My hands are gimped-up from html coding, but it's worth it--a very valuable read!
Constitution Paper PING!
Long read, but rich in education.
Surpised he didn’t also reference the Articles of Ratification of the several states also.
In June-July of 1798, the Congress passed what are known collectively as the "Alien and Sedition Acts." The Sedition Act made it illegal to publicly criticize the government or government officials. As an obvious restriction on free speech, in violation of the First Amendment, The Sedition Act was the most controversial of the Acts.
Recognizing The Alien and Sedition Acts as unconstitutional, Thomas Jefferson, then Vice-president of the United States, and James Madison assisted Kentucky and Virginia, respectively, to void The Acts within their borders. Jefferson drafted resolutions against The Acts for the Kentucky legislature. Madison likewise drafted resolutions against The Acts for the Virginia legislature. In November, the Kentucky legislature passed Jefferson's resolutions declaring the Acts void, and in December the Virginia legislature passed Madison's, declaring the Acts unconstitutional.
The states, Jefferson wrote, "have the unquestionable right to judge of [the Constitution's] infraction; and that a nullification, by [the states], of all unauthorized acts done under color of [the Constitution], is the rightful remedy."
Unfortunately the power of the States to overrule the Supreme Court ultimately lies in Ratification of Amendments — and you need 38 States. Little did anyone foresee that more than 12 states would give up their rights to the “Progressives”. For the foreseeable future, we on the Right are not going to be able to pass any Amendment which would bring back balance to the Constitution.
I would recommend an Amendment that would be a re-write of the Tenth Amendment, with specifics and some teeth....
Great reading and very educational!
Good work.
Thanks for posting.
We need to have a vigorous debate in public on this topic. Like the topic of a Constitutional Convention, there are still peaceful avenues left by which we can resolve the growing threat of the Leviathan Feral State. Moreover, the closer this debate gets to having credibility, the more it will electrify and frighten the left because both topics threaten their gravy train and their ideology, the secular Utopia.
Legal scholar Randy Barnett has been working for a number of years on amendments to the Constitution to repair some of the more glaring faults we are now suffering under.
One of those proposed amendments is:
Article [of Amendment 6] — [Power of States to Check Federal Power]
Upon the identically worded resolutions of the legislatures of three quarters of the states, any law or regulation of the United States, identified with specificity, is thereby rescinded.
bttt
Anyone familiar with Davis and Lee knows about nullification. No need to read it.
The States can’t nullify because they were not a party to the original compact between citizens of the several states. The Constitution was ratified by special conventions of specially elected representatives in each state. It was not ratified by state governments.
As such, the people themselves created both the state and federal governments and delegated power and authority to them in their respective constitutions, reserving certain rights to themselves FROM government. As such, only the people can dissolve or alter that delegation of authority. I don’t see how the state has been delegated the power of nullification by the people. Where does it say that in any constitution - or is it an expansion of power beyond that specifically delegated?