A group of Republican Senators and Representatives are putting forward an ammendment to the Constituion that would grant states the ability to veto federal laws. Thats right, the self proclaimed “Party of Lincoln”, founded to defend the Union and the federal government vs. the states rights advocated by southern states which eventually seceded and formed the confederacy is attempting to undermine federal authority in favor of the states. Isn’t it ironic, don’t you think?
If this is the policy they want to pursue, thats fine, but its high time they stop invoking Lincoln given that he stood for the opposite of what they do today. Teddy Roosevelt would seem to be a bit of a mismatch too. Reagan is spot on though, they can still be the Party of Reagan.
With all due respect, David, you paint with a broad brush. The amendment proposed by Rep. Bishop (who happens to my representative) and others is not a nullification-style procedure made famous by Southern states prior to the Civil War. Those decisions, which were made on an individual state-by-state basis are much more dangerous to American Federalism than the proposal brought forward by House and Senate Republicans. This amendment would require 2/3 of States to agree upon a repeal. One would need to find broad consensus to gain such a coalition.
Even in cases where repeal was actually mandated:
“The law would then be sent back to Washington for further consideration, at which time Congress may choose not to act again on the matter, or they may vote to override the states’ repeal and pass it in finality.
The last time I checked, the 10th Amendment was still apart of the Bill of Rights. With the advent of the 17th Amendment, further encroaching upon States Rights, I would argue that this amendment is great middle ground.
I fail to see what is so controversial about the States having the ability to veto a federal law…the States were and should again be, superior to the federal government. The federal government after all was created by the States, in part to serve the interests of the States, and not the other way around.
1) The Republican Party was formed to free the slaves and promote the interests of the individual, not to preserve the Union. It most definitely was not formed to protect the Federal government.
2) The Republican Party was not opposed to State’s rights. They were opposed to the use of State’s rights to preserve slavery. Sadly, the ignorant and ill informed today conflate the ideas of State’s Rights and slavery.
3) It is true that President Lincoln’s highest value was the preservation of the Union. He often said that he would endure slavery to preserve the Union.
4) I believe that secession was and is legal. The people of a State joined the Union voluntarily and I see no reason why they should be denied the right to leave. The right of the people to overthrow their government is enshrined in our national papers. Given that, how outrageous is the idea of secession?
(Sadly I feel I have to explicitly state that I think slavery is evil, and I am glad the North won the Civil War)
When I originally read David K.’s summary, I thought this was about individual states choosing to nullify federal laws. Although I would, on balance, disagree with that policy, I can certainly understand people supporting it. Actually reading Rep. Bishop’s description, however, it just seems nonsensical. Given that it takes half the senators to pass a law (or 60 senators to overcome a filibuster), and each state gets an equal number of senators, can someone explain how the federal Congress could pass a law in the first place that was opposed by 2/3 of the states?
By the way, the federal gov’t wasn’t created by “the states,” it was created by 13 states. Quite a few of the other states were first territories purchased or otherwise acquired by the federal government, which subsequently granted them statehood within the existing federal system. I don’t mean to imply that the history should determine the present or future balance of power between the various levels of government (in fact, I would disagree with that pretty strongly). However, if one does want to inform their opinions with history, it would be good if that history were accurate.
can someone explain how the federal Congress could pass a law in the first place that was opposed by 2/3 of the states?
*cough*Obamacare*cough*
By the way, the federal gov’t wasn’t created by “the states,
Really? I don’t remember anyone else being involved.
Quite a few of the other states were first territories purchased or otherwise acquired by the federal government, which subsequently granted them statehood within the existing federal system.
Only after they asked to join the Union.
*cough*Hawai’i*cough* ? (grin)
If secession is a valid option, then we aren’t a union at all, we are a confederacy. Thats what the Articles of Confederation provided for and they failed. The Constitution established a Union. The civil war further reinforced that we are a Union and not a confederacy. We are born, or become citizens of the United States of America. While state pride is fine, the primary loyalty should be to the nation first and the principles on which it was founded, which is what Lincoln was fighting for.
If individual states could secede anytime they disagreed with the government, we would no longer BE one nation.
I appreciate that unlike some who just believe they or their states can simply ignore the law these representatives are following the process of an amendment, I disagree with its intent, but I do respect the process. Just as I believe that true gun control can’t happen without an amendment to repeal or modify the 2nd Amendment.
As for the Republican party, yes slavery was the mobilizing issue around which they formed, but they also promoted and fought for the federal power over states rights, taxation to raise money that was used to improve the nation from a federal level include building of railroads, and funding education and aid to agriculture.
Lincoln himself was in favor of these efforts and others such as liberal immigration policies.
