"The 14th amendment, and it's beating the states to death, was the worst possible thing that could have happened."I don't think so, not in the least bit. The creation of the 14th, although lacking the verbal strength of the 1st and 2nd, was one of Congress's greatest acts. It extended protection of federally recognized rights to all it's citizens, regardless of what State they were in. In case you forgot, it was enacted, because certain States were trampling on the rights of some of it's citizens. You may not care that local jackboots railroaded folks to long prison terms, because they couldn't afford legal representation, but I certainly care.
"The founders wanted to limit the beast"
What you're missing is that their are many beast that need restraint. The 10th applies to the fed beast, the 14th applies to all the lower beasts. Anything that restrains beasts is always good.
The 14th amendment is an abomination. It was enacted to bludgeon the Southern states after the civil war. If it was one of "greatest acts" of congress...why did our founders not install its language in the original bill of rights?
Thomas Jefferson understood what you do not....
"I consider the government of the United States as interdicted by the Constitution from intermeddling in religious institutions, their doctrines, discipline, or exercises. This results not only from the provision that no law shall be made respecting the establishment or free exercise of religion,
but from that also which reserves to the states the powers not delegated to the United States. Certainly, no power to prescribe any religious exercise or to assume authority in religious discipline has been delegated to the General Government. It must rest with the States, as far as it can be in any human authority (letter to Samuel Miller, Jan. 23, 1808)."
Try and understand this....
"The particular portion of the miscellany that is the 14th states: "No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges and immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws." The gargantuan grant of power to the federal government is thus sealed: "The Congress shall have power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article
." In American federalism, the rights of the individual are secured through the strict limits imposed on the power of the central government by a Bill of Rights and the division of authority between autonomous states and a federal government. As Frank Chodorov wrote, States' Rights are "an essential Americanism. The Founding Fathers and the opponents of the Constitution agreed on the principle of divided authority as a safeguard to the rights of the individual
." If the Bill of Rights was intended to place strict limits on federal power and protect the individual from government, the 14th, in effect, defeated that purpose. What it did was to put the power to enforce the Bill of Rights in federal hands, where it was never intended to be.
Naturally, states can just as well violate individual rights. But, as Chodorov highlighted, there is no monopoly power behind a state's action. If a state wants to outlaw alcohol, then one can move to a state that doesn't. (That's one way for state legislators to ensure that their states will be as densely populated as the moon.) If a state wants to establish a religion, and its own constitution doesn't prohibit this, one can move to a state with a different constitution. Competition in government puts the brakes on folly and abuse and preserves freedom.
The 14th Amendment violated this balance, or as Felix Morley observed in "Freedom and Federalism," it nullified "the original purpose of the Bill of Rights, by vesting its enforcement in the national rather than in the state governments." This just about renders asunder the Ninth and 10th amendments – what powers do the states retain if the federal government has gobbled them all up?
When the federal government became the arbiter of individual rights – freedom of religion included – the doctrine of limitation of powers was badly damaged, if not destroyed. In the real world, as opposed to the arid arena of pure theory, government – especially centralized government – is the natural enemy of natural rights. Putting the central government in exclusive charge of protecting natural rights is the height of folly."
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The 14th amendment undid a lot of what our founders set up. Why not just erase state lines and state legislatures and make this just one big area ruled by Washington D.C.? That is what the 14th amendment is pushing towards.