''Article VI
[2] This Constitution, and the laws of the United States which shall be made in pursuance thereof, and all treaties made, or which shall be made, under the authority of the United States, shall be the supreme law of the land; and the judges in every State shall be bound thereby, anything in the Constitution or laws of any State to the contrary notwithstanding.''
Thus, the provisions of any ratified treaties become co-equal with the Constitution, but not part of it. The nasty bit here is that the provisions of ratified treaties are immune to alteration, supplantation, or cancellation by either the formal amendment process or declaration from a Constitutional convention.
Now, of course, there is no possible way that the Framers intended this result; all they intended by this section (as the Federalist Papers bear out very clearly) is for the several states to be unable to override or interfere with any provisions of a treaty ratified by the United States.
It has never yet been ruled upon, to my knowledge, what happens if a provision of a ratified treaty directly contradicts one or another portion of the Constitution. This question will surely arise shortly, given all these half-assed treaties that have, unfortunately, been ratified by the assorted vermin in the Senate. No bets on whether the Supremes will be able to cobble together a majority to support the clear Constitutional intent of the Framers.
The successful argument against would have to be something along the lines of: ''Is it the Court's considered opinion that, for example, James Madison would have countenanced for a microsecond the delegation of control over any part of the sovereign territory of the United States to a group of people dedicated to the very destruction of the United States, _____ (fill in your favourite such group)??''
And we'll be reduced to hoping that the Supremes answer ''No.'' Yet one more example, of many, why ONLY originalists are to be allowed onto the Supreme Court.
Time for some enterprising law student to find some odious clause of some obscure treaty and use it against the federal government. Probably some indian treaty from the 19th century should contain something like that.
Well, I'm willing to "Bet" on the outcome.
5-4 IN FAVOR of said treaties with the usual suspects (libs) in favor and the other "constructionists" opposed.
Then along comes Sire Kennedy to break the time (In Favor) and will cite as "authority" the history of the Yak in Tibet and the Human Rights History of the Mongols in Russia.
Frequently Congress' interpretation of a treaty is at variance with that of the originators.
dedicated to the destruction of the United States....
You mean like Jeff Davis and his buddies?
Which brings me back to my previous point above.
This was tossed aside years ago. Standard doctrine now is is that treaties are contracts between governments, and laws define actions of citizens within states. There is no longer any credence to that "supreme law of the land" BS..
Example: the 1977 Carter Canal Treaty said I wouldn't have to pay any income tax. The IRS said the treaty doesn't matter. We took it all the way up the appeals court and the majority voted against the minority (Scalia) saying we were right. Scalia got named to the SCOTUS and with the IRS he managed to overturn the appeals court ruling on the SC level. Scalia didn't know what a recusal was back then.
Bottom line: treaties are all well and good but lawmakers can and do ignore them inside the US. Treaties do not trump the Constitution Hell, they can't even trump the IRS!