For God, Family and Republic

Republicanism Triumphant! Well, at least in Original Intent.

The coercion of a state is averse to the principles of sovereignty. It was original intent to afford the States the nt role in a federal system. In Federalist #45, James Madison reminds us, "The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the federal government are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the State governments are numerous and indefinite. The former will be exercised principally on external objects, as war, peace, negotiation and foreign commerce..." The Tenth Amendment is the keystone of federalism: "The powers not delegated to the United States by this Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people." Madison furthur explains, "The powers reserved to the several States will extend to all the objects which in the ordinary course of affairs, concern the lives and liberties, and properties of the people, and the internal order, improvement and prosperity of the State." There you have it folks! The federal government commensurate with original intent was confined to a handful of powers, chiefly foreign affairs, defense, and regulation of interstate commerce. Congress' powers, for example, are all enunciated in Article 1, Section 8 of the U.S. Constitution.

Here are some excellent quotation compilations from Federalists James Madison and Alexander Hamilton, which are illustrative of the reality that original intent gave no credance to notions that a State could be coerced. These were the understandings, and perhaps pleadings of Federalists in urging for the adoption of the Constitution in 1787.

“But ambitious encroachments of the federal government, on the authority of the State governments, would not excite the opposition of a single State, or of a few States only. They would be signals of general alarm. Every government would espouse the common cause. A correspondence would be opened. Plans of resistance would be concerted. One spirit would animate and conduct the whole. The same combinations, in short, would result from an apprehension of the federal, as was produced by the dread of a foreign, yoke; and unless the projected innovations should be voluntarily renounced, the same appeal to a trial of force would be made in the one case as was made in the other. But what degree of madness could ever drive the federal government to such an extremity.”
–James Madison, The Influence of the State and Federal Governments Compared, Federalist #46, Jan 29, 1788.

“The use of force against a State would be more like a declaration of war, than an infliction of punishment, and would probably be considered by the party attacked, as a dissolution of all previous compacts; a union of States containing such an ingredient seemed to provide for its own destruction.”
–James Madison, Philadelphia Constitutional Convention, May 31, 1787.

“Any government formed on the supposed practicability of using force against the unconstitutional proceedings of the States, would prove as visionary and fallacious as the government of Congress.”
–James Madison, Philadelphia Constitutional Convention, June 8, 1787

“When the sword is once drawn the passions of men observe no bounds of moderation. The suggestions of wounded pride, the instigations of resentment, would be apt to carry the States against which the arms of the Union were exerted, to any extreme to avenge the affront, or to avoid the disgrace of submission. The first war of this kind would probably terminate in a dissolution of the Union.”
–Alexander Hamilton, The Union as a Safeguard Against Domestic Faction and Insurrection, Federalist #10, Nov. 23, 1787.

“Experience is the oracle of truth; and where its responses are unequivocal, they ought to be conclusive and sacred. The important truth, which it unequivocally pronounces in the present case, is that a sovereignty over sovereigns, a government over governments, a legislation for communities, as contradistinguished from individuals, as it is a solecism in theory, so in practice it is subversive of the order and ends of civil polity, by substituting in place of LAW, or the destructive COERCION of the SWORD in place of the mild and salutary COERCION of the MAGISTRACY.”
–Alexander Hamilton, The Insufficiency of the Present Confederation to Preserve the Union, Federalist #20, Nov. 23, 1787.

“To coerce a State would be one of the maddest projects ever devised. No State would ever suffer itself to be used as the instrument of coercing another. This being the case, can we suppose it wise to hazard a civil war? Suppose Massachusetts, or any large state, should refuse, and Congress should attempt to compel them, would they not have influence to procure assistance, especially from those states which are in the same situation as themselves? What picture does this idea present to our view? A complying state at war with a non-complying state; Congress marching the troops of one state into the bosom of another; this state collecting auxiliaries, and forming, perhaps, a majority against its federal head. Here is a nation at war with itself. Can any reasonable man be well disposed towards a government which makes war and carnage the only means of supporting itself — a government that can exist only by the sword? Every such war must involve the with the guilty. This single consideration should be sufficient to dispose every peaceable citizen against such a government. “
–Alexander Hamilton, Debate in New York Ratifying Convention, June 20, 1788.

