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Can the union kick out a state!

sudden valley gunner

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Constitutionally I feel they can.

For example The federal constitution mentions the guarantee of every state to have a republican form of government. If a state decided to become a monarchy, there is no constitutional provision for the feds to force a people to a government they do not want. (applies to secession too). This appears to me that the union can boot a state for not having a republican form of government. After all isn't voluntary unions a two way street?

Also then a republic would be a representative government of sovereigns. In a state this would be the individuals would it not? It makes sense a few times Madison uses the words sovereign states if he was actually referring to the sovereign peoples who make up the state.
 

utbagpiper

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For example The federal constitution mentions the guarantee of every state to have a republican form of government. If a state decided to become a monarchy, there is no constitutional provision for the feds to force a people to a government they do not want. (applies to secession too).

I think the federal constitutional guarantee of a republican form of government is along the same lines as the 14th amendment guarantee of equal protections. If a State refuses to abide these terms, the feds do have authority to enforce them. A republican form of government is as much a guarantee of individual rights as are the provisions in the BoR now incorporated via the 14th amendment.

The very form of government--a republican form--is what the founders determined was the best way to secure individual rights and liberties: better than a monarchy, better than pure democracy, way better than anarchy.

Now, if a State chooses to secede that is another matter.

I consider it a deficiency of our federal constitution that it does not spell out explicitly what is required for a legitimate secession. If 50%+1 of legislators or even voters wanted to secede for the purpose of re-instituting slavery among the racial minorities living in the State, or to ban RKBA, or to force a State sponsored religion on all residents, I think we would agree it would be a good thing for the feds to step in and protect the rights of the minority about to be oppressed.

But we should be able to imagine some orderly process by which a State could secede while guaranteeing the rights of its citizens, including, perhaps, super-majority thresholