The point of states rights was supposed to be a check against federal power. It would limit the ability of the federal government to decide top to bottom what states could do. Right now, that would be a great limit on Trump. Personally, I feel far too much power is put in the federal government. People really hate that some states will do bad things, but overall I think it would be good. We would have had gay marriage and legal weed.
How are they being screwed?
In some states. In other states we would probably still have segregation.
In some ways I would prefer greater autonomy for states but one problem we have now is that a lot of states are simply not productive enough. I guess we could let migration solve that problem, but that might just make it worse too.
Meh. You overlook the enormous power of multinational capitalism & the basic premise of divide & conquer in order to profit. If we're to remain a free people the power & organizational level of govt has to scale up to match that of corporate interests. If not, we'll end up as lords & serfs.
And what happens when that strong central government gets corrupted by those same companies. Literally every time in history, a strong central government has had corruption with said companies. So who protects us from our protectors?
When you make the central government powerful, you give the incentive for companies to consolidate their efforts in corrupting that one thing.
And what happens when that strong central government gets corrupted by those same companies. Literally every time in history, a strong central government has had corruption with said companies. So who protects us from our protectors?
When you make the central government powerful, you give the incentive for companies to consolidate their efforts in corrupting that one thing.
And what happens when that strong central government gets corrupted by those same companies. Literally every time in history, a strong central government has had corruption with said companies. So who protects us from our protectors?
When you make the central government powerful, you give the incentive for companies to consolidate their efforts in corrupting that one thing.
Are you saying that all western nations are currently suffering from regulatory capture? That seems to be pretty wrong.
Having a stronger central govt does not preclude stronger state govts as well. You paint them as oppositional when the truth is that Repubs want weak govt at all levels.
It's often zero sum. A strong central government can say that a drug is illegal, and can stop states from making it legal. A strong central government can make gay marriage illegal and the states must follow.
How could a state be strong and a central government be strong? Strong is relative to the other side.
It was the federal govt that forced gay marriage onto many states. It's the same with civil rights & women's rights as well. Child labor. Pure food & drugs. Pollution. Workplace safety. Financial regulation. States like Alabama would have very weak govt & third world poor if it weren't for continuous injection of federal funds to keep them afloat.
W/O a strong federal judiciary we'd have christian authoritarians like Roy Moore running roughshod over people's rights like they did 100 years ago.
Only after forcing marriage to be defined as man and woman. I think you forgot DOMA. Just like it was the federal government that said women can't vote, and a state was the first to allow it.
You may want to visit your examples again.
The federal government never forced marriage to be defined as man and woman and the federal government never barred women from voting. DOMA said states weren't required to recognize OTHER states' gay marriages and nothing more.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defense_of_Marriage_Act
So the 14th amendment did not explicitly say male in it? I'm pretty sure it did.
Also, here is the intro to DOMA.
The Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) (Pub.L. 104–199, 110 Stat. 2419, enacted September 21, 1996, 1 U.S.C. § 7 and 28 U.S.C. § 1738C) was a United States federal law that, prior to being ruled unconstitutional, defined marriage for federal purposes as the union of one man and one woman, and allowed states to refuse to recognize same-sex marriages granted under the laws of other states. Until Section 3 of the Act was struck down in 2013 (United States v. Windsor), DOMA, in conjunction with other statutes, had barred same-sex married couples from being recognized as "spouses" for purposes of federal laws, effectively barring them from receiving federal marriage benefits.
The federal government never forced marriage to be defined as man and woman and the federal government never barred women from voting. DOMA said states weren't required to recognize OTHER states' gay marriages and nothing more.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defense_of_Marriage_Act
The 14th amendment prohibits denying the right to vote to men, it does not require denying the right to vote for women. Those were always state level choices.
Right, and as per your quote there is zero in there that prohibits states from recognizing same-sex marriage. In fact while DOMA was the law of the land large numbers of states did exactly that. The federal government chose what IT defined as marriage, (as it still does) but never forced any other entity to abide by its definition.
I think that is splitting hairs though. The federal government was used to deny rights of others.
The reason for it being done on the federal level and not state by state was because its far easier to get the fed to do it vs individual states.