[alexamenos]

Originally Posted by SeanL

You seem to be confused on how the constitution works. Specific rights aren't enumerated in the constitution.

Seriously?

You mean specific rights like freedom of speech, or the press, or the right to peacably assemble, or petition the government for redress of grievances, etc., etc...

Are these the sort of specific rights which aren't enumerated in the constitution? Because they are quite specifically enumerated in the constitution.

I think it'd be slightly more plausible to say that the enumeration of specific rights within the constitution does not negate other rights not enumerated in the constitution, or per the 9th:

The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.

That's not too hard to understand, is it?

But of course the next question is "oh yeah, sez who?" and that, imo, is plainly addressed in the 10th:

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

The answer to the aforementioned question, "oh yeah, sez who?" is "the States respectively, or to the people"...it damn sure doesn't say "The Supremes on High."

So when the Supremes on High step in to the States and start enumerating unenumerated rights, what they're doing is what the old folks used to call "usurpation".

Usurpation: illegal seizure and occupation of a throne.

It's a full-on power play, a territorial pissing match over who gets to be the king with the United States stepping across a very clearly delineated boundary.

Personally, I'm a little partial (not committed, much less devoted...just partial) to some old school liberal superstitions, "self-government" being on of those kinds of thing. I'm also a bit of a fan of the principle of subsidiarity, and my guess is the dead white guys that wrote the constitution were quite familiar with the concept if not the exact same phrase.

Moreover, or maybe as a subset of subsidiarity, I think it's good to have what I like to call a "separation of powers", not just functionally, but geographically as well. In this I mean that it's wise to have political subdivisions that are not...well...merely geographical subdivisions of the super power.

Anyhoo...I think if you take a regard for self-government and mix in a little principle of subsidiarity, then you get an argument for State's having...let's call it a "right"....to tell the United States to go away from time to time.

Mix in the fact that Constitution unequivocally states that powers not delegated to the federal government are reserved to the states and you have a pretty fair case for the constitutionality of "State's Rights."

(And i haven't even mentioned yet that we could bring back Jim Crow laws if only we had State's Rights!)

But I digress.

We all know that the "rule of law" is situational, and that political power comes out of the business end of a gun. Any question of "State's Rights" was effectively put to rest by 1865.