It’s amazing how little the liberal rhetoric has changed. Whenever there is an issue with policy or Federal encroachment on State sovereignty . They drag out the worn out race card and insults.
The amusing point to all this is that they believe themselves so intelligent and have such lofty impressions of themselves that they do not take the time to look at the people they are insulting. WE are made up of minorities, disillusioned Democrats, fed up environmentalists, disgusted working class Americans. And yet we are all ignorant rednecks with a racists agenda. LOL!!
The lines are getting old and the only thing they have accomplished is to expose their ignorance of the Law of The Land. Perhaps, they need a memorable lesson to assist in the assimilation of the necessary information to permeate those thick skulls. Not to mention a bit of air let out of those over bloated egos would be in order……
~Desert Rose~
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A Basic Civics Lesson for Pseudo-Historians
Posted by Mike Maharrey
I need a civics lesson.
This according to the keepers of acceptable opinion at two divergent publications.
Both The Economist and the Montgomery Advertiser recently ran opinion pieces skewering nullification, specifically state efforts to block unconstitutional federal gun laws in Kansas and Alabama. Interestingly, both the author of The Economist piece and the editorial board over at the Alabama newspaper used the same strategy. They both try to make their readers believe anybody who actually views nullification as legitimate must not be too bright. Their implication? “The federal government enjoys absolute supremacy and a bunch of dumb racist, rednecks who don’t know anything about the U.S. government want states to ignore laws they don’t happen to like.”
From the Economist: “It is remarkable that a civics lesson like this is necessary.”
The Montgomery Advertiser editorial board gets even snarkier.
“That body (the Alabama Senate) has taken a plunge into the past by revisiting and embracing the long-discredited practice of nullification, the notion — abandoned decades ago by most people who passed sixth-grade civics.”
Talk about groupthink. Federal supremacists apparently find the whole “civics lesson” theme clever. I have to admit – it does effectively create the impression that nullification supporters wander around in ignorance among the illiterate and uneducated. But the mockery would prove even more effective if the writers actually knew what in the hell they were writing about.
Here’s the problem: these amateur historians actually think the three things they leaned in their government school sixth-grade civics class make them some kind of experts. They might want to move on from pre-civics to basic civics before they try demeaning those of us who actually know the historical and the philosophical basis for nullification.
Let’s touch on a few basics, shall we?
1. Federal Supremacy – These wanna-be historians actually think the federal government stands absolutely supreme all the time, no matter what. They apparently never bothered to put down the sixth-grade textbook and read the actual supremacy clause in the Constitution. If they did, they would find that only acts “in pursuance of” the Constitution stand supreme. Yes Virginia, federal supremacy actually has limits! Alexander Hamilton made this clear in Federalist 33.
“If a number of political societies enter into a larger political society, the laws which the latter may enact, pursuant to the powers intrusted [sic] to it by its constitution, must necessarily be supreme over those societies and the individuals of whom they are composed….But it will not follow from this doctrine that acts of the large society which are not pursuant to its constitutional powers, but which are invasions of the residuary authorities of the smaller societies, will become the supreme law of the land. These will be merely acts of usurpation, and will deserve to be treated as such. Hence we perceive that the clause which declares the supremacy of the laws of the Union, like the one we have just before considered, only declares a truth, which flows immediately and necessarily from the institution of a federal government. It will not, I presume, have escaped observation, that it expressly confines this supremacy to laws made pursuant to the Constitution.”
2. The extent of federal power – While we’re on the subject of limits, our civics professors apparently need a reminder. The federal government can’t just do whatever it wants. It operates under strict limits. The feds can only exercise powers delegated to it in the Constitution. James Madison described the extent of federal power in Federalist 45. He insisted that the powers delegated to the general government were “few and defined,” and those left to the states and people were “numerous and indefinite.” The ratifiers even insisted on a Bill of Rights “in order to prevent misconstruction or abuse of its powers.”
3. Who decides constitutionality? - Federal supremacists sell you a load of crap. They want you to believe the people of the states created a federal government with limited, enumerated powers, insisted on further “declaratory and restrictive clauses” – the Bill of Rights - and then left it to that government to decide the extent of its own power. This idea not only earns them an F on their civics test, they also fail their logic test. Basically, these geniuses want the Dallas Cowboy player to referee the Dallas – New York Giants football game. How do you think that would turn out for the Giants?
Fact: the people of the states created the federal government in the first place. Therefore, the people of the states retain the right, in the last resort, to determine the extent of the powers they gave to the government they created. So yes, Kansas can determine what limits the Second Amendment places on federal regulation of firearms. Granted, this idea may fall into the realm of advanced civics, so maybe we should let a real expert explain it. How about we call on Madison, the “Father of the Constitution?”
“The States then being the parties to the constitutional compact, and in their sovereign capacity, it follows of necessity, that there can be no tribunal above their authority, to decide in the last resort, whether the compact made by them be violated; and consequently that as the parties to it, they must themselves decide in the last resort, such questions as may be of sufficient magnitude to require their interposition.”
Related articles
- A Basic Civics Lesson for Pseudo-Historians (tenthamendmentcenter.com)
- A Basic Civics Lesson for Pseudo-Historians (txwclp.org)
- A Basic Civics Lesson for Pseudo-Historians (sgtreport.com)
- Rasmussen Poll: Nullification Goes Mainstream (familysurvivalprotocol.com)
- REP. Matt Krauses’s “COME AND TAKE IT” Firearm Protection Bill Passes The Texas House (familysurvivalprotocol.com)
- Nullification – The Rightful Remedy and Our Last Hope (ncrenegade.com)
- SHAPIRO: Another attempt at nullification (washingtontimes.com)
- Absolute Federal Supremacy: A Crackpot Post-Antebellum Theory (txwclp.org)
- AG Holder: Feds Will Ignore State Laws and Enforce Gun Grab (fromthetrenchesworldreport.com)
- Eric Holder says Feds Will Ignore State Laws and Enforce Gun Grab (fromthetrenchesworldreport.com)
