, but it makes clear that all powers not granted to the federal government by the Constitution are reserved by the states or the people. The Constitution therefor did not have to tell the states they still had the right to leave after ratification.
Ratification was de jure conditional, even if that wasn’t made explicit. It didn’t have to be explicit. You have the Constitution backwards.
You keep referencing Madison, and I’ll just assume you’re right about him. What about the scores of people then and later, Northern, Souther, and Western, who explicitly asserted or acted as if they believed in retained sovereignty and the right of secession? Do they not count?
“The Revolution was against the Royal government within which there was no representation and which our people had never given its consent and were not treated as ‘Englishmen’”
So? What is the point, here? You’re talking about the reasons for seperation, whereas I thought the argument was over its legality. Much rides on your point about consent, though not so much as you seem to think. So they never gave consent. I’m not sure it matters, since the colonies can be seen as creations of the crown instead of the states as creators of the union. But nevermind, what does it mean to consent? Consent once and that’s it? You can never take it back? Does that represent sovereignty to you?
The colonies revolted as corporate agents of the people against their having been denied the rights of Englishmen. They can do so again against the U.S. under the Constitution, for denying the people their rights or for any old reason. That’s what sovereignty actually means.
“You are advocating a revolution against a government which is of our own making and within which we have representation”
So? Governments properly formed and constituted can become destructive of the ends of liberty. Anywa, the states are still sovereign. They can secede for good or bad reasons; it doesn’t matter. I don’t recall the Declaration declaring:
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Unless at some time in the past they agreed to it, and they have representation of some sort. Then they’re screwed and have to stick with whatever government.”
Pretending as if onloy the War for Indepence was justified and the states revolting against anything else out of bounds is ex post rationalizing and cherry-picking. Your argument is the exact same anyone arguing for the colonial system or the Articles of Confederation as perpetual.
“It is silly to believe that anyone today could come up with something better without a massive restriction of the number of people who could vote.”
So? I still fail to see your point. Could you form a coherent argument, please? So it’d be silly, or undemocratic, or whatever. What does that have to do with its legality? What does that have to do with, if it’s illegal, being different than the illegal revolution or usurpation of the Articles?
“Had the Union been split by the RAT Rebellion of 1861 you would probably be speaking German and saluting Hitler’s successor”
There is no basis for this in fact or whimsy. If the nazis couldn’t invade across the Channel, certainly they couldn’t across the Atlantic. Whence this notion that the U.S. was in any direct danger from nazi Germany? I don’t get it. Must be because people cling to the illusion that we only fight wars of existential self-defense.
“Had the Union been split by the RAT Rebellion of 1861 you would probably be speaking German and saluting Hitler’s successor. There was nothing good or principled about the South’s stupidity, it was an IGnoble Cause from start to finish.”
Are we talking about the legality of secession as such, or beating up on the South? Let me join in: damn rebel redneck hillbilly racist human rights abusing jerkfaces. That being said, they had every right to leave the union.
Message to Arizona- Start forming Infantry Regiments wholly under the control of the Arizona Governor and state legislature. Patrol your borders. IT IS THE ONLY THING YOU CAN DO THAT WILL GET THE ATTENTION OF FEDZILLA.
I don’t think that those who advocate secession are either patriots or take their oaths under the Pledge of Allegiance seriously.
We need to stop voting for anyone who is not willing to deport 100% of all Illegal Aliens....anything other is Amnesty
Unfortunately, the current GOP President appointed SCOTUS were chosen by pro-Illegal Alien presidents.
If we continue to vote for pro-Amnesty Presidents...we continue to get Pro-Amnesty, Pro-Illegal Alien rulings.
Anyone not committed to secure borders and 100% of all Illegals deported...supports Illegal Alien Amnesty
“My point is simply that it is power, not reason, that ultimately decides such questions.
Secession is legal only to the extent that force allows it to succeed. Had the South won, it would have been ‘legal.’ Because it lost, it was ‘illegal.’”
It’s okay to say what matters is what powers says matters. That’s historically accurate. But it’s not okay to say Might Makes Law, anymore than Might Makes Right. That’s a contradiction. Just as when you say Might Makes Right you’re actually saying there is no such thing as right or wrong, when you say Might Makes Law you’re saying there is no such thing as law. Which I guess is what you mean by putting quotation marks around legal and illegal.
Well, just to be clear, they can say this or that is legal or illegal, but that’s not how it works. New laws may be whatever the side that wins says they are, since they get the power to pass laws once they’ve won. But they do not get to change what the laws were or continue to be if they don’t replace them.
But over here if you even talk about it you are threatened with Civil War.
Methinks you have opened a can of worms with this thread.
I believe the first paragraph of the Declaration of Independence, and Article IV section 4 of the Constitution (e.g. Republican form of government), gives the states a right to seceded from the Union. Unfortunately, it didn't go well the first time.
Article V (convention) would open a big can of worms, although in my opinion would probably fail, and begin a process which would lead to CWII.
Methinks the ballot box is much more preferable to the cartridge box. I'm getting to old to hump ammo.
5.56mm
Oh, well that's it then! Whatever Madison said is law.
No, seriously I've read some books on this and secession was viewed as always on the table in America until the Civil War put an end to it. There were debates about secession in New England, as well as in the South, for generations. So, a lot of people got it wrong, I guess.
Doesn't the 10th Ammendment guarantee secession, as a right reserved because it is not mentioned in the Constitution itself?
I think Thomas Woods Jr. has written on this.
We will find you a desk job.
“LOL - Of course it is not!
Rebellions, revolutions, and successions never are legal.”
Wrong. Secessions are legal so long as they are carried out by the proper authority. For instance counties cannot legally secede from states because counties weren’t ever sovereign. States are, or are through the people. That’s according to the theory, of course. There isn’t really any such thing as sovereignty, but we pretend there is. And so long as we pretend, it is what it is.
The states did not give up the right to leave the U.S. because the power to do so was not explicitly denied to them by the Constitution. According to common sense as laid out in the 10th amendment, whatever is not granted to the feds or denied to the states is reserved by the states or the people. Secession is one such reserved power, and it derives from the sovereignty of the states. Therefore, secession is legal.
Lincoln or anyone can call it rebellion or revolution, but they’re plain wrong.
Open rebellion might not solve all our problems, but an uprising sure does make people think and look critically at the sour situation.
The Gaspee burning, the Boston Tea Party, Lexington and Concord, Shay’s Rebellion ... our history is sprinkled with angry revolts. I think we need another.
Sadly, a few people would get killed. But a few shots fired might wake people up to the usurping of our liberties and the destruction of our Constitution.
Personally, I think a few thousand angry militia volunteers along the Arizona border might open a few eyes, but that’s just me.
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