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To: jjm2111

You wrote: "No, the Federal BoR trumps the states."

That is only true because the Supreme Court said so. It was not the original intent.
The Supreme Court also very clearly said, in the Kelo decision, that the states have the power to do what is being done here with eminent domain.

One cannot argue that the Bill of Rights applies to the states, but that Kelo is unconstitutional, because the only reason the Bill of Rights applies to the states is because the Supreme Court said so. So, if the Supreme Court had the authority to make that decision, deciding where the line lay in the first place, it had the authority to decide Kelo: that states can take property by eminent domain to increase tax revenue, and that this is a "public purpose".

One can argue that the Supreme Court decision is bad in a moral sense, but one cannot argue that the Supremes had the power to extend the Bill of Rights to the states, but not the power to decide the contours of that extension.
In for a penny, in for a pound.


8 posted on 12/04/2006 11:18:46 AM PST by Vicomte13 (Aure entuluva.)
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To: Vicomte13
You wrote: "No, the Federal BoR trumps the states."
That is only true because the Supreme Court said so. It was not the original intent.

That turns out not to be the case:

Senator Howard, who introduced the Fourteenth Amendment for passage in the Senate, certainly read the words this way. Although I have cited his speech at length in my Adamson dissent appendix, I believe it would be worthwhile to reproduce a part of it here....
Now, sir, here is a mass of privileges, immunities, and rights, some of them secured by the second section of the fourth article of the Constitution, which I have recited, some by the first eight amendments of the Constitution, and it is a fact well worthy of attention that the course of decision of our courts and the present settled doctrine is, that all these immunities, privileges, rights, thus guarantied by the Constitution or recognized by it, are secured to the citizens solely as a citizen of the United States and as a party in their courts. They do not operate in the slightest degree as a restraint or prohibition upon State legislation...
...The great object of the first section of this amendment is, therefore, to restrain the power of the States and compel them at all times to respect these great fundamental guarantees.

26 posted on 12/04/2006 1:18:16 PM PST by steve-b (It's hard to be religious when certain people don't get struck by lightning.)
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To: Vicomte13

“You wrote: "No, the Federal BoR trumps the states."

That is only true because the Supreme Court said so. It was not the original intent.

The Supreme Court also very clearly said, in the Kelo decision, that the states have the power to do what is being done here with eminent domain.”

No, you have that wrong. This is what the drafters of the 14th Amendment said

“Quoting Barron v. Baltimore (1833),[53] Representative Michael Kerr of Indiana argued that the Bill of Rights limited only Congress.[54] Martin Thayer of Pennsylvania responded: "Of what value are those guarantees if you deny all power on the part of the Congress of the United States to execute and enforce them?"[55] Thayer's argument exhibited the intent of what would become the Fourteenth Amendment”

And

“What would become the Fourteenth Amendment was debated in the House on May 8 through 10. Stevens remarked that its provisions "are all asserted, in some form or another, in our DECLARATION or organic law. But the Constitution limits only the action of Congress, and is not a limitation on the States. This Amendment supplies that defect, and allows Congress to correct the unjust legislation of the States."[102] Representative Thayer stated that the proposed amendment "simply brings into the Constitution what is found in the bill of rights of every State," and that "it is but incorporating in the Constitution of the United States the principle of the civil rights bill which has lately become a law”

And

“In the ensuing debate, no one questioned Howard's premise that the Amendment made the first eight amendments applicable to the states.[117] Howard explained that Congress could enforce the Bill of Rights through the Enforcement Clause, "a direct affirmative delegation of power to Congress to carry out all the principles of all these guarantees."[118] Howard added: "It [the amendment] will, if adopted by the States, forever disable every one of them from passing laws trenching upon those fundamental rights and privileges which pertain to citizens of the United States, and to all persons who happen to be within their jurisdiction."

And

“Howard's explanation that the Fourteenth Amendment would protect "the personal rights guaranteed by the first eight amendments of the United States Constitution such as ... the right to keep and bear arms" appeared on the front page of the New York Times[120] and New York Herald[121] and were printed in the National Intelligencer[122] and Philadelphia Inquirer.[123] The New York Times found his speech "clear and cogent,"[124] while the Chicago Tribune found that it was "very forcible and well put, and commanded the close attention of the Senate."[125] "It will be observed," summarized the Baltimore Gazette, "that the first section is a general prohibition upon all of the States of abridging the privileges and immunities of the citizens of the United States, and secures for all the equal advantages and protection of the laws."[126] Other newspapers were impressed with the length or detail of Howard's explanation.”

From “Intent of the Fourteenth Amendment was to Protect All Rights” by Jon Roland

It was the Courts, deciding that they did not want to dispense with 80 years of precedent, much of which they wrote, that resulted in their selectively ‘incorporating’ the Bill of Rights. It was not the Intent of the drafters of the Amendment that the courts ignore the amendment. It was simple willfulness on the part of the court. It took another 40 years for the Courts to discover the intent of the Amendment. To this day there is no case law regarding the 2nd Amendment, though the 14th was drafted in good part to prevent Southern states from seizing arms from fee blacks and preventing them from voting.



30 posted on 12/04/2006 1:30:42 PM PST by Jim Verdolini
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To: Vicomte13

You have to be kidding. Are you saying the 2d amendment does not apply to the states? The third? the fourth? the fifth?

You need to go back to sixth grade civics class.


46 posted on 12/04/2006 4:12:10 PM PST by spintreebob (W)
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