Although he engaged in many practices during the war that present day Democrats would raise holy hell over, from the standpoint of what he stood for prior to the war, it wouldn’t have been in line with today’s Republican party. Somewhere in the last 150 years the parties have done an almost complete flip flop on core issues.
In regards to Obamacare opposition, actually only about half the states have opposed it legally, and in some cases, such as here in Washington, that opposition doesn’t come from the support of the constituents but is being pursued by the state Attorney General over the objections of the Governor and the people. 33 states would have to oppose it at a state level and the data doesn’t back that up.
I think David K. has made an interesting point on #9 about whether AGs represent the will of the state, but here’s how I analyze the issue:
1) At the time PPACA passed, there were certainly plenty of states vehemently opposed, but it was less than a majority (as measured by the actions of the state governments).
2) After the 2010 election, the number expressing opposition at the state level increased to more than half (but less than 2/3). The House voted to repeal the bill (the margin was considerable, but not 2/3, but that’s neither here nor there, because it’s the House). The Senate did not vote in favor of repeal, and almost certainly won’t during the present congress.
3) If the level of opposition to the law continues, it may well get repealed after the 2012 elections. If public opinion swings back to where it was in 2008, then it won’t get repealed. There’s an argument to be had about whether it’s good to have 6 year terms for Senators.
However, like all politicians, including those at the state level, Senators roughly represent the views of their constituents at the time they were elected (to a first order approximation). Which brings me back to my previous point: If a single state (or small group) wants to claim that they are being tyrannically oppressed by the federal gov’t, I can understand that. But two thirds? I just don’t buy it.
As the TPM article outlines, this nonsense can only be brought into logical cohesion by people that oppose the 17th Amendment (like Zach in post #1). They look at the old system where a state government elected by the people appointed Senators, and believe that represented the will of the people better than the actual will of the people expressed in a direct election.
They look at the old system where a state government elected by the people appointed Senators, and believe that represented the will of the people better than the actual will of the people expressed in a direct election.
Incorrect. Those of us who oppose the 17th Amendment believe that the purpose of the House was to represent the people, and the purpose of the Senate was to represent the States. Since the 17th Amendment Senators have become nothing more than “super” Representatives.
I fear there is far too much wrong with this to even try and correct the tangental truths. But a few do stick out.
First, the Republican Party was founded by a coalition of interests (all parties still function as such given the nature of our government.) One of those interests was the abolitionist movement. However, the party platform at the time of Lincoln’s election was to restore the compromises that would prohibit the spread of slavery.
The Civil War started almost tangentially to the slavery question. The legal issues were over specific questions of Federalism. The case was whether or not the federal government possessed the power to stop the expansion of slavery. Federalism won. The Civil War only became about freeing the slaves writ large and nation wide after the emancipation proclamation. The other question was whether or not states had the power to succeed from the Union. Again, Federalism won. And they do not.
The power the states possess over the federal government is not succession. No state has this power (sorry Texas). If succession were a power we would be the European Union not the United States. The power the states have is disillusionment. If two thirds of state legislatures so vote, there is a Constitutional Convention and the Union is dissolved (Article V) any new constitution must be re-ratified by the states, and any sate choosing not to ratify may leave at that time. And that very point makes this present amendment even more redundant, but I’ll get to that.
The debate at the time of ratification and the issue many had was that states were ceding rights to a federal government. Thus the Bill of Rights was drafted as a protection on those rights. Again, the federal government is the preeminent law of the land, were this not the case we would be the EU.
Why are we talking about slavery again?
Anyway, as written this amendment is antithetical to federalism. But more importantly, it’s just useless, redundant, and a waist of time and money.
As I mentioned, at the same barrier of votes the States already have the power to dissolve the government. If things really have gotten so far off the rails that 60% of Senators (specific state representatives) are willing to vote for cloture, and 50% +1 of Senators are willing (that is half the states or half of all the states representatives) to vote for something that 2/3s of states are so strongly opposed to that they willing to bass bills through the state legislatures to stop it, it’s probably time to dissolve the government and start over because such a situation should logically be impossible and thus something must be very wrong.
Further where does the localizing of governments end, can 2/3s of town / city / county councils overturn a state law? How about 2/3s of HOAs overturning a county law? We do representative government for a reason. And does that mean that 2/3s of HOAs in 2/3s of counties for a state to do something, like repeal a federal law? It’s silly. We vote for representatives for a reason. Most people like their representative, it’s the other guy’s they have a problem with. And this Amendment does nothing to solve that.
The Amendment as proposed is simply some useless grandstanding. And gives sate legislatures (some of which almost never meet) more things to waist their time on grandstanding about.
