Abraham Lincoln set the rule that a state can't leave the USA with out a war. West Va left the Confederacy to rejoin the USA in 1863... Obviously that was not a problem for the USA.
And it was determined shortly after 1800 that the constitution is what ever the Supreme Court Justices say it is.
How many times does the Supreme Court have to rule in direct oppostion to the clear meaning of the words in the constitution before Williams and others figure out that the Constitution is not the Supreme Law of the land. The Supreme law of this land is what ever 5 of the nine Supreme court justices say it is.
Time after time people bring cases that go to the surpreme court based on what the constitution says in the matter. As we have learned once again that is a dumb thing to do. If one wants to predict the outcome of a Supreme Court Case one should never ask what the law or Constitution says. Those Documents are worhtless predictors. The only question is are their 5 votes on the court to support a case. If there are not it does not matter what the constitution says. It matters what the judges say.
And then Boom-Pow-Splat we get a huge new entitlement bill that Lyndon Johnson would be proud of — and that Ted Kennedy is proud of — and a Supreme Court that can't tell the difference between "I have a dream" and "You owe me." The Medicare bill has me feeling like I'm reading lips all over again. I knew the guy wasn't Barry Goldwater, but... As for the Supremes, they have sentenced us to another hundred years of this sh*t. Damn them. Not a good week, my friend. |
Mild Nitpick: Most of the territory that became West Virginia was never part of the Confederacy, and most of the parts of present-day WV that were Confederate only were because Confederate troops controlled those counties for a time during the War. The western part of the state, which had never been all that friendly with the more "Southern"-oriented eastern counties anyway, saw the writing on the wall and started plotting to secede from Virginia just before Virginia seceded from the Union. When Virginia did go Confederate, the leaders of the Western counties simply gathered together and declared themselves the legitimate Restored Government of Virginia, which President Lincoln officially recognized.
Even after this political victory, the citizens of the Restored Government had decided enough was enough (and also realized it was quite likely that the Union would win and they'd end up stuck back with the eastern half of the state again), and set about to create an entirely separate state with no connection to Virginia whatsoever. Due to the war and various political and Constitutional technicalities, it took a couple of years to accomplish, which is why West Virginia did not gain official admission to the Union until June 1863. But in no way was West(ern) Virginia ever part of the Confederacy, except where they were forced to be at gunpoint.
(The somewhat complex, sticky details are available here, if you're interested.)
The masses have been socially engineered thru various generations since our founding to walk the tracks which are in diverging angle to those the constitution laid down for us to travel. This has gone on for so long that even if a justice was willing to rule on issues based on their charter, that being rule of law based on constitutional relevance, the resulting ruling would be so foreign to what the people have been conditioned to that they would have a cultural nervous breakdown.
With daily effort which would be viewed as extreme and all that is bad, we could drag the public kicking and screaming back to constitutional pinnings in about a hundred years.
Time after time people bring cases that go to the surpreme court based on what the constitution says in the matter. As we have learned once again that is a dumb thing to do. If one wants to predict the outcome of a Supreme Court Case one should never ask what the law or Constitution says. Those Documents are worhtless predictors. The only question is are their 5 votes on the court to support a case. If there are not it does not matter what the constitution says. It matters what the judges say.
I see you're one of those people whose posts I'm going to have to avoid, so that I don't end up eating the business end of a .38.
"Constitution? We don't need no steenkin' Constitution!"
Sigh. These are the times that try men's souls, aren't they? Here we are, thinking we're finally making some progress... got the White House, both houses of Congress... got the Democrats on the run... even got the media on the run.