Posted on 12/27/2014 10:31:14 AM PST by SeekAndFind
This week, Tennessee became the 25th state to join a lawsuit against the president’s executive amnesty order. The lawsuit may work, but there’s another, more direct, and considerably more interesting redress against executive overreach. Proposed in 1798 by Thomas Jefferson and James Madison.
In 1798, Congress passed the Alien and Sedition Acts, which were signed into law by President John Adams. The A&S Acts comprised four bills that increased the federal government’s power to shut up dissenters; most noxious was a provision that permitted the prosecution of anyone who said anything about the government that the government considered “seditious.” Fourteen of the dominant Federalist party’s political enemies were arrested and imprisoned.
John Adams has — to date — been our only Federalist president. Prior to the presidential election of 1804, votes were cast only for president; each elector in the Electoral College cast two presidential votes, and whoever came in second became the vice president. In 1798, Federalist John Adams’s VP was Democratic-Republican Thomas Jefferson — and Thomas Jefferson hated the Alien and Sedition Acts. So did future president James Madison.
Like all VPs, Vice President Jefferson had approximately no power. And James Madison wasn’t even vice president. So, like all great dissenters, they grabbed their pens and — anonymously — wrote the Kentucky and Virginia resolutions. The K&V resolutions laid out what would come to be known as the nullification doctrine.
The nullification doctrine posits that, as the federal government is the product of the Constitution, and the Constitution is a compact of the states, it’s the states that have the final say on any law’s constitutionality. If a state determines that a law exceeds the terms of the compact to which it agreed, it has the right to nullify that law within its own borders.
Jefferson and Madison’s idea was for states to declare the Alien and Sedition Acts null and void. Instead of joining a lawsuit against the executive amnesty, those 25 states could simply deem the executive amnesty null and void, and refuse to recognize illegal aliens’ work permits or issue them driver’s licenses.
Why, you wonder, would that be better than filing a lawsuit? In a certain sense, it wouldn’t — because winning that suit would strike down Mr. Obama’s order in all 50 states. Which is not an unlikely outcome, given the order’s extremely shaky legal footing. However —
The judiciary has consistently ruled against the nullification doctrine, asserting its unique, judicial right to declare laws unconstitutional. But this executive order isn’t a law. And given its extremely shaky legal footing, it isn’t difficult to imagine a federal bench recognizing the states’ right to disregard federal orders that don’t clearly have the force of law. And that would be a tremendous — tremendous — blow against the executive’s assumption of legislative powers.
But in the shorter, directer term: It would force the Obama administration to go on offense, suing the states to enforce a law that isn’t a law. And I don’t think that case can be made.
Power to the states; power to the people. Huzzah. Write your governor; call your attorney general.
— Josh Gelernter writes weekly for NRO and is a regular contributor to The Weekly Standard.
This is good.
If they can’t plant illegals into red states and get them the right to vote there then they become a burden to the blue states where they will have to settle.
They will suck the welfare teat dry in those blue states while failing to matter in national elections.
This action along with certain red states ending the winner-take-all electoral vote contests would make it tough for dems in national elections. No more electoral windfalls in some states due to vote fraud in large demo cities.
Bump
ACTION NOW: Write your governor; call your state attorney general.
The judiciary has consistently ruled against the nullification doctrine, asserting its unique, judicial right to declare laws unconstitutional.
But this executive order isn’t a law. And given its extremely shaky legal footing, it isn’t difficult to imagine a federal bench recognizing the states’ right to disregard federal orders that don’t clearly have the force of law.
And that would be a tremendous — tremendous — blow against the executive’s assumption of legislative powers.
But in the shorter, directer term: It would force the Obama administration to go on offense, suing the states to enforce a law that isn’t a law. And I don’t think that case can be made.
I don't see where Obama would get a direct vote in the matter, although he might try fighting it in the courts. Seeing as state participation was voluntary and as those states are arguing for enforcing the law instead of ignoring it we ought to be able to, at worst, run a lot of Obama's clock. Meanwhile the selection pressure of following Obama's 'law' will be felt in the bluer non-compact states, while the compact states are protected from much of its corrupting effects.
Alas the hard part will be getting it past the Congressional leadership, but history records other successful bipartisan immigration revolts against them.
a wonderful Kwanza Present for Obie!!
So if a Southern state determined that the Civil Rights Act exceeded federal authority, it could continue to discriminate.
How well did that work for Governor Wallace?
It's not even an executive order. It's an "executive action".
As a matter of fact Josh, it is quite difficult to imagine. I can't imagine any federal bench ruling against consolidation of the central power. It is what they do.
OBAMA CALCULATEDLY SKIRTED THE LAW AND SIGNED TWO "MEMOS" TO LAUNCH AMNESTY: Nullification means power to the states and power to the people.
ACTION NOW: Write your governor; call your state attorney general.
The judiciary has consistently ruled against the nullification doctrine, asserting its unique, judicial right to declare laws unconstitutional.
But this executive order isn’t a law. And given its extremely shaky legal footing, it isn’t difficult to imagine a federal bench recognizing the states’ right to disregard federal orders that don’t clearly have the force of law.
And that would be a tremendous — tremendous — blow against the executive’s assumption of legislative powers.
But in the shorter, directer term: It would force the Obama administration to go on offense, suing the states to enforce a law that isn’t a law. And I don’t think that case can be made.
Thanks, Liz.
this would be so fine.
Names and addresses to call, mail, email, and maybe a list of contacts in conservative radio and other personalities that can push this.
What about contacting Rush, Mark Levin, Alex Jones, hell, even that whiny self absorbed blow hard, Glenn Beck? If enough people get behind this it may work.
ping
Note tagline.
A few paragraphs after that, I covered the South Carolina nullification crisis and its aftermath.
Existing legal precedents would argue against nullification unless the Constitution were amended to permit it. That is one of the things I'd like to see come out of an Amendments Convention.
Nullification just isn’t good enough. It has no force of law, it can be voided at the next state-wide elections and it’s a challenge to the feds to break it by force. What state is willing to enforce a nullification order against, say, the 1st Infantry Division?
How about we stick to what’s actually written in the Constitution and work toward an Article V convention instead of wasting time and effort on the nullification pipe dream?
For later read.
The federal gov’t rules that States must provide education and healthcare to illegals, then the States have to come up with the money to pay for it. Oh yea, the federal gov’t might kick in a few dollars to pay for the healthcare, but they shouldn’t be able to tax a State’s citizens to pay for anything that the constitution didn’t provide for, like the military.
So to provide education to the illegals, the citizens have to pay taxes to the federal gov’t, then pay State income, sales and property taxes to pay for education, and take out bonds putting them in enormous debt; and what they get is a third-rate education for their own children.
The States that didn’t partake in the Medicaid expansion because it would hurt their budget; their citizens still have to pay federal taxes that are going to help the States that did. And when it goes broke they will have to raise taxes and take out more debt. Hospitals close(if they can’t raise taxes and take out bonds) because they have to take care of illegals and the federal gov’t doesn’t pay them enough (with taxpayer’s money)so the local citizens can’t make it to an emergency room in time.
The question would be who would actually dare to defy the king when he sends in the armed forces to enforce his orders .
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