Now, if the primary issue instead is the difficulty of repealing a law once passed by the federal government. There I can kind of agree with you. But there is a simpler solution. Instead of having to fully pass a bill of repeal (non-action being the preferred status of government makes this nearly impossible). Simply pass a Constitutional Amendment that gives either the House or the Senate the power to revoke their passage of a law based on, say, a 2/3 vote. Thus if congress does do something so horrible that it must be repealed it can be taken care of at the next election cycle by the people. A much simpler and more direct resolution to the issue. And congress is already the representatives of the states their vote should be reasonably expected to represent the will of their respective states. If it does not, as I mentioned, we’ve got way bigger problems than just one law. If you want the house can vote as states like they do if there isn’t an Electoral college majority, and 2/3s of “state votes” would be what is counted. If you wanted to make it even more complicated you could limit this power to the first 100 days of a new congress or something. But that seems a little perfunctory.
It would seem imprudent to allow the President the power to retroactively Veto something, so such a power should logically only be granted to the two chambers of Congress.
In regards to the 17th Amendment there are inherent problems in either selection method.
Now, if Senators simply served at the pleasure of the state house, perhaps that would help. But it would introduce it’s own array of difficulties.
A slight correction to Dane: yes, the main issue the Civil War began over was technically whether a state could leave or not. But the South started the succession crisis to defend slavery. Its there in their founding documents, and by listening to their founding members. So from the beginning, at least the Confederacy was fighting the war for slavery.
…the purpose of the House was to represent the people, and the purpose of the Senate was to represent the States.
This. Were the 17th Amendment repealed, the interests of the States would be better represented in the federal system and this Bishop amendment would be unnecessary. As it is currently written, the Bishop amendment is relatively toothless, symbolic, and won’t ever amount to much; getting two-thirds of state legislatures to agree to overturn a law would be far more arduous than building enough of a political consensus in Congress to repeal the unwanted law with a simple majority.
Finally, gahrie is off his rocker supporting the idea of secession. The concept that states should be allowed to leave the Union is simply disastrous and unworkable. Suppose Kansas has finally had it and decides to secede. Are they then going to build an army? How are they going to conduct international commerce? They would be at the total mercy of the other 49 states. And then suppose that Kansas wished to rejoin the union once the U.S. has removed whatever laws or institutions Kansas deemed too onerous to any longer live under — how the heck would that work? Secession and nullification are simply dumb ideas and do not reflect thinking things through to the obvious logical ramifications.
B. true. That’s what I was attempting to say by it being tangental. I’m not sure how important the long form politics of this are anymore, but basically the South was ignoring the Missouri compromise and attempting to get slavery into the territories. Abolitionists and business interests in the North didn’t like this for a number of reasons, that both overlap and don’t. The Republicans came to power primarily based on a platform of stoping the spread of slavery. To the South “stoping the spread of slavery” was the first step in abolition (probably true). In the long run this would weaken the political power of the slave holding states at the national level to the point where slavery could be abolished over the opposition of the South. Thus the South argued that the Federal government lacked the power to do what they were trying to do. And further argued that in such a case they had the a power / right of secession. The North said they did not. There was a war and the matter was decided.
Maybe I’m missing something here…Is there some sense in which a State, that State being itself free and democratic (small ‘d’), has interests that differ from the interests of the citizens of that State? In particular, where the interests of that State should be given priority over the interests of its citizens?
I certainly understand the Connecticut Compromise: the Senate has 2 members from each State so that less-populous states, which may have different interests than more-populous states (due to geography, history, different industries, degree of urbanization, etc.) don’t get crowded out. That I get.
But the State officials elected by the citizens of a State, getting a veto power over federal laws passed by the Senators of that same State, who were elected on a state-wide basis by those same citizens? I can understand a desire for that in the 18th century, when many people were uneducated and the media was less fast, thorough, and diverse than it is now. But in today’s world? Really?
Is there some sense in which a State, that State being itself free and democratic (small ‘d’), has interests that differ from the interests of the citizens of that State?
Apparently the Founding Fathers thought so, since they included the Tenth Amendment in the Bill of Rights, and created the Senate to represent the States.
Were the 17th Amendment repealed, the interests of the States would be better represented in the federal system and this Bishop amendment would be unnecessary.
I have been publicly declaring my support for the repeal of the 17th Amendment for nearly thirty years.
If succession were a power we would be the European Union not the United States.
Prior to the Civil War, most people thought of the federal government as being an entity similar to the European Union. If you asked someone their citizenship, they would have replied with the State they were from, not say “American” or “United States”. The phrase “The United States” was considered a plural, as in “The United States are….”, not singular as in “The United States is…” the way it is today.
