March 18, 2009 News+Opinion » Features

Popular state sovereignty bills draw comparison to Civil War posturing 

Are You Breaking Up With Me?!

by Greg Hambrick

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The threat is only implied in more than two-dozen state sovereignty bills making the rounds in legislatures across the country, except for a New Hampshire bill where the authors didn't hold back. Any law infringing on the state's right to self govern would trigger the dissolution of the nation: "All powers previously delegated to the United States of America by the Constitution ... shall revert to the several states individually."

The S.C. House of Representatives has approved a resolution with the same state's rights concerns (but omiting the dire consequences), and the Senate is expected to soon take up a similar resolution.

S.C. State Rep. Michael Pitts (R-Laurens), who authored the House bill, says that it's not as much a threat to the Union as it is a "wake-up call." Federal mandates have strained his patience, particularly those laws relating to gun control and the treatment of illegal immigrants. Threats aren't necessary, he says.

"If Washington doesn't wake up and our economy keeps going the way it is going, I don't think we'll have to dissolve the union," he says. "It won't be able to stand."

Political revolts against federal laws are nearly as old as the nation itself. From trading to slavery to civil rights, states have felt put-upon by Washington's mandates. But it was a political standoff on Charleston's shores in 1832 that framed the argument leading to the Civil War.

It was a stand for state's rights that applied similar language to what we're seeing in the present-day debates over sovereignty, says Civil War historian W. Scott Poole, an associate history professor at the College of Charleston.

"I was fairly horrified actually," Poole says upon reading Pitt's House bill. "It clearly harkens back to nullification."

"King Street, King Street"

A federal tariff on European imports was crippling sections of the South Carolina economy in the late 1820s, and there was no relief following the election of President Andrew Jackson in 1828. The mounting tension led the state to nullify the tariff in November 1832. The challenge from South Carolina was likely one of the worst of Jackson's presidency, writes Newsweek Editor-in-Chief Jon Meacham in American Lion, his 2008 book on Old Hickory's years in office.

The state would continue to collect the fee for several months while it awaited other southern states to join the protest. In the meantime, Jackson ordered ships to the Charleston Harbor to ensure the tariff was collected and to protect federal interests in anticipation of armed revolt. But secessionists weren't as well positioned in other states, and South Carolina nullifiers were left to stand alone. Even among its own residents, there were unionists in S.C. who felt strongly that the nation must be preserved.

In one particular exchange cited in American Lion, the political debate nearly led to a brawl in the streets of Charleston, according to a letter by the Rev. Samuel Cram Jackson.

A group of people supporting nullification "staked out King Street downtown," and they sent word to federal supporters, called Unionists, who had gathered nearby that they should use Meeting Street or risk a confrontation, according to Meacham.

"The warning infuriated the Unionists," Meacham writes, going on to quote the letter from Samuel Cram Jackson: "Their blood was up, to think that the nullifiers should dictate the street they should walk in. The cry resounded, 'King Street, King Street.' Before they left their hall, they organized into companies, chose their leaders, and promised implicit obedience. Both parties were armed with clubs and dirks." It looked to be 500 nullifiers, compared to 1,000 Unionists. The confrontation was eventually resolved without a battle. According to Samuel Cram Jackson, "it was owing entirely to the firmness and wisdom of the leaders that the streets of Charleston did not run down with blood."

Without support from other states, and citing the threat of federal force, South Carolina accepted a compromise tariff in early 1833, ending the political standoff.

Meacham notes a letter from Jackson soon after the resolution that reveals he understood the real goal of the state's nullification posturing.

"The tariff was only the pretext, and disunion and southern confederacy the real object," Jackson wrote. "The next pretext will be the negro, or slavery question."

Back to the Future

As in 1832, some have claimed the modern argument over state sovereignty is in response to the crippling financial crisis, like the Republican Caucus of the state Senate.

"While Congress continues its irresponsible spending spree and grows our debts on the backs of hardworking South Carolina taxpayers, many Senate Republicans are pushing a resolution to reaffirm our state's sovereignty under the United States constitution," wrote spokesman Wesley Donehue in a recent caucus release.

But, once again, it is about more than just money.

Pitts notes he first designed his bill in response to mandates that the state provide education and emergency medical treatment to illegal aliens. And it goes beyond that to other concerns, like the threat of stricter gun control laws under the new Democratic administration, Pitts says, as well as Bush-era policies, like No Child Left Behind and the Patriot Act. Authors of sovereignty bills in other states have also made reference to federal abortion laws.

The U.S. government has been continuously overstepping its bounds since Roosevelt, Pitts says. "They send money to the states with strings attached."

But courts have determined that it's Washington's prerogative to require states to spend the money it provides in a particular way, says College of Charleston political science professor William Moore. Today, states are even more dependent on federal aid than they were 200 years ago.

