Originally, that was what we were. But now, first and foremost, we’re a nation. As evidenced by your own post, where you take it for granted that it’s easy to move to a different state, but difficult to move to a different nation.
If that’s the case, why do we have state governments and state constitutions? Is the end-goal to eventually get rid of them?
If we’re not foremost a nation, why do we have a national government and a national constitution?
Like nearly every nation on the planet, we have both nationwide government and local government. And like nearly every nation on the planet, our national government is the primary government.
That’s a strawman if I ever heard one.
Personally I just think states should follow laws that protect the basic dignity and humanity of all persons regardless of sex. I’m fine with the federal government deciding that every state has to do that.
In another thread we were talking about marital rape laws, which are very lax in some states. Upthread I mentioned child rape and forced marriage. Are you cool with states not having those protections?
If you’re not cool with it then you might come around to seeing my POV because all three issues regard the right a woman has to her own dignity and bodily autonomy. They are all about the same thing: a woman’s right to control what happens to her body.
Of course not. I want those protections codified in law. But if that’s what the citizens of that state want, then that’s on them. That’s their choice. I am genuinely surprised so many self-proclaimed liberals on here are anti-choice.
Seriously? You are okay with other states granting the right to rape children and force them into marriages? Seriously?
Absolutely not. And I would never live in that state. I would choose another state. That said, I believe the federation should always exist.
And your example is hypothetical, of course. No state would allow child rape, thankfully. Talk about strawman…
Not unless the child was married to the rapist.
What you are saying is honestly one of the most extreme things I’ve ever read on this board. I don’t even know what to say. If you have any power at all to stop an atrocity from happening, you should stop it, full stop. There’s nothing noble in upholding an ideal that leads to conclusions like yours.
Some states absolutely do allow child rape. They allow marital rape. I’m gobsmacked you don’t know this.
Folks talk sometimes about the “laboratory of the states”, and how different states having different laws lets us see what works well and what doesn’t. And that does happen. But the problem is, the way our system is set up, the result is that the things that don’t work well are the ones that end up getting implemented nationwide. It’s a fundamentally broken system.
Several state legislators in various states have, in fact, proposed legalizing child rape, in recent years. Not enough of them to make it happen, yet. Yet.
I’ve heard that before, too. But like you, I am dubious of whether or not it really happens. I mean, how would it actually be implemented? Organically? Doubtful. And we don’t have a Federal Department of Let’s See What Works and Doesn’t Work.
When it comes to state governments and state constitutions, I see two major atvantages:
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I get to choose who my servants will be. And if they fail me, I can fire them, move, and hire different servants.
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States compete for residents, and will change their laws accordingly. If citizens are leaving your state in droves due to high taxes, for example, there is an incentive to lower taxes.
I seem to recall reading somewhere that the idea of making the Bill of Rights incumbent upon the states was floated in the 1787 Constitutional Convention, and explicitly not adopted. If true, what was the reasoning and what might be inferred from this?
Moderating:
You need to tie this directly to the issue under discussion; that is, whether abortion should be left up to individual states. You’ve simply made a general statement that requires others to try and figure out what you’re getting at.
In one sense, you are right. But in another sense, even post-Dobbs, the federal Constitution is not entirely silent on abortion. A state may ban abortion without violating the Constitution, but that does not mean all abortion bans are constitutionally valid.
From the First Amendment right to petition the government for grievances, the Article IV comity clause, and the Fourteenth Amendment’s privileges or immunities clause, the Court has implied an individual right to travel. Even to obtain an abortion (noted in Justice Kavanaugh’s Dobbs concurrence).
The commerce clause in Article I has been interpreted as allowing Congress to preempt state regulation of interstate commerce, including trade in abortifacients with FDA approval. Federal legislation requiring hospitals to stabilize patients (EMTALA) arguably preempts state anti-abortion laws in certain medical emergencies–so the Biden administration argued.
The Fourteenth Amendment itself provides that no State shall deprive any person liberty without due process of law. Dobbs only held that the right to obtain an abortion is not so fundamental to ordered society that without said right, society would break down and process of law would cease to exist. The due process clause protects more than that narrow class of fundamental rights.
If the state of Florida arrests and convicts a doctor for violating an anti-abortion statute, for example, that doctor has still been deprived of liberty. The doctor has the right to petition a court for a writ of habeas corpus, per Article I. If the court grants the petition, the state must argue that it has justly confined the doctor; here, the doctor has the opportunity to challenge whether the state followed due process of law (two possible challenges follow, below). This challenge falls within federal jurisdiction under Article III.
Consider a state law giving a state official or panel of officials the authority to declare abortion illegal on the basis of medical necessity on a case-by-case basis. The delegation and deliberation process itself may be challenged as arbitrary and capricious, especially if the official appears to go against the medical consensus or denies all requests as a matter of form. Pursuant to the Mathews test, the Court would weigh the process’s effects to private interests of doctor and patient against the risk of erroneous deprivation and the public or state interest.
State laws with a statutory exception for medical necessity paired with very strict enforcement may also be challenged as void for vagueness; if a doctor cannot tell whether a procedure is a life-saving medical necessity or a felony, state courts following the rule of lenity should construe the ambiguity against the state, and refusal to do so could lead a federal court to strike down state law as void for vagueness.
~Max
Sorry I wasn’t clearer. What I was trying to ask is, if the proposition that rights should be federally upheld was considered and specifically rejected before the passage of the 14th amendment, was this simply done by silent omission or were there any arguments or reasoning why the original Framers felt that way; and would any of those arguments still be relevant?
Moderating:
What does this have to do with whether or not you’re in favor of abortion being an issue left to the states? Does your opinion on this issue rest upon such a determination? If it does, isn’t it up to you to ascertain whether it applies and/or is relevant?
I’m going to direct you to take this discussion to another thread if you want to pursue this line of inquiry. It’s a hijack to this discussion, I think.
You’re talking about people who don’t have choices, though. Children don’t get to choose whether the state they are in allows them to be forced into marriage. Most women probably don’t even know there are states where some kinds of marital rape is legal. There are vast swaths of the population who can’t just pick up and leave. And, of course, you can’t change your state residence in the incredibly brief time between falling pregnant and needing an abortion, and of course, many states are trying to confine women to the states where they live and punish them for trying to get an abortion elsewhere.
So again, we’re talking about who actually gets to choose. It sounds like you get to choose, but not everybody gets to choose, and many women certainly don’t. Your position also ignores the reality of women who are economically dependent, who are trapped just by nature of already having been forced to give birth so many other times, who are captives in abusive relationships, who were forced to marry their rapist at age 13, 14, 15 and have no way out. You seem to have the incredible privilege of agency that many do not.
So your ideal society in which everything is determined by the states may be an ideal for you, but it’s a nightmare for others.
Valid, but that’s the nightmare we wake up to every day. ETA: If there is one thing the Fourteenth Amendment did not do, it did not guarantee women the right to vote. So how could it guarantee a right to abortion?
~Max