Posted on 02/08/2014 4:37:09 AM PST by Jacquerie
Does a state have the right to nullify federal statutes the state considers unconstitutional? This depends largely on how you define “nullification.” It also depends on what you mean by “right” and what kind of document you understand the Constitution to be. IOW, it depends on your premises.
Unfortunately, people often discuss/debate, and attack each other over—the merits or demerits of nullification without making their premises clear. The result is quarreling among people who are fundamentally on the same side.
The Constitution has been characterized as:
* A compact (i.e., contract) to which only the states are parties, by which the states granted power to federal officials. This is the pure interstate compact theory, expressed in Jefferson’s 1798 Kentucky Resolutions.
* A “compound” compact, created by the people but to which the states are parties. This was apparently Madison’s post-ratification view (see, for example, the equivocal wording about the nature of the Constitution in his Notes on Nullification), and may have underlain his 1798 Virginia Resolution.
* A popular grant: that is, a grant of power from the people—mostly to federal legislators and officials, but in some cases to state legislative authorities (as in the Time, Places, and Manner Clause) or to state legislators (as in Article V). This view was expressed by some of the seven state legislatures that formally repudiated the Kentucky and Virginia Resolutions. It also was Chief Justice John Marshall’s conclusion in the famous case of McCulloch v. Maryland (1819).
You can make the best case for narrow-definition nullification as a constitutional prerogative if you adopt the first of the three alternatives. The basic idea is that if other states have broken the compact by letting their agent (the federal government) run amok, then aggrieved states (compacting parties) have the right to protect themselves.
(Excerpt) Read more at constitution.i2i.org ...
You have a good point there. There are certain God-given rights that are always retained by individuals. Even when we grant/delegate authority to a government, that transfer is at most temporary and conditioned on the proper use of such authority. Just as one cannot permanently waive the right to sue over reckless conduct, one cannot permanently give up basic human rights. The delegation or other transfer of specific powers to a government is inherently conditional on the government's proper use of the delegated powers and respect for all God-given individual rights.
The Federal Fuel Taxes get collect BY the state. Ha ha.
The level of sniveling Federal Boot licking on this thread is disgusting.
Aren’t the pot laws in Colorado and Washington a form of nullification?
Maybe age is catching up to me, but I thought that this series of yours began long before 2010. :-( I think I dropped out long before you reached #46.
Rereading your paper, it occurs to me that the one thing that Madison did not foresee was the compact that would form between blocs of people that were independent of state boundaries, that is, the national parties. I think that Madison saw the states as firewalls that would be the strongest and final binding of people's common interests. Today, that cannot be said to be true.
Today, the problem is that the states send Senators to the federal government, and once there they lose their allegience to their home states and instead, form party bonds that drive competing interests. I put the blame for this on the 17th amendment, which makes Senators have to divert their focus towards the need for campaign funds. By joining a national party, they take advantage of economies of scale, and can reduce some of the pressures to raise funds by aligning with a party that will share its accumulated funds across its members - but only if they toe the party line on an agenda that may be at odds with the interests of their home states.
And thus begins the break between We the People and the Federal Government that we ordained and established.
-PJ
RIGHT...
1) Does “A” State exist as a subject of the federal givernment?..
-OR-
2) Does the federal givernment exist as a subject of the States?..
This is indeed the subject at hand... and the real difference between so-called progressives and conservatives..
It was BRILLIANT when the teachers Unions STOPPED teaching civics and american history in public schools -OR- re-wrote the history they DO TEACH... (to hide THIS )..
A convention of the STATES CAN INDEED abrogate anything the federal givernment has or will do... AND abrogate the federal givernment ITSELF...
Meaning ABOLISH... and Re-create it... or even form a CON-federation.. States ARE NOT provinces they are individual governments themselves.. PRIMARY to any confederation.. composed of LOCAL governments even more primary than State government..
Federal givernment is a loose “construct” or “corporation” or “franchise”... of the States.. States will exist whether federal gov’t exists or not.. even if they call themselves by another name..
Government is either “TOP Down” or “Bottom UP”..
The only bottom up government that ever existed is the United States.. Could be..... “once existed”...
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Good catch. IMO, a grant is a gift, while a delegation is a temporary condition with provisos attached.
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Another question would be can a power, delegated to one, then be delegated again without the permission of the Original authority?
The idea was to amend the Constitution to allow the following.
If the legislatures of three-fourths of the states pass a Resolution of No-Confidence in the federal government, the federal government is declared dissolved, and new elections would be held 30 days after the three-fourths threshold was met. These elections would be for president, vice president, House and all Senate seats, regardless of "class". Once the new government was installed, all members of the federal judiciary would be fired, and the new government would replace them with judges of their choosing.
If we ever get that Amendments Convention, this is the kind of amendment I would like to see proposed.
Article V presents a greater threat to them than all the guns in America.
Listen up speed bump, we already had the FED vs The States, it was called the civil war. That’s as close to nullification you can come.
Some of us just don’t like considering fantasy machinations from fringe kooks.
No state has the right of nullification. States have recourse above and beyond nullification that don’t threaten civil stife. They have the judicial system, they have the election system, they have the Vth amendment.
A typo, but it sings! That is what it has devolved into.
-PJ
“Congress is not empowered to tax for those purposes which are within the exclusive province of the States.” —Justice John Marshall, Gibbons v. Ogden, 1824.
But after the pro-big federal government Progressive Movement succeeded in stealing control of the Senate from state legislatures, giving control of the Senate to low-information voters who were probably clueless about Congress's limited power to lay taxes, the Sentate became the enemy of the state legislatures. This is because crooks got themselves elected to Congress to "legally" steal people's money, arguably state revenues, in the form of constitutionally indefensible federal taxes.
-PJ
When we hear the word "state" we tend to think of Alabama, Nebraska, Alaska, etc., which isn't really helpful with this debate, but the word is actually synonymous with "nation". The various states were never intended to be mere administrative departments of a fe[de]ral leviathan.
The ninth and tenth amendments to The Constitution, as well as the supreme court decision that stated that laws against the constitution are a nullity, cement the right of the States to make their own determination and act accordingly.
I suppose the fedgov could sue the States...
So in 1830, Madison revisited his pre-constitutional question, the Great Desideratum. How to design a government strong enough to meet its objects, yet structured such that it didn't violate our natural rights?
What especially burns me is the unconstitutional, yet black-robe approved assignment of Article I, Section 1 legislative powers to the executive branch. Denying the consent of the people to the laws they live under constitutes rejection of our revolution.
When we hear the word “state” we tend to think of Alabama, Nebraska, Alaska, etc., which isn’t really helpful with this debate, but the word is actually synonymous with “nation”.
Each State has a Charter(Constitution)...
Making them in fact sovereign nations..
The United States is merely a legal construct.. a corporation.. with partners.. and equal shares..
bound by a contract(constitution)...
If the contract is violated the contract is legally void...
And All corporate funds are embezzled..
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