Civil War History - Secession and PoliticsWas it Slavery, or was it States Rights? Perhaps it was the election of Lincoln? What were the real reasons for Southern Secession and what were the political issues in this time of war? Find your answers here in the Secession and Politics Disussion.
And I leave you with a quote by Supreme Court Justice Benjamin Nathan Cardozo:
"The Constitution was framed upon the theory that the peoples of the several states must sink or swim together, and that in the long run prosperity and salvation are in union and not division."
Sincerely,
Unionblue
__________________ "The American people and the Government at Washington may refuse to recognize it for a time but the inexorable logic of events will force it upon them in the end; that the war now being waged in this land is a war for and against slavery." Frederick Douglass
"Loyalty to our ancestors does not include loyalty to their mistakes." George Santayana
It seems to me that one implication of your argument is that the States are no more sacrosanct than than the Union. The People, at least in theory, formed the States; the People through the States then formed the Union. Why can not, say, the People of New York City, meet in convention tomorrow and vote to form their own State, or their own Republic, separate from both the State and the Union?
I would say that, it New York city was being abused, that such would be up to the people of New York City to decide that the abuse is unacceptable. First, in our federal system, if the State of New York didn’t intervene in some way to stop the Union from abusing New York City, then the issue would be between people of New York city and their State government. The people of New York City would have to decide whether continued membership in the Union and the State of New York would be worth it. But this would be a natural right of revolution. I don’t know enough about New York State’s constitution to know whether a constituent part of the State can leave. But as Alex Hamilton noted in the NY State Convention, there is a fundamental difference between the relationship between the people and their State governments and the relationship between the people and the Federal government. Hamilton said that the people were delegating only specific powers, whereas the people delegated every power to their State governments except those powers that the people had specifically reserved. (June 28, 1788. “That the states have an undoubted right to lay taxes in all cases in which they are not prohibited, is a position founded on the obvious and important principle in confederated governments, that whatever is not expressly given to the federal head is reserved to the members. The truth of this principle must strike every intelligent mind. In the first formation of government, by the association of individuals, every power of the community is delegated, because the government is to extend to every possible object; nothing is reserved but the unalienable rights of mankind: but, when a number of these societies unite for certain purposes, the rule is different, and from the plainest reason — they have already delegated their sovereignty and their powers to their several governments; and these cannot be recalled, and given to another, without an express act.” Elliott’s Debates, vol. II, pg. 362-363.) This distinction between the powers of the State and Federal governments was absolutely essential.
Quote:
Originally Posted by elektratig
It is no answer, I think, to say that they cannot do so because New York City is a creature of the State of New York -- which is just another way of saying (I think) that the City lacks sovereignty. The issue is not whether the City has sovereignty, but whether the People of the City have sovereignty -- and are the People not always sovereign?
I believe that in examining the nature of the forming of the Union, the key and central role of the people of the States (not the State governments, who are merely their agents) should not be undervalued. In our system, the decision of the people of the States, acting for themselves as a people delegated Federal powers & formed the Union.
Quote:
Originally Posted by elektratig
Put yet another way -- for I fear I'm not expressing myself well -- you argue (apologies if I'm misconstruing) that the People never gave up the right, on a state-by-state basis, to reassert their sovereignty to extent of walking away from the federal constitution. But by similar logic, it seems to me, any group of the People -- a town, a county, a region -- would have the same right to walk away from the federal and/or state government. I don't understand why the State is the irreducible unit of sovereignty (or maybe you're not saying that).
Where sovereignty ultimately lies is an important question. The view expressed by those advocates of the Constitution in the State Conventions of 1787-1790 show, pretty clearly, that the Federal Government would have certain limited and enumerated powers (including powers normally associated with sovereign states, such as the power to engage in foreign policy, as Luther Martin pointed out).
Montesquieu (widely read by the Founders) had said that only small countries could remain as republics; that a nation covering a large territory would inevitably end up with a despotic government. Anti-Federalists in 1787-1790 asserted that would be the case if the United States became a consolidated nation-state. Federalists universally countered that the proposed Union was not a consolidated government, but one of only specific and limited powers. This key distinction was absolutely essential in gaining the concurrence of the people of the States top the new system. To then turn around post-facto and assert that the United States government was indeed a consolidated government would be to break faith with the people and render the agreement subject to voiding by its contractors: the people of the States.
