The federal government doesn't intrude on those areas where it is not explicitly granted power by the Constitution - that is left to the States, and this rightly includes abortion (just as it already does every other form of homicide, btw). And okay, technically, an HLA would "sidestep" federalism by explicitly granting the issue to federal purview, but really, that's not exactly what the Founders had in mind when they set up our federally balanced system.
But we did the same for all other forms of homicide, when we passed the 14th A. " ...nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws." Homicide cannot be made legal by any State, because it denies the victim due process. This is as true for extra-judicial lynchings of Blacks that were not prosecuted at the time as it is for the unborn today. This is currently sidestepped in law by not granting the unborn with "personhood".
Federalism is not about State's "rights"; it is about the proper division and exercise of the Powers granted by the people to both the States and the Federal. Legalizing the extra-judicial killing of the unborn is not a granted Power to either level of government, so "criminalizing" it isn't a question. The default position is that it is already a criminal act, unless justified by due process (such as justifiable homicide in self defense is now).
No, just a Southron who rejects the Yankee-imposed Webster's orthography, and who is also an Anglophile, to boot.
But we did the same for all other forms of homicide, when we passed the 14th A. " ...nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws." Homicide cannot be made legal by any State, because it denies the victim due process. This is as true for extra-judicial lynchings of Blacks that were not prosecuted at the time as it is for the unborn today. This is currently sidestepped in law by not granting the unborn with "personhood".
Unfortunately, the verbiage prior to the portion of the 14th amendment which you quoted says that this applies to those who are born in the USA or who are naturalised US citizens. The letter of the text would seem to exclude the unborn (an oversight I would chalk up to nobody in 1868 anticipating the industrialised murder of millions of unborn each year). On this basis, it doesn't cover the unborn - sad, but yet the case. As such, the matter DOES fall back onto the States, being a power not explicitly granted to the federal gov't nor denied to the States (10th amendment).
Federalism is not about State's "rights"; it is about the proper division and exercise of the Powers granted by the people to both the States and the Federal. Legalizing the extra-judicial killing of the unborn is not a granted Power to either level of government, so "criminalizing" it isn't a question. The default position is that it is already a criminal act, unless justified by due process (such as justifiable homicide in self defense is now).
Yes, federalism IS about State's rights, specifically because of the issue of proper division and role. The 10th amendment was intentionally left broad because the Founders wanted the States to be in charge of their own local affairs. The Federal Constitution was intended to regulate affairs that occur between States (i.e. to be an impartial referee), and to take care of matters which affect the Union as a whole (like foreign policy, warmaking, etc.) If the Fed steps in on issues that rightly belong to the States, then the matter is a States' rights issue.
Nonsense. Homicide is legal, in every state, under some circumstances. There is substantial variation among the several states as to what circumstances qualify.
I see no constitutional argument that would prevent states from effectively legalizing abortion (by creating justification loopholes large enough to fly an A380 through) without severely limiting their authority to define other types of justifiable homicide.
Besides, I think it would make sense to give states back the power to restrict abortion on their own before declaring they have to do so themselves.