I believe the main function of the Tenth Amendment is to prevent some States (perhaps a majority) from imposing laws on other States, except when the topic of that law is a power delegated to the federal government by the Constitution. If the Constitution is well constructed, then those powers should be things that can best be or only be addressed on a national level. I think that protecting one State’s internal matters from meddling by other States is a very important thing.
On the other hand, protecting a State from it’s own elected representatives (its Congressional Delegation in Washington), by reserving rights to the State’s elected representatives (its legislature and Governor)…that seems, at best, a lesser goal. And, in the pre-17th Amendment era, now you’re talking about reserving powers to the State government rather than delegating them to an appointee of that same State government. I don’t think so.
Rather than inferring what the Founding Fathers thought, can you give some examples from recent history where the interest of a State was significantly different from the interest of the People of that State? It seems to me that, when that sort of situation is described in discussions of current events, it is usually in the context of distinguishing between a tyrannical regime and the populace that it oppresses (Libya, Baathist Iraq, the Taliban, China, the Iron Curtain, etc.). Can you list some examples where the citizens of a US State were using their directly-elected Senators in Washington to overturn the will of their own State government? Not one State vs. another, but within the one State. Then perhaps we might judge whether, in these actual situations (or even hypothetical situations that are reasonably plausible), it is a worthy goal to defend the State from its own directly-elected Senators.
gahrie, is there evidence that people thought of themselves as Marylanders first, Americans second? I don’t know one way or another, except that our Presidents tended to address Americans for obvious reasons. I’d like some proof for that, some scholarship proving your point here.
B.Minich:
Alas I fear it is going to take me a while…every search in every search engine I’ve tried gets me bogged down into the birther argument.
Heh. Yet another reason to disdain the birthers: they make Google less useful!
Under the articles of confederation G. is correct on the from the state first mentality. That mentality did not immediately change upon signing the Constitution. I don’t have a precise date for when we sifted from Marylanders to Americans, as it were. But the shift was underway by the war of 1812. The Civil War, I think, sealed the deal on us being Americans. So I don’t believe G. is that far out in left field with that particular assertion.
dcl @ #26, but that naturally begs the question of, was the state-first mentality a logical and appropriate response to Constitutional impositions (as opposed to the Articles of Confederation)? Or did we rightly outgrow that and embrace our identity of Americans first, state residents second (or third, or fourth, or…)? Because what I think I hear gahrie arguing is that, because folks in 1790 viewed themselves as Marylanders first, that was the right approach and ought to be today as well. I really don’t think I agree with that whatsoever — our society is far too mobile and there are so many more relevant inputs to one’s identity than simply what state one happens to reside in at any given point in time (that being said, I still sniffle that my son is technically a Virginian and not a Californian like me). I am all for separation of powers and devolving things as much as possible to state and local governments, but no part of that belief system supports the idea that secession is acceptable and/or within a state’s rights. I just think the state, as an institution, ought to have better institutional representation in the federal government, and the most logical way to do that is to repeal the 17th Amendment.
AML @ #27, I think you fairly well hit the nail on the head.
Not sure that the 17th Amendment makes much difference. There is no good way to get millionaire cash out of the equation, and when it comes down to it, that’s what we need to do to get government to be responsive to the interests of citizens first, corporations etc. second. Which is ultimately in everyone’s best interest, but at least for the moment, money wins… no matter how you cut the pie.
I don’t fear money in politics — the two are inseparable. As long as political decisions have monetary / economic / profit ramifications, those with a lot of chips on the table will rightly feel compelled to risk some of their chips to influence the outcome. Better that our representatives raise campaign funds more efficiently and effectively out in the open for all to see so they can instead spend more time deliberating policy or meeting with constituents. If a congressman’s constituents are not happy that Exxon puts $10M to his reelection campaign and think that said congressman is thus Exxon’s puppet, they are free to express their outrage through blogs and other media and attempt to fund an opposition candidate and vote the Exxon puppet out of office.
OTOH, the sunshine policy that I’ve supported for a long time may not be the most effective approach. One idea I’ve heard that sounds like it actually might work much better is, force all campaign donations to be anonymous. Campaign funding accounts are run like blind trusts, and candidates have zero access into who is putting in money; they can only control the debit side of the ledger. That would allow Exxon or George Soros to donate $10M to their candidate of choice, and yet the candidate and the public would have no idea who their benefactor is. The execution of this sort of CFR initiative would be highly challenging, but as theory it’s very attractive and compelling.
That’s an interesting idea, assuming you really can keep it secrete it might work rather well.