Court sides with Trump in ‘sanctuary cities’ grant fight

The Boston Globe ^ | February 26, 2020 | LARRY NEUMEISTER

[shotgun]

I’ve said this since January 2017, acceptance of any federal funding is subject to compliance with all federal law. Lack of compliance may result in loss of current funding, repayment of all federal funding spent to date for that program, and criminal penalties if it is willful fraud. It is signed by the executive of the accepting agency.

I work daily with federal transportation grants and they wield that hammer routinely if they think an agency is getting out of line.

[Svartalfiar]

Not true. People back in the 1930s still understood the federal government had no legal authority to do such a thing without passing a constitutional amendment. So all they did back then was make it illegal to sell marijuana without a proper tax stamp, and then simply refused to give anyone the tax stamp.

It wasn’t until the 70s that selling marijuana actually became illegal in and of itself, rather than a ginned up tax violation.

The FedGov needed a Constitutional Amendment to ban alcohol, what's so different about any random plant? And those tax stamps are bullshit anyway, unless they were products coming in from overseas. Where's the FedGov authority to tax or do anything about stuff that stays entirely within a State?


It makes me think of obama and how he and now Trump selectively enforce our federal laws. Don’t get me wrong, I love President Trump but this selective enforcement crap just grates on me.

And therein lies one of the big issues with our current system. Congress has gone so far outside the bounds of their powers, there's so much stuff that simply can't be enforced. I forget where this comes from, but supposedly everyone commits about three felonies a day, without even knowing it. If FedGov can be pushed back into its Constitutional cage, you wouldn't have this issue: there'd be enough Federal people to properly investigate/prosecute real crimes, and you'd also only have Federal crimes that truly were crimes, not kiddie stuff that no one cares if there's prosecutorial discretion or not.

[Svartalfiar]

And the minority conservatives that live in these place EXPECT the US government to enforce its laws!

And we also expect the FedGov to keep those laws in line with their Constitutional powers!

What's so different about marijuana and alcohol that one requires a Constitutional amendment to ban, while the other just needs some laws and random agency regulations?

How does "shall not be infringed" compute with Brady or GCA or GCA'86 or NFA or FFA or AWB or etcetcetc?

What part of regulating interstate commerce allows for corn requirements in fuels?

What part of the Constitution allows the FedGov to even be giving away any of this grant money in the first place? Cities/States/colleges should not be depending on Fed (our!) dollars to pay for so much, if any, of their budgets.



I could go on and on. What we really need is a Constitutional amendment that requires every law passed by Congress to have all contents be related to the title (no more 'omnibus' bullshit!), and a section of the law that explains exactly what authority Congress has to pass such law. (Art1Sec8 quotes would do nicely.)

[bIlluminati]

I agree, in stronger terms.
Since it took a Constitution Amendment to make alcohol illegal (for 13 years), precedent would require a Constitutional Amendment to make possession and sale of anything else to be illegal. Funny how big government fans only use precedent when it supports their position of the day.

[Vaquero]

Where Sotomayor roids will flare up again

She’s a Bronx, Puerto Rican. I’m a Bronx eyetalian. I’m a Yankees fan. She’s a Yankees fan. It’s an embarrassment. Most of the PRs in the Bronx are dewey eyed loser Mets fan. The generally leftist NY MLB team. She obviously was paying attention to her brethren when choosing a team to root for.

(ps. My brothers kids are half PR. I’m not criticizing PRs. Just the leftist @$$hole ones)

[Vaquero]

Please. Let them secede. We’ll keep the National Forest stretches of oceanfront and all National forests and parks and all military bases. They can have the $hitty Streets of Nan Francisco and LA.

[i_robot73]

Odd, my copy of the Constitution must be old, I see ZERO reference to “grants”, esp. those of a “Federal” nature.

Guess we’ve finally done w/ a\o moved away from the “by what authority” question of our once Const. Republic.

What’s next? Going to court to get ‘approval’ for govt employees violating Fed. law??

Yeah, yeah, “vote more (R)N(C) to do....*something*. Some day....maybe”, right?