"If you have your hand in the government pocket, you're going to have to abide by those requirements," he says.

The threat of secession in the New Hampshire bill has doomed its passage as it was overwhelmingly rejected by the state House earlier this month, but South Carolina is poised to approve its sovereignty resolution, which avoids declaring such drastic consequences.

Pitts, an Army veteran and retired police officer, stresses he doesn't want to see South Carolina secede from the Union, though he's candid enough to note that "we have very little in common with the West Coast."

The struggle in 1832 was only a prelude to the secessionist battle to come decades later. Jackson framed the argument for preserving the union in his response to South Carolina's nullification threat.

"To say that any state may at pleasure secede from the union is to say that the United States is not a nation," Jackson wrote. "Because the union was formed by a compact, it is said that the parties to that compact may, when they feel themselves aggrieved, depart from it; but it is precisely because it is a compact that they may not. A compact is a binding obligation."

His words suggested a resolve in the heart of Washington that would truly be tested years later on the battlefield. Recollections of the blood spilled in that war between the states likely kept New Hampshire from approving its recent preamble to revolt. It will likely also keep other states like South Carolina from doing more than stomping their feet in dissatisfaction.

TenthAmendmentCenter.com
  • TenthAmendmentCenter.com

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States need not nullify their status in the Union... only demand their Constitutional rights be honored irrespective of the Federal Courts or the Congress.

As a sovereign... each state may demand its residence and employers to remit all taxes directly to their respective capitals... there to be held until the Federal Government renews its respect for the Constitution and the several states rights. Such action by the several states would put Washington on notice that they have gone to far in their wild interpretation of their Constitutional authority.

The Federal Courts and police agencies including the IRS could be nullified in their power to enforce their mandates by each states legislature, Administration and Courts standing in opposition at the local level. Putting these agencies on notice that their unconstitutional usurpation of States rights under the 9th and 10th Amendments… and their abuse of the 1st thru 8th Amendments placed upon their local citizens will no longer be tolerated.

When a Federal court or the administration acts to impose its unconstitutional mandates on the people of the several states… the local authority should rise up, to restrain their power as one of the checks and balances of our federal system... The several states may use the State militia, local sheriff/law enforcement agencies, and magistrates to restrain federal officials, from imposing their unconstitutional mandates on the citizens and government of their sovereign state.

It is doubtful that the military and its membership comprised of citizen officers and soldiers would support any order to engage the several states... especially, if the states reserved their power to restraining federal judges, and enforcement agents etc.

Best Regards;

RA Nelson

Posted by RA Nelson on May 3, 2009 at 10:47 PM | Report this comment

Yet it is the Abortion question, that scares off otherwise supportive people, who would benefit from states asseting their tenth ammendment rights, on behalf of thier citizens.

And as distasteful as bringing up this old chesnut/gordian knot on the forum here, I'll have to give my two cent's worth, even in the face of igniting the blinding back and forth yet again.

Imagine those on the pro-life, and pro-choice sides, staking postions on the top and bottom (or left-and-right, maybe) broad side of a infinitely long two-edged TRANSPARENT GLASS SWORD floating in space, walking back and forth endlessly, from tip to handle, looking for that magic spot to painlessly traverse over that sword's deadly razor-sharp edges, to the other side, to make their attack, kill their enemy, and finally claim that coveted prize: eternal control over the woman, and her vagina, and what comes out of it, and their own destiny filled with god-like power, through it.

Each side, being able to see the other through that transparent glass sword, hurls taunts and catcalls at the other, daring them to jump over and fight, secretly hoping that those who will, catch the razor-sharp edges and meet their doom, so that there will be less effort exerted for victory when the BIG BATTLE someday commences.

On the rough hewn handle, and at the butt end of this two edged glass sword in space, is all the pregnant women of the world, walking aimlessly, round and round, on thier tippy-toes, holding their swollen bellies, with pained looks on thier faces, nervously awaitng the outcome, and their ubiqutous fates, hoping, for the best outcome for themselves, yet, solemny resigning themselves to the worst, because they believe they will never be in control of the war, nor of thier collective fate.

Yet neither the pregnant women on the rough-hewn handle, nor the male and female combatants on the either side of the glass sword, realize, that they are not in control of the sword as it travels in space to a unknown, perhaps final, destination.

And, as this sword travels in space, it spins, on its long axis, faster, than a speeding bullet whizzing through air. For some on this sword, it is gravity keeping them grounded to the suface of the glass, cheerfully continuing thier unyeilding campaign of taunts for the other side to jump and hopefully die, blisssfully unaware that others, find themselves flung off to their unknown doom.

Even more mind-boggling that this trasnparent glass sword is so straight and true, that where the thickest part of the middle of this blade should be, is only the thickness of a baby's one fine hair.

and the breadth of this blade is wider than all the lengths of oceans put together. No one can truly see where the edge is, determining comfort zone for safety. Sure, many have claimed to know, even sold others "knowlegde", but none can REALLY be sure.

Guessing games and wild wagers have become the passtime for not only the combatants, when they sometimes tire of the never-ending taunts, but for the pregnant handle-walkers, to keep themsleves in better spirits as they walk aimlessly round the round handle, whenever their arms tire of holding their swollen bellies, and keeping thier feet on thier tippie-toes, and grow bored of keeping thier solemn vigils of bleak resignation.

Some of the combatants and handle walkers have become so dispondent of the never ending wait for the BIG BATTLE, that they have given up all hope, and try to find that unseen edge, to maybe fall on it themselves, bringing welcome relief through doom, hoping, that will shame all into stopping the unending torment each side brutally wages on the other, and remembering those who wanted relief from the unyielding drumbeats of the coming BIG BATTLE. Failing at finding that hoped-for edge, some have made edges of their own, or even allowed the spinning of the sword to fling them off. Yet the efforts of those who left, appear in vain, for the insufferable taunts both sides inflict on the other, continue, blissfully unabated.

All the while, this sword continues cutting through space, speeding faster than light itself, unswerving, by the bustlings of the millions and millions upon it, toward a destination none dare wonder, to an end none dare dream.

Posted by KaptBlasto on March 30, 2009 at 1:22 AM | Report this comment

We have elements even in our mostly Liberal State of Wisconsin to push for a State Sovereignty bill. Even the people here are "starting" to realize the ONE and ONLY true meaning of FREEDOM and why it is so important to Liberty and INDIVIDUAL prosperity.
FREEDOM means freedom from government or self government under natural laws and equal justice of the Ten Commandments as inscribed on the doors of The Supreme Court where Moses, tablets in arms, looks down from the mosaic on the wall.
Without FREEDOM and Liberty, we will all be broke under a hybrid of Socialism / Communism and Fascism, leading to nothing more than the EQUAL DISTRIBUTION OF MISERY with the exception of the cronies of The Government in huge Corporations, huge Banks, huge Unions and the officials and employees of BIG Government.
THE FEDERAL RESERVE "SYSTEM" is controlling the whole works because they control all of the money. The fact is that the IRS collects ALL INCOME TAXES and, according to the publically available GRACE Commission Report of 1983 to President Reagan, goes DIRECTLY to THE FEDERAL RESERVE company. A private International Corporation owned by forty mostly foreign individuals and I have the list of owners.

Capt. Karl
THE LIBERTY TREE LANTERN

Posted by Capt. Karl on March 24, 2009 at 6:33 PM | Report this comment

The Federal Government only has money because it takes it from it's citizens. If you refuse, they just take everything else you got. They bailed out every rich pac represented... auto, banks, finance, etc, while the IRS says I owe 2500 and they threaten to levy my bank accounts, take my house, cars, whatever.
I see no help for the "ant colony" that serves as the engine of this country, just more of the take take take for us.
As far as Im concerned, the United States of America is the best country on earth.. but the US Government is an enemy of the people of that country.
Way to go those states with a set of balls.

Posted by charleston2 on March 24, 2009 at 9:04 AM | Report this comment

Secession is far from the point of the state sovereignty movement. Rather, it is this sort of common knee-jerk first-impression association with secession and the old Deep South that prevents many people from understanding with and identifying with what the 9th and 10th Amendments are really about. "State Sovereignty" was a buzzword used in the 1960s by states like Alabama and Mississippi in their attempts to defy racial integration of schools mandated by Brown v. Education, and "secession" was the cry of the Confederacy seeking to retain slavery in the 1850's. This is not associated with either of those causes, though both states' rights and sovereignty are the issues.

The Federal Government has grown to become a separate entity with its own vested self-interests, quite apart from the interests of the people. The 9th Amendment requres Popular Sovereignty to be the law of the land. It says that, though the Federal Government derives its power from the Constitution, the Constitution derives *its* power form the people, who do not abdicate that power by consenting to lend it to the government. The 10th Amendment denies the Federal Government any powers that are not specifically outlines in the Constitution, which are very few and do not include any power to rule domestically over the people. The New Hampshire resolution, defeated in the NH House, references the fact that the original 13 states, of which SC is one would never have ratified the Constituion without the inclusion of these two amendments.

See http:www.statesovereignty.org for more news, information and discussion on this topic. This is becoming a massive movement that I believe will gain momentum all across this great country.

Posted by Rex in Alabama on March 19, 2009 at 4:23 AM | Report this comment

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