The foundation of Nullification is intimately tied into our definition of government, which is set forth in the Declaration of Independence. The Constitution merely creates and establishes a government based on the principles set out in the Declaration and so the principle of Nullification did not need to be articulated. Thats why Nullification transcends the Constitution and thats why the Supreme Court has no authority to declare it unconstitutional. The high courts authority only to the interpretation of the verbiage within the four corners of the Constitution. To understand how our system of government was supposed to work in relation to the states, consider a simple analogy. Imagine a group of families settle in a previously uninhabited region. Each family stakes out 10 acres of land as their property for farming and whatever use they deem necessary for their survival. As individual families they must rely upon themselves to provide for their defense against any who might trespass and threaten their livelihood. After a time if these settlers begin to establish trade with each other and setter A begins charging a fee for his neighbors to transport their goods across his property to sell to settlers on the other side. This causes the settlers to either abandon trade or, in an effort to offset the cost of the penalty, raise the price for which he sells his goods. Soon chaos and anarchy reign and the settlers agree that something must be done. So they gather together and come up with a compact which declares that a body shall be established, consisting of members selected by the entire settlement, to settle disputes, provide for the common defense of the settlement, and to regulate trade so that if flows smoothly within the settlement. That is the entire purpose for which this ‘governing’ body was established. These ‘governors’ could not enter a person’s private property and tell them what to do. They were merely there to keep the peace between each settler, to provide for a common defense, and should the need arise, negotiate treaties and other such arrangements with any neighboring settlements. That is our system in miniscule. Each settler was sovereign over his land as our each state in our Union. The governing body was to settle disputes, provide for the common defense, regulate trade, and negotiate with other settlements. So was our government. But our government has intruded into the states and now usurps powers and authority over the states that it was NEVER intended it possess. In this analogy, what would have happened had a majority of settlers banded together and demanded that their governing body enact rules which imposed undue hardship on the minority? What recourse could they possibly have when their rights and sovereignty were being attacked by a larger, more powerful majority? They would have but two options; either they could withdraw from this union of settlers, or they could stand up and fight to regain what was rightfully theirs. Such has been the nature of our federal government, and its relationship to the states since nearly the beginning of our nation’s existence. The federal government has sought to expand its power and exert control over the states which was clearly an abuse of power and an encroachment upon the rights of the states, and the citizens thereof. Under the administration of our second president, John Adams, laws were enacted which many felt overstepped the power of the federal government and encroached upon the rights of the states and the people. The Alien and Sedition Acts forced a sitting Vice-President, Thomas Jefferson, to take a stand against the acting President. In 1798, Thomas Jefferson wrote the Kentucky Resolutions, in which he wrote: “1. Resolved, That the several States composing, the United States of America, are not united on the principle of unlimited submission to their general government; but that, by a compact under the style and title of a Constitution for the United States, and of amendments thereto, they constituted a general government for special purposes — delegated to that government certain definite powers, reserving, each State to itself, the residuary mass of right to their own self-government; and that whensoever the general government assumes undelegated powers, its acts are unauthoritative, void, and of no force: that to this compact each State acceded as a State, and is an integral part, its co-States forming, as to itself, the other party: that the government created by this compact was not made the exclusive or final judge of the extent of the powers delegated to itself; since that would have made its discretion, and not the Constitution, the measure of its powers; but that, as in all other cases of compact among powers having no common judge, each party has an equal right to judge for itself, as well of infractions as of the mode and measure of redress.” The following year, he authored another set of resolutions – the Kentucky Resolutions of 1799 – in which he went one step further: RESOLVED, That this commonwealth considers the federal union, upon the terms and for the purposes specified in the late compact, as conducive to the liberty and happiness of the several states: That it does now unequivocally declare its attachment to the Union, and to that compact, agreeable to its obvious and real intention, and will be among the last to seek its dissolution: That if those who administer the general government be permitted to transgress the limits fixed by that compact, by a total disregard to the special delegations of power therein contained, annihilation of the state governments, and the erection upon their ruins, of a general consolidated government, will be the inevitable consequence: That the principle and construction contended for by sundry of the state legislatures, that the general government is the exclusive judge of the extent of the powers delegated to it, stop nothing short of despotism; since the discretion of those who administer the government, and not the constitution, would be the measure of their powers: That the several states who formed that instrument, being sovereign and independent, have the unquestionable right to judge of its infraction; and that a nullification, by those sovereignties, of all unauthorized acts done under colour of that instrument, is the rightful remedy: That this commonwealth does upon the most deliberate reconsideration declare, that the said alien and sedition laws, are in their opinion, palpable violations of the said constitution; and however cheerfully it may be disposed to surrender its opinion to a majority of its sister states in matters of ordinary or doubtful policy; yet, in momentous regulations like the present, which so vitally wound the best rights of the citizen, it would consider a silent acquiescence as highly criminal… In time, the encroachment of federal law on states rights would lead to the Civil War. In its Declaration of Secession, South Carolina stated, “The people of the State of South Carolina, in Convention assembled, on the 26th day of April, A.D., 1852, declared that the frequent violations of the Constitution of the United States, by the Federal Government, and its encroachments upon the reserved rights of the States, fully justified this State in then withdrawing from the Federal Union; but in deference