“The question fairly stated is, Has the Constitution delegated to Congress the power to coerce a State into submission which is attempting to withdraw or has actually withdrawn from the Confederacy? If answered in the affirmative, it must be on the principle that the power has been conferred upon Congress to declare and to make war against a State. After much serious reflection I have arrived at the conclusion that no such power has been delegated to Congress or to any other department of the Federal Government. It is manifest upon an inspection of the Constitution that this is not among the specific and enumerated powers granted to Congress, and it is equally apparent that its exercise is not “ necessary and proper for carrying into execution “ any one of these powers. So far from this power having been delegated to Congress, it was expressly refused by the Convention which framed the Constitution. ¶It appears from the proceedings of that body that on the 31st May, 1787, the clause authorizing an exertion of the force of the whole against a delinquent State came up for consideration. Mr. Madison opposed it in a brief but powerful speech, from which I shall extract but a single sentence. He observed: 'The use of force against a State would look more like a declaration of war than an infliction of punishment, and would probably be considered by the party attacked as a dissolution of all previous compacts by which it might be bound.' Upon his motion the clause was unanimously postponed, and was never, I believe, again presented. Soon afterwards, on the 8th June, 1787, when incidentally adverting to the subject, he said: ‘Any government for the United States formed on the supposed practicability of using force against the unconstitutional proceedings of the States would prove as visionary and fallacious as the government of Congress,’ evidently meaning the then existing Congress of the old Confederation. ¶Without descending to particulars, it may be safely asserted that the power to make war against a State is at variance with the whole spirit and intent of the Constitution. Suppose such a war should result in the conquest of a State; how are we to govern it afterwards? ¶Shall we hold it as a province and govern it by despotic power? In the nature of things, we could not by physical force control the will of the people and compel them to elect Senators and Representatives to Congress and to perform all the other duties depending upon their own volition and required from the free citizens of a free State as a constituent member of the Confederacy. But if we possessed this power, would it be wise to exercise it under existing circumstances? The object would doubtless be to preserve the Union. War would not only present the most effectual means of destroying it, but would vanish all hope of its peaceable reconstruction. Besides, in the fraternal conflict a vast amount of blood and treasure would be expended, rendering future reconciliation between the States impossible. In the meantime, who can foretell what would be the sufferings and privations of the people during its existence? The fact is that our Union rests upon public opinion, and can never be cemented by the blood of its citizens shed in civil war. If it can not live in the affections of the people, it must one day perish. Congress possesses many means of preserving it by conciliation, but the sword was not placed in their hand to preserve it by force.”
–James Buchanan, Presidential Address Before Congress, December 1860.

Even if one surmises that Hamilton was being disingenious about his true convictions, nonetheless one must give weight to the preponderance of pleadings made to secure ratification of the Constitution. Hamilton may have pushed for a plan of complete consolidation at Philadelphia, but his motions were tabled, and he conceded the preeminence of the States as he pleaded for adoption of the Constitution in his state's ratifying convention. Hamilton's words in the New York ratifying convention are particularly damning for centralizing nationalists. Madison reminds us, "the legitimate meaning of the Instrument must be derived from the text itself; or if a key is to be sought elsewhere, it must be not in the opinions or intentions of the Body which planned & proposed the Constitution, but in the sense attached to it by the people in their respective State Conventions where it received all the authority which it possesses." All authority which it possesses! The Anti-Federalists are said to be the losers with the adoption of the U.S. Constitution, but they were profoundly influential in shaping the consensus that developed. The nationalists were defeated as well.

For all these reasons, I have no use for centralizing nationalists that would argue to the contrary. It remains the height of folly to claim that state inferiority was original intent... or that the States have no say when the federal government operates outside of the scope of its delegated powers. While the Anti-Federalists may not suceeded in getting a Constitution entirely amenable to them, we must not forget that those who advocated for a national polity lost as well. The consensus at the 1787 Convention, and the subsequent State Ratifying Conventions from 1788-1789 was for a federal polity! "Sovereignty is the highest degree of political power, and the establishment of a form of government, the highest proof which can be given of its existence," observes John Taylor of Caroline. "The states could have not reserved any rights by articles of their union, if they had not been sovereign, because they could have no rights, unless they flowed from that source. In the creation of the federal government, the states exercised the highest act of sovereignty... But the union possesses no innate sovereignty, like the states; it was not self-constituted; it is conventional, and of course subordinate to the sovereignties by which it was formed."

In our time, centralizing nationalists can appeal to the opinions and views aired at the Philadelphia Convention by nationalists like James Wilson, but they would be ignoring the reality that the nationalists were summarily defeated. In Federalist #40, Madison rhetorically asks, "What are these principles? Do they require that, in the establishment of the Constitution, the States should be regarded as distinct and independent sovereigns? They are so regarded by the Constitution proposed." To disavow any doubt on the matter regarding state sovereignty, the passage of the Tenth Amendment in 1791 placed the states' rights keystone and the doctrine of enumerated powers clearly within the fabric of the Constitution. Finally, proponents of coercive action against States are neither faithful to the Constitution or true republicans. Consolidators, centralizers and advocates of state inferiority represent the party of constitutional usurpation. True republicans find their vindication in principle and in right not might... Consolidators can boast of their triumph, but they do not have original intent on their side.

I can e-mail a profound compilation of quotations to further substantiate my claims.

# posted by Ryan S. : 9:48 PM