Quote:
Originally Posted by elektratig
If you think about it, the issue is not entirely theoretical, although NYC may not be the best example. It's not so far fetched to imagine at some point the People of the San Francisco-Oakland-Berkeley area voting to establish an independent pacifist-socialist-gay-green republic (or whatever), thereby severing all ties with the hated fascist Red States; or the southern portions of Arizona and California forming the independent republic of Mexifornia. Could they do so?
If the people of Berkeley found the US engaging in a foreign war without the benefit of a congressional declaration of war to be morally unacceptable and unconstitutional, then we would have an interesting debate. (Knowing Berkeley, I bet that discussion is happening now anyway).
My bringing the point up is merely to respond to Tim’s allegation that no secessionist said that they were engaging in a revolution. Of course, some did specifically say that their act was a revolution. (And I believe that defining what exactly constitutes revolution in a federal system is an inquiry worthy of thought, which is why I presented by NJ case; not that it is likely, but that the case highlights some interesting thoughts). I am not saying that the Union must accept secession if a State withdraws and says it is engaging in revolution. But I do insist that unionism, as acted on in 1861 was (a) anti-democratic (it was the Federal government that was attempting to overthrow popularly-elected State governments not the reverse), and (b) was without constitutional sanction. In order for the Federal government to legitimately exercise a power, that power must be specifically delegated to the Federal government by the people of the States. The Union insisted that the seceding States were still in the Union, and therefore, the limitations on the Federal powers vis-à-vis the States still applied. No power to overthrow popularly-elected republican governments was delegated, therefore, it does not legitimately exist. The Union had the same power to invade the seceding States that it has to invade Mexico, but to cloak the act of overthrowing republican State governments in the trappings of defending the Constitution and the ideals of democratic governance is more than a little disingenuous.
Secession is, in my view, an extremely useful brake on what might otherwise be a potentially unrestricted central power. If the majority chooses to abuse a minority to the point that the minority would choose independence (and all the risks associated with it) rather submission, then the majority has to re-examine how far it wants to go in enforcing its views. I would not suggest that every political conflict should end in secession, in most cases, the majority might have reason to stop and think about how far they can push their agenda. To assert the idea that no State can leave without congressional approval (or the approval of the majority of the States) would leave me to ask where, short of the NJ case I provided, the limits are. Taken to its logical extreme (as in the NJ case), a written constitution is a gross deception and the Founders were either fools or liars.
Respectfully,
John Taylor
__________________ "In this Constitution, the citizens of the United States appear dispensing a part of their original power in what manner and what proportion they think fit. They never part with the whole; and they retain the right of recalling what they part with." James Wilson of Pennsylvania, October 28th, 1787
Sandefur’s article is interesting from several perspectives.
Any attempt to recast past events to fit a modern political perspective is fraught with difficulty and interpretative pitfalls. A Marxist interpretation of the Crusades, for example, would be hazardous because, to my knowledge, no Crusader (or Muslim defender) was motivated by Marxism. The philosophy simply didn’t exist yet. In Sandefur’s case, he is looking at the founding of the Republic and the eruption of the Civil War from the perspective of a certain branch of libertarian thought. I am unaware of any of the Founders (or seceders) who considered themselves libertarians. They were men acting on their beliefs and interests. Sandefur seems to be engaging in historical anachronism; looking at events of 1861 and looking for the solutions to the problems in the period 1787-1790. The problem with this view is that history plays out in one direction, from the past towards the future. No one knows the destination when starting out on a particular journey. Sometimes, the choices made were not the only possible choices, yet Sandefur’s article seems to treat the events as they happened as the only possible events that could have happened, and then goes back to antecedent events, and bastes them in an air of inevitability. I don’t look at the founding and the ratification of the Constitution with a view to what eventually happened 80 years later. I don’t look at the Constitution with an eye toward what it should say. I look at it with an eye to what it meant to those who had it within their power to examine it, and adopt or reject it, and the conclusions they drew.
Some general critiques of Sandefur’s piece are in order.
