Well, I’m sure it happens. I admit somebody in Oregon or Vermont making a state’s-rights argument is probably more likely to be pro-freedom than someone from a southern state, which in the last century has frequently been pro-racism and most recently anti-ssm.
Vermonters occasionally do invoke state’s-rights arguments, a google reveals. In 2005 some Vermonters seemed quite incensed at a federal delay in licensing a hydroelectric dam. Oh, those crazy green mountain boys…!
Because I don’t think there’s much of a distinction between the two groups. State’s Rights as a philosophy has pretty much died out except among those who want to use it as an excuse.
What makes you think it has died out? Maybe people just got tired of being called racists by people like you.
Defending racism makes you a racist. When you try to, for example defend the South in the Civil War with talk about State’s Rights, you are defending slavery. Even as far back as then, State’s Rights was about bigotry.
And let’s not forget the National States’ Rights Party, or the States’ Rights Democratic Party. The phrase “states’ rights” comes by its unsavory reputation honestly.
I think yes, we do all want that. I know this because no one I’ve ever met has approved of every law of which they’re aware to such an extent that they think at least one of them is unjust. I’m not entirely sure they’d be willing to throw huge chunks of money to litigate in favor of upholding a law with which they disagree, or about which they’re ambivalent.
I for one am not of the opinion that all laws are created equally. So much so that I’d rather not waste money judicial resources fighting for silly laws which really serve no purpose other than having passed some “sounds good, feels good” standard which appeals to certain morally superior asshats.
It would be nice to see our resources spent on things of actual import: like buying elections, how to unfuck illegal wars and so on.
So, that original Constitutional clause about reserving to the states those powers not explicitly granted to the Federal government…? Which form of vile injustice were they aiming for with that?
If you admit that their intention was noble, or at least acceptable, then you admit that good things can be perverted to evil causes. Duh.
Barry Goldwater, for instance, opposed the Civil Rights Act on exactly those grounds, that increasing Federal power, even in pursuit of a worthy goal, would sacrifice an essential principle. I thought he was wrong then, and I think so now, but I don’t for a minute think that he was motivated by bigotry.
Lot of “grey” out there in the real world, Der. About time you caught on to that.
According to this blog, it’s not just Bush holdovers who authored this brief:
Obama’s hand-picked guy in the DOJ has delivered this slap in the face.
Even back then, much of the motive for preserving state autonomy was the preservation of slavery. The rest had to do with the states at the time being nearly separate countries; that’s simply not true any more.
He needn’t answer that question as it’s a false premise. The constitution has to be taken as it is today, not as you want it to remain. Now equal protect and due process are, by the constitution’s own terms, extended to the states.
I don’t see how arguing for the original framers’ intent is particularly relevant since the issue at hand was appended to the constitution many moons after they had all long been dead. That is to say that what we’re discussing is a power explicitly held by the federal government and applicable to the states. Indeed, so many were in favor of having that be the case simply because each state couldn’t be trusted to honor the spirit of the document and our precepts of ordered liberty wisely. So, the people decided to make it clear that there’s a bare minimum of fundamental liberties which lie beyond the government to proscribe.
This has pissed off many people, none of them of the mind that personal freedom in an alleged democracy is a bad thing. Indeed, it’s the people who want to usurp an individual’s idea of what makes him happy with their novel, better idea of what would really make said person happy. Or, in the alternative, at least makes the would-be-usurper happy knowing that he’s managed to force others to live in his contrived notion of what should be. This is the very paragon of hubris.
You appear eager to misunderstand. The clause is there, hence, an argument that regards that clause as a Constitutional issue is on a firm foundation. One might well argue that America has outgrown it, and I would not disagree.
But to assert that the “states rights” clause has no substance, and any argument based upon it is simply a smokescreen for bigotry is to presume too much. As I said, I thought Barry Goldwater was wrong on that issue, but not that he had no basis for his argument, only that the circumstances of injustice overwhelmed such objections, that immediate relief was demanded and justifiable, and that if such relief must injure the principle of “state’s rights”, then so be it.
When Barry Goldwater is cited as a foundation of American law, then his thoughts might be relevant.
As it stands now, the constitution allows for, nay mandates, that certain provisions of the constitution are directly applicable to the states. On this point there can be no reasonable argument otherwise. And as it is now, the federal government can, and does, with the full power of the constitution limit the degree to which states can screw their citizenry out of their rights.
Plese note the text of the Tenth Amendment: “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.” I do not see the word “rights” anywhere in it, nor anywhere else in the Constitution is there any guarantee of ‘rights’ to states.
The First Congress concurred with widespread pipular sentiment that the new Constitutional government required to be restrained from infringing on the rights of citizens of the United States. It wa felt that the states which had recently fought a war against what was popularly understood to be King George’s tyranny could be trusted not to so infringe. The events leading up to and during the Civil War gave the lie to that presumption, and the Fourteenth Amendment was in consequence passed, prohibiting the states from infringing on the rights of citizens of the United States.
I might also point out that there is no constitutional ground for the passage of DOMA.
The constitution says:
which suggests that Congress is able to regulate how public acts in one state should be recognized by another.
“prescribe the manner in which [they] shall be proved, and the effect thereof” is the relevant language. The preceding sentence places an affirmative duty on the states to extend full faith and credit to specified acts of other states; Congress’s only role is to prescribe a national standard for proving such, and the effect of furnishing such proof.
It does not give Congress power to make exceptions to the constitutional duty imposed on such states. Even if you wish to construe “and the effect thereof” as permitting a zero result.
Heck, I bet a 1L could find Constitutional grounds in the commerce clause.
Yes, except case law has determined that the affirmative duty on the states to extend full faith and credit to specified acts of other states isn’t absolute. There are limits to comity. Even without DOMA, a state could probably refuse to recognize gay marriages conducted in other states without falling afoul of the full faith and credit clause. (Whether such a ban would violate equal protection or due process is another question)
Note too that DOMA also set terms for Federal recognition of marriage.
Then the people of the state bring a petition to the federal government under the ninth amendment to have the state’s claimed authority rendered illegitimate.
Richard Socarides, former Hill staffer and then former top aide to President Clinton, weighs in: