Yes, but Jefferson fully advocated the supremacy of states rights! The key here Walt, is a LIMITED FEDERAL GOVERNMENT! If the Federal Government is to control all aspects of our existence, then how are we any different from the former Soviet Union?
Posted on 05/23/2002 8:52:25 AM PDT by stainlessbanner
At first, I was trying to wrap my mind around a cross between the biggest cave in the world and a fire ant.
For the last time, the Supremacy Clause, like every other clause in the Constitution, only applies to the laws and governments of States that are in the Union.
The clauses of the Constitution didn't apply to States that hadn't yet ratified, in 1787, and they don't apply to States that, sitting in convention as the People, exercise their Sovereignty which is certainly reserved under the 9th and 10th Amendments (but need not be explicitly reserved, because Sovereignty trumps all agreements) by taking counsel among themselves and seceding from the Union.
Read it again, they severed their ties with the federal government - "do ordain and declare that all the laws and ordinances by which the State of Tennessee became a member of the Federal Union of the United States of America are hereby abrogated and annulled." The state government that ratified the Constitution continued to exist.
If the constitution is the supreme law of the land, then it is illegal (though not necessarily immoral) for secession to occur as there is no mechanism for such an action.
Re: all your posturing about the supremacy clause - as has been pointed out - the founders refused to grant the federal government the power to negate state laws. The supremacy clause merely maintains that the Constitution and federal laws "made in pursuance thereof" are the supreme law. Laws not "made in pursuance thereof" are null and void. Unless there is something within the Constitution to indicate that the states granted the federal government the power to hold them captive, the right is a state right - just as the 10th so plainly declares.
There is an excellent moment-by-moment description of the confrontation between Massachusetts troops and Southern supporters in Baltimore in April 1861 at: Baltimore Confrontation. This may be what you are referring to. This was right after news of Fort Sumpter.
Things really got out of hand, sort of like Palestinians vs. Israeli troops. Twelve Baltimore citizens were killed by the troops; 4 soldiers were killed by the largely unarmed mob. How would the Feds know whom to arrest?
Feeling that an immense loss of life was possible if additional troops came into the city, the mayor and police commissioners with the governor consenting determined to block more confrontations between Northern troops and people of the city by burning the railroad bridges. The citizens had turned out en masse with arms in their hands, and there might have been a pitched battle with troops.
Like moths to the light . . .
or rebs to a chance at self-parody.
First, let's dispense with that familiar dishonest device of politics of confusing "country" with "nation" (as in "Ask not what your country...?). A nation is a creation and tool of the politicians, associated, but not identical with, a geographical region and its population, the country. Do we owe a duty to the nation? I don't think so, the nation exists to meet needs of the governing class and their clients, not our fellow countrymen. For this reason, as I see it, Southerners owed no duty or allegiance to the Union or to the Federal Government. In a Republic, the government is supposed to be the servant of the people. The government owes a duty to the people; the people do not owe a duty to the government. This is one point on which the founding fathers, some of them at least, had some serious confusion. They did not adequately eliminate all features of royal government in their attempt to create a republican government.
Yes, but Jefferson fully advocated the supremacy of states rights! The key here Walt, is a LIMITED FEDERAL GOVERNMENT! If the Federal Government is to control all aspects of our existence, then how are we any different from the former Soviet Union?
Had Hamilton not been killed, he would have backed Madison up on those absurd ex post facto interpretations and we would have Ditto posting letters from both of the old royalists and insisting that we seat a Parliament and crown a king, probably that jug-eared little fake "texan" they foisted off on us. ;-)
No, neither amendment contains any reference to the "rights" of the federal government. Rights are only mentioned as belonging to the people. Powers are delegated to the federal government by the people through their states via the specification of those powers in the Constitution. Rights are the sole province of the people. What you're doing here is like a four year-old pointing out what she sees in a cloud and insisting that everyone else must see it as well.
The plain language you posted refutes your claim. There is simply no way to read: "The powers not delegated to the United States, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively or to the people" and then to claim that for a state power to be valid, it must be enumerated as you are doing in reference to secession.
This is really bizarre the way you have actually posted the text of Article VI and of the 9th and 10th amendments and are now pointing proudly at them and assuring me that their plainly worded language says something else entirely from what my eyes can see. I'm to trust you instead of my lying eyes, huh?
I urge you to seek professional help before you snap and kill us all.
People who have that habit of stretching existing language to read as they want it to cannot ever be shown their error. There are several on FR who suffer from that affliction.
I am shocked, shocked I tell ya.
""The name of American, which belongs to you in your national capacity, must always exalt the just pride of patriotism, more than any appellation derived from local discriminations. With slight shades of difference, you have the same religion, manners, habits, and political principles -- you have in a common cause fought and triumphed together; the independence and liberty you possess, are the work of joint counsels, and joint efforts, of common dangers, sufferings, and successes...These considerations speak a persuasive language to every reflecting and virtuous mind, and exhibit the continuance of the Union as a primary object of patriotic desire. Is there a doubt whether a common government can embrace so large a sphere? Let experience solve it. To listen to mere speculation in such a case were criminal. We are authorised to hope that a proper organization of the whole, with the auxiliary agency of governments for the respective subdivisions, will afford a happy issue to the experiment. With such powerful and obvious motives to union, affecting all parts of our country, while experience shall not have demonstrated its impracticability, there will always be reason to distrust the patriotism of those who in any quarter may endeavour to weaken its hands." -- George Washington.
Had Washington been alive in 1861 he would have been first in line to offer his services to Abraham Lincoln.
So there we have it. The Official Gospel of the Neo-Confederate Cult is that James Madison was just an Old Royalist.
You guys are to too damn bizarre for words.
Who dat? This little jug-ear freak that got the other good 'ol southern boy elected in 92?
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