1. He seems to mistake the people of the States with the State governments.
2. Sandefur mistakes eventual unanimity (of the State Conventions) for inevitable unanimity. Article VII of the Constitution shows this to be incorrect. (“The Ratification of the Conventions of nine States, shall be sufficient for the Establishment of this Constitution between the States so ratifying the Same.” Emphasis added) On August 30th, 1787, Madison remarked that if the blank should be filled with "seven" eight, or "nine"-the Constitution as it stands might be put in force over the whole body of the people, tho' less than a majority of them should ratify it.” James Wilson countered that “As the Constitution stands, the States only which ratify can be bound.”
3. Sandefur engages repeatedly in begging the question. His fallacious reasoning goes something like this: “Secession is unconstitutional. Sobran says secession is permissible. Sobran is wrong. Therefore secession is unconstitutional.”
4. Sandefur confuses the idea of governmental powers with the idea of sovereignty.
5. Sandefur seem unaware that advocates of ratification went to great lengths to assure the cautious that limitations on Federal powers were a key aspect in the safety of the system.
I will address specific criticisms of Sandefur where his articles warrants it.
“It is important to keep in mind the distinction between secession and revolution.” Sandfeur might have been kind enough to take this opportunity to explain the difference to us.
“there is no greater legal fiction than ‘state sovereignty,’ or ‘the right to secede.’” Here Sandfeur engages in the first of several attempts to beg the question. The question of whether there is a right to secede is one of the issues in question in the paper. Starting off with the conclusion if fallacious.
"Declaration of Independence, for instance, was issued in the name of the “thirteen united States of America,” who, as “one people” were breaking their former political bonds, and declaring that “these united colonies are free and independent states.”
One might wonder why Quebec, Nova Scotia and the rest of what is not Canada weren’t included. This is not a frivolous question. I happen to think that it has something to do with the will of the people in those colonies.
Here is an example of Sandefur looking at what eventually happened, and assuming that this was the only possible outcome. But the people of what is now Canada could have joined in the Revolution, but they chose not to. Nobody in the more southern colonies had much of a problem with that. And it didn’t undermine the legitimacy of their revolution, because that revolution was based on the desires of the people of the colonies for independence.
“Considering them as political beings, they were dumb, for they could not speak to any foreign sovereign whatever. They were deaf, for they could not hear any propositions from such sovereign.”
Because they people of the States decided that they wanted to have their federal government handle that sovereign power for them all, collectively.
“Charles Cotesworth Pinckney of South Carolina answered that ‘[t]he separate independence and individual sovereignty of the several states were never thought of by the enlightened band of patriots who framed this Declaration; the several states are not even mentioned by name in any part of it,—as if it was intended to impress this maxim on America, that our freedom and independence arose from our union, and that without it we could neither be free nor independent.’”
I am not aware if anybody ever hinting that Rhode Island’s refusal to ratify the Constitution would cause her to revert to her former status as a British colony. Her independence was not philosophically dependent on her membership in the Union.
Really what Pinckney was really trying to do here was to invest the Constitution with and air of inevitability. To convince the delegates to the South Carolina Convention not to think too long about ratifying, but just to get on with ratifying.
“The new Constitution would solve this problem by creating a new kind of government—one of “divided sovereignty,” partly national and partly federal, in which all of the people of America would vest the national government with a part—limited and enumerated—of their sovereignty.”
The people of the States, through the Constitution, delegated sovereign powers to the Federal government. There was debate over where sovereignty ultimately lay. There was unanimity, however, that the Federal powers would be limited to those specifically enumerated in the Constitution.
“The national sovereignty would therefore be totally separate from the sovereignty of the states.”
And when that agent expands its own powers beyond the limits that the people of the State placed on those powers for their own safety and happiness, that Federal government is in rebellion against the will of the people.
“The Constitution did not consolidate the states entirely, but “[s]hould all the States adopt it, it will be then a government established by the thirteen States of America, not through the intervention of the Legislatures, but by the people at large.”
Each State deciding for itself and for itself alone. If the people of any State refused to ratify, they would be independent. And since the people every State had the power to not ratify and strike out on their own, final, absolute sovereignty (the power form which there is no appeal) lay with the people of each State to decide for itself.
This is why the Constitution was ratified by special ratification conventions rather than state governments: to make clear that the states were not parties to the Constitutional compact.
No, the States weren’t, but the people of the States were.
"Divided sovereignty (also called “dual sovereignty”), was the principal innovation of the Constitution. While the strong-union view saw ratification as simply an overhauling of the union, to the weak-union view, ratification reformed the sovereignty of the states as well as of the federal government."
But only to the extent agreed to, and within the limits the sovereigns, the people of the States placed on the Federal powers.
In addition, the Federal government was only empowered within those States that were members of the Union.
“In order to recognize this leading principle, the proposed system sets out with a declaration, that its existence depends upon the supreme authority of the people alone.”
Not by the people at large, but by the people of the States, each State deciding for themselves.
“So while the states would, for the most part, retain their sovereignty, ratification meant that the whole people of the United States would now agree to vest their inchoate power to engage in, for example, foreign policy, in the federal government, which would be supreme for the limited, enumerated purposes of the Constitution (such as the power to engage in foreign policy)”
Here Sandefur is being sloppy. The purposes of the Union are “to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity.” To achieve these purposes, the people delegated certain specific, enumerated powers to the Federal government.
“No political dreamer was ever wild enough to think of breaking down the lines which separate the States, and of compounding the American people into one common mass.”
And yet, the views of Marshall (and Sandefur) would do just that.
“These sources—as well as those cited in my previous articles—reveal how well understood was the central fact that the Constitution was a government of the whole people of the United States, not a league or treaty of states in their corporate capacities."
But only for certain powers, limited by the Constitution.
“Only ‘We the People’ are members of the club, and only that “people” which created it can change it,”
Here Sandefur has backed into the truth. That is why we secession wasn’t enacted by the State Governments, but by State Conventions.
“The Constitution guarantees to every state a republican form of government, prohibits states from entering into any compact with other states without Congressional permission, and prohibits states from entering into any “Treaty, Alliance, or Confederation,” even with Congressional approval. These clauses would be rendered null if secession were constitutional."
Here Sandefur’s argument is particularly weak. Can Canada “enter into any Treaty, Alliance or Confederation?” And why is that? Because they are not part of the United States. More relevantly, could Rhode Island enter into a treaty if she had never ratified? The key point of this clause, a point apparently lost on Sandefur, is that these clauses only apply to States in the Union. It has no relevance to the issue of whether States could leave the Union.
“If a state can unilaterally secede, then any group of criminals might declare themselves the “rightful” government of a state, and issue a proclamation of secession—and then the federal government could do nothing.”
Here Sandefur is engaging in a particularly egregious straw man. Likening leaders of secession to criminals. Actually, the people of the States decided that their States should leave the Union. One wonders if Sandefur is intending to liken the people to criminals. If so, it is a sentiment worthy of Pol Pot.
“First, since the Constitution does prohibit secession, that power cannot be reserved to the states.”
Sandefur begs the question again here. He starts with his conclusion. And reverse-engineers his argument.
“… any more than the United Nations can “reserve” any rights to the people of the United States.”
Once again, Sandefur confuses the Federal Constitution and the Federal Government.
“[i]f a more explicit guard against misconstruction was not provided,” wrote Madison in 1831, “it is explained in this as in other cases of omission, by the entire absence of apprehension that it could be necessary.”
In 1788, when it counted, Madison said just about the opposite,. On June 6th, he said, "the powers of the federal government are enumerated; it can only operate in certain cases; it has legislative powers on defined and limited objects, beyond which it cannot extend its jurisdiction.”
“In my response, I pointed out that only three states did so—only one of which did later secede—and I quoted these alleged reservations, showing that they actually referred not to any reserved right to leave the union unilaterally, but simply to the right of the people to revolution, which neither I, nor Madison, nor Lincoln, ever denied.”
So, according to Sandefur, actual reservations, mean nothing. Perhaps they were intended solely to deceive the people into ratifying?
“Why did the Confederacy fire on Fort Sumter? Why did they break the supreme law of the land by declaring themselves no longer part of the union? The answer is, in order to preserve their slave property from interference by the federal government.”
Here, Sandefur is engaging in another strawman. Slave property wasn’t threatened with any interference (except restriction from the Territories). Sandefur could probably find out why the seceding States seceded. Why the deception? If the record doesn't support one's argument, then the record is not wrong. Chances are that your argument is.
“The Confederacy seceded, not in response to the initiation of force, but in response to the election of Abraham Lincoln.”
Perhaps Mr. Sandefur should spend some more time researching the record, and less time reading Claremont Institute propaganda.
“And I am infinitely saddened to see that many people, including many libertarians, believe the Constitution was a counterrevolutionary document which sold out the principles of the Revolution and inevitably tended toward the bloated, centralized government of today.”
Yet, Sandefur’s philosophy makes bloated centralized government possible. Opposition to a Federal government that refuses to respect the limits the people of the State placed on it would have kept the government from becoming bloated and centralized.
In conclusion, Sansdefur is engaging in that least legitimate of historical endeavors: trying to force the record to fit modern opinions and philosophies. His time would be better spent reading works like Elliot’s Debates and seeing what the Founders really said, not what Harry Jaffa and the Claremont Institute says they said.
Respctfully,
John Taylor
__________________ "In this Constitution, the citizens of the United States appear dispensing a part of their original power in what manner and what proportion they think fit. They never part with the whole; and they retain the right of recalling what they part with." James Wilson of Pennsylvania, October 28th, 1787
Thanks for your post. After studying it at length, I'd prepared a response on another computer -- that I don't have access to now (it's a long story). Because I'm too lazy to recreate the whole thing, for the time being I'll try to explain briefly what's still bothering me.
Let me start with the quote that sent me down this road:
"Perhaps nothing was more symptomatic of [John] Adams's divergence from the mainstream of American thought than his inability to understand what the defenders of the new Constitution, the Federalists, had done to the concept of sovereignty. Instead of locating sovereignty in either the national or the state governments, the Federalists had located it in the people at large. By asserting that all sovereignty rested with the people, the Federalists were not simply saying, as theorists had for ages, that all governmental power was derived from the people. Instead they were saying that sovereignty, the final supreme indivisible lawmaking authority, remained always with the people and that government was only a temporary and limited agency of the people -- lent out to the various governmental officials, so to speak, on a short-term, always recallable loan. No longer could any parts of the state and federal governments, even the so-called popular houses of representatives, ever fully represent the people; instead all elected parts of the governments -- senators and governors and presidents -- were now regarded in one way or another as simply partial agents of the people. Some were suggesting that even judges were agents of the people."
Gordon S. Wood, "The Relevance and Irrelevance of John Adams", in Revolutionary Characters: What Made the Founders Different (Penguin Press 2006, at pp. 191-92.
The implications of the passage are stunning. Conceptually, the relationship between the people and their state constitutions is identical to the relationship between the people and the federal constitution. In both cases, the sovereign people made temporary loans of certain governmental powers.
If that is the case, then the right of a minority of the people to secede -- if it exists -- must apply equally to the federal and state constitutions. Imagine, for example a small rural town in upstate New York, population 250. A New Age guru and his 500 followers move in and take over voting control of the town. Fearful that both the state and federal governments are going to infringe their free exercise of religion, the people of the town assemble in constitutional convention and vote 500 to 250 to secede from both the state and federal constitutions and to establish a separate republic.
Assuming that there is something wrong with this scenario, there must be a limiting principle that also preserves the sovereignty of the people. As I think about it, I am moving toward the idea that the principle must be this: the people who participate in a decision to secede must be the same group of people who are subject to the constitution from which secession is sought.
I would add that I don't think that the fact that the people ratified the federal constitution on a state-by-state basis is inconsistent with the conclusion that withdrawal or alteration of authority must be undertaken by the people as a whole. In ratifying the federal constitution, the people were in fact performing two different acts. First, they were ratifying the federal constitution. Second, they were withdrawing some of the authority they had previously lent to their state governments -- i.e., they were amending their state constitutions.
ET, Since the people had delegated powers as people of States, not as one collective people at large, I would say that sovereignty resided (resides?) in the people of the States. In Philadelphia, on August 30th 1787. Mr. Madison remarked that "if the blank should be filled with seven eight, or nine-the Constitution as it stands might be put in force over the whole body of the people, tho' less than a majority of them should ratify it." Mr. Wilson countered, that "As the Constitution stands, the States only which ratify can be bound."
