Monday, February 23, 2009

The States Are Not Branches Of The Federal Government!
  Government piece by J. D. Longstreet

“We are telling the federal government that we are a sovereign state and want to be treated as such. We are not a branch of the federal government,“ that from Arizona state Rep. Judy Burges. And more and more state legislators and state legislatures are expressing the very same feelings. And they are doing something about it.

A state senator in Oklahoma, Randy Brogdan, has introduced a resolution that would enable his state to “reclaim its 10th Amendment right to reject any and all acts of Congress that go beyond its enumerated powers in violation of the 10th Amendment.“

The Tenth Amendment, a part of the “Bill of Rights”, says flatly: “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.“

Some legal experts say that the Supremacy Clause in the US Constitution makes all the efforts of the states moot. The Supremacy Clause is a clause in the United States Constitution, article VI, paragraph 2. The clause establishes the Constitution, Federal Statutes, and U.S. treaties as “the supreme law of the land.“ The text establishes these as the highest form of law in the American legal system, mandating that state judges uphold them, even if state laws or constitutions conflict. Here’s the text of the Supremacy Clause lifted from the Constitution:

“This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the contrary notwithstanding.“

Whoa! Talk about throwing your weight around!

OK, so what do the state legislators have to say about that, huh? Well, remember Oklahoma state senator Randy Brogdan? His answer, we believe, sets the stage for the coming fight in the Supreme Court. Brogdan is quoted as saying: “Federal law does not trump the Constitution.“

We have heard from Arizona and Oklahoma… You have to ask if this is a repeat of the uprising of the states in the 1800’s. The answer is no. This is different, and yet, at the same time, it is about the same thing: My Confederate ancestors called it “State’s Rights.“ That is exactly the underlying cause of the unrest in the states today… States Rights.

States involved in the States Sovereignty Movement, as of this writing include: Hawaii, Michigan, Missouri, Montana, New Hampshire and Washington and, of course, Arizona and Oklahoma. Reports tell us that the same sort of “resolutions”, “bills’, and so forth, are soon to be introduced in more than a dozen other states. There’s an excellent article at the Washington Times we recommend you read. You’ll find it HERE.

As I surveyed a map of the country with the states involved to one degree or another in the States Sovereignty Movement highlighted on it, I must tell you, it made this old man’s heart beat a little faster. For, you see, the states involved were from the north, the south, the east, and the west, and even way out in the Pacific Ocean. No matter how it turns out, no single section of this country will ever bear the stigma of “traitors” as my beloved South has done since the 1860’s. No state, no group of states, should ever have to bear that indignity, especially when what they did was perfectly legal as is what the states in the State’s Sovereignty Movement are doing today.

For even more information on the State’s Sovereignty Movement and a map of those states involved go HERE.

I fervently hope this gets to the Supreme Court before the Federal Government does something stupid, as it did in the 1860’s. We all know the Federal Government has stretched its legal bounds beyond those intended by The Founders of this country. We KNOW that. Its time they were called on it.

J. D. Longstreet
http://csadispatch.blogspot.com/

http://www.csadispatch.blogspot.com/2009/02/states-are-not-branches-of-federal.html

Posted by J. D. Longstreet on 2/23/09

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