to the opinions and wishes of the other slaveholding States, she forbore at that time to exercise this right. Since that time, these encroachments have continued to increase, and further forbearance ceases to be a virtue. And now the State of South Carolina having resumed her separate and equal place among nations, deems it due to herself, to the remaining United States of America, and to the nations of the world, that she should declare the immediate causes which have led to this act.” The sentiments expressed by South Carolina in its Declaration of Secession sound awfully similar to the Declaration of Independence, dont they? As we all know, in that document, all thirteen of the original colonies agreed to a certain declaration which said, “When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.” Our Declaration of Independence was a declaration of secession by all thirteen colonies from their commonly accepted sovereign, England. Although they considered it their right, England on the other hand felt it was an act of treason, or to be more specific, an act of war. Such was the case when South Carolina seceded. They felt it was within their right, but the federal government, not the northern states so much, but the FEDERAL GOVERNMENT declared it to be open rebellion. Whatever your beliefs as to the Civil War, its origins and its outcome, you must consider the question addressed in the earlier analogy about the settlers. What recourse do states, or the people, have when a governing body oversteps their legal authority and enacts laws which are detrimental to the people they represent? Our Declaration of Independence states “That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.” Is that right to alter or abolish a right which must be a commonly held belief by all parties, or can an individual state decide that their continued adherence to the union would only be detrimental to the people of that state, and that they therefore have the right to withdraw from that Union? Again, it doesn’t matter if you agree with their reasons or not, you must ask yourself is it within a states right to do so when it feels that the federal government has become destructive of the ends for which it was established. And, more importantly, if you don’t believe it is within a states right to secede, then what peaceful recourse does a state have when it feels that its rights are being encroached/infringed upon? In Federalist 28, Alexander Hamilton stated that “If the representatives of the people betray their constituents, there is then no resource left but in the exertion of that original right of self-defense which is paramount to all positive forms of government, and which against the usurpations of the national rulers, may be exerted with infinitely better prospect of success than against those of the rulers of an individual state.” What is this original right of self-defense of which he spoke if it is not to either withdraw from the Union or to take up arms against it? In his First Inaugural Address, Abraham Lincoln put to rest where he stood on the issue of secession, “It follows from these views that no State, upon its own mere motion, can lawfully get out of the Union, — that resolves and ordinances to that effect are legally void, and that acts of violence, within any State or States, against the authority of the United States, are insurrectionary or revolutionary, according to circumstances.” He would consider it an act of rebellion, just as did King George when the 13 colonies seceded from England. Yet, Lincoln contradicted himself by the end of his address. “This country, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inhabit it. Whenever they shall grow weary of the existing Government, they can exercise their constitutional right of amending it, or their revolutionary right to dismember or overthrow it.” In either case, it seemed that Lincoln left no middle ground: You would either remain in the Union, or you would start a revolution and attempt to dismember it. Instead of allowing for a peaceful withdrawal by those states who felt that remaining in the Union would be detrimental to their residents he drew a line in the sand - either stay in the Union, or face the threat of war when we try to force you into compliance. We need not go into the actual war itself as we all know how it turned out. The South lost and along with it died the belief that the states had the right to peacefully withdraw from the Union when they felt it was incompatible, or detrimental, to their sovereignty. Yet there still remained one obstacle for the federal government in its quest to obtain complete control over the states, that being the fact that United States Senators were chosen by the States themselves. Therefore any law which the federal government wanted to see enacted had to make it through a body of representatives who still, supposedly, were loyal to the states they represented. Hence the passage of the 17th Amendment which altered the structure of our government by removing any say the states had in the enactment of law by having the people, instead of the states’ legislatures, chose their Senators. With the ratification of the 17th Amendment the states were now at the will of the federal government as they had absolutely no means of fighting the growth of the federal Leviathan. Look at what has become of the states.... They are mere shadows of their former glory. They are filled with assemblies and legislatures that are beholden to the federal teat for subsidies and funding for internal improvements. If they speak out against federal law which encroaches upon their sovereignty the beast that is the federal government simply threatens to cut off vital funding and the states comply. Yet there is an awakening, of sorts, going on and although it may not be a light at the end of the tunnel... Its the Nullification Movement. Its the Tea Party movement. It gives us hope that there are some people in this country who still understand how things were and are supposed to function in our Republic. It offers a choice as to whether we will continue blindly and obligingly down the pathway to further encroachments of our rights, or will we say enough is enough and stand up and tell the beast that is Washington D.C. no more. Samuel Adams once said, “The liberties of our country, the freedom of our civil Constitution, are worth defending at all hazards; and it is our duty to defend them against all attacks. We have received them as a fair inheritance from our worthy ancestors: they purchased them for us with toil and danger and expense of treasure and blood, and transmitted them to us with care and diligence. It will bring an everlasting mark of infamy on the present generation, enlightened as it is, if we should suffer them to be wrested from us by violence without a struggle, or to be cheated out of them by the artifices of false and designing men.” The only question which remains to be asked is which side will history will record you as having taken, the side which meekly surrendered to an oppressive tyrant, or the one who stood up for liberty. This post is based, in large part, on the article written by Neal Ross (My Thoughts on the Erosion of States Rights, Federal Observer)
Posted on: Mon, 02 Dec 2013 05:55:05 +0000
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