On June 6th, 1787, Madison demonstrated that he had adopted this understanding: "Were it, as the gentleman asserts, a consolidated government, the assent of a majority of the people would be sufficient for its establishment; and, as a majority have adopted it already, the remaining states would be bound by the act of the majority, even if they unanimously reprobated it. Were it such a government as is suggested, it would be now binding on the people of this state, without having had the privilege of deliberating upon it. But, sir, no state is bound by it, as it is, without its own consent.” Thus every State, acting for itself, was free to refuse its assent, and become completely independent of the United States. Thus, ultimate sovereignty (the power from which there is no legitimate appeal), at least before ratification, would seem to reside in the people of each State.
In the NY case you cited, I would refer you to the NY Constitution, which differs from the intended US Constitution is at least one very key aspect: The powers of the Federal government consist only of those powers specifically delegated to it. June 28, 1788, Alec Hamilton said “The states have an undoubted right to lay taxes in all cases in which they are not prohibited, is a position founded on the obvious and important principle in confederated governments, that whatever is not expressly given to the federal head is reserved to the members. The truth of this principle must strike every intelligent mind. In the first formation of government, by the association of individuals, every power of the community is delegated, because the government is to extend to every possible object; nothing is reserved but the unalienable rights of mankind: but, when a number of these societies unite for certain purposes, the rule is different, and from the plainest reason — they have already delegated their sovereignty and their powers to their several governments; and these cannot be recalled, and given to another, without an express act.” (Elliott’s Debates, vol. II, pg. 362-363.)
Thus the powers of NY State consist of everything that is not specifically prohibited. Thus, if the Guru (or New York City) decided to secede from NY State, the State has the power to force them to remain in the State, even if these individuals chose not to, unless the NY Constitution prohibits the State from doing this. Within the Federal Union, the power to force a State to remain in the Union is not specifically delegated, therefore, it cannot be legitimately exercised. Respectfully, John Taylor
__________________ "In this Constitution, the citizens of the United States appear dispensing a part of their original power in what manner and what proportion they think fit. They never part with the whole; and they retain the right of recalling what they part with." James Wilson of Pennsylvania, October 28th, 1787
What do you make of this, from the minutes for Wednesday July 23, 1788 of the proceedings of the New York convention meeting to consider ratification of the proposed federal constitution:
"The committee [of the whole] continued the consideration of the amendments till Thursday; when Mr. LANSING moved to adopt a resolution, that there should be reserved to the state of New York a right to withdraw herself from the Union after a certain number of years, unless the amendments proposed should previously be submitted to a general convention.
"Gov. JOHNSTON. Mr. Chairman, I knew that many gentlemen in this Convention were not perfectly satisfied with every article of this Constitution; but I did not expect that so many would object to this [the Supremacy] clause. The Constitution must be the supreme law of the land; otherwise, it would be in the power of any one state to counteract the other states, and withdraw itself from the Union."
What do you make of this, from the minutes for Wednesday July 23, 1788 of the proceedings of the New York convention meeting to consider ratification of the proposed federal constitution:
"The committee [of the whole] continued the consideration of the amendments till Thursday; when Mr. LANSING moved to adopt a resolution, that there should be reserved to the state of New York a right to withdraw herself from the Union after a certain number of years, unless the amendments proposed should previously be submitted to a general convention.
I believe that Lansing's proposal was to automatically withdraw form the Union, if a bill of rights were not added within a certain timeframe. What New York did say, however, was "That the Powers of Government may be reassumed by the People, whensoever it shall become necessary to their Happiness; that every Power, Jurisdiction and right, which is not by the said Constitution clearly delegated to the Congress of the United States, or the departments of the Government thereof, remains to the People of the several States, or to their respective State Governments to whom they may have granted the same; And that those Clauses in the said Constitution, which declare, that Congress shall not have or exercise certain Powers, do not imply that Congress is entitled to any Powers not given by the said Constitution; but such Clauses are to be construed either as exceptions to certain specified Powers, or as inserted merely for greater Caution." Since the powers had been delegated by the people of the States, they could only be resumed by the same method, if "necessary for their happiness." Respectfully, John Taylor
__________________ "In this Constitution, the citizens of the United States appear dispensing a part of their original power in what manner and what proportion they think fit. They never part with the whole; and they retain the right of recalling what they part with." James Wilson of Pennsylvania, October 28th, 1787
"Gov. JOHNSTON. Mr. Chairman, I knew that many gentlemen in this Convention were not perfectly satisfied with every article of this Constitution; but I did not expect that so many would object to this [the Supremacy] clause. The Constitution must be the supreme law of the land; otherwise, it would be in the power of any one state to counteract the other states, and withdraw itself from the Union."
North Carolina Debates, Tuesday July 29, 1788.
I have always regretted that no anti-Federalist challenged this by asking Gov. Johnston what if the provisions of the Constitution were not being complied with? If a material provision of the Constitution were deliberately violated with impunity, what might the States do? Apparently, Gov. Johnston was one of those who was very keen to get the Constitution ratified and could bear to think of a dismembered Union, because of all the problems that would entail. But he was an individual delegate (albeit a prominent one). In the end, this North Carolina Convention refused to ratify the Constitution. (Did Johnston's assertion lead them not to adopt it at that time?) Later, at the second North Carolina Convention, in Fayetteville, in November 1789, and after Virginia and New York had ratified with their caveats as to resumption of delegated powers if perverted to the oppression of the people, North Carolina satisfied the doubtful by including the declaration "That Government ought to be instituted for the common benefit, protection and security of the people; and that the doctrine of non-resistance against arbitrary power and oppression is absurd, slavish, and destructive to the good and happiness of mankind." This would seem to be in line with the Virginia and New York caveats. If the Federal Government proved to be oppressive, they were not bound to obey it. Respectfully, John Taylor
__________________ "In this Constitution, the citizens of the United States appear dispensing a part of their original power in what manner and what proportion they think fit. They never part with the whole; and they retain the right of recalling what they part with." James Wilson of Pennsylvania, October 28th, 1787
"Mr. LANCASTER. Mr. Chairman, it is of the utmost importance to decide this great question with candor and deliberation. Every part of this Constitution has been elucidated. It hath been asserted, by several worthy gentlemen, that it is the most excellent Constitution that ever was formed. I could wish to be of that opinion if it were so. . ..
"How do we know that, if we propose amendments, they shall be obtained after actual ratification? May not these amendments be proposed with equal propriety, and more safety, as the condition of our adoption? If they violate the 13th article of the Confederation in this manner, may they not, with equal propriety, refuse to adopt amendments, although agreed to and wished for by two thirds of the states? This violation of the old system is a precedent for such proceedings as these. That would be a violation destructive to our felicity. We are now determining a question deeply affecting the happiness of millions yet unborn. It is the policy of freemen to guard their privileges. Let us, then, as far as we can, exclude the possibility of tyranny. . .."
NC Debate, Wednesday July 30, 1788 (emphasis added).
"Mr. SPENCER rose in support of the motion of the gentleman from Halifax. He premised, that he wished no resolution to be carried without the utmost deliberation and candor. He thought the proposition was couched in such modest terms as could not possibly give offence to the other states; that the amendments it proposed were to be laid before Congress, and would probably be admitted, as they were similar to those which were wished for and proposed by several of the adopting states. He always thought it more proper, and agreeable to prudence, to propose amendments previous, rather, than subsequent, to ratification. He said that, if two or more persons entered into a copartnership, and employed a scrivener to draw up the articles of copartnership in a particular form, and, on reading them, they found them to be erroneous, — it would be thought very strange if any of them should say, 'Sign it first, and we shall have it altered hereafter.' If it should be signed before alteration, it would be considered as an act of indiscretion. As, therefore, it was a principle of prudence, in matters of private property, not to assent to any obligation till its errors were removed, he thought the principle infinitely more necessary to be attended to in a matter which concerned such a number of people, and so many millions yet unborn. . .."
NC Debate, Thursday July 31, 1778 (emphasis added).
Thanks for your recent responses. As to Lansing's resolution, I quoted everything about it in Elliot's Debates, I believe, and it doesn't say that NY's withdrawal was to be automatic. Are you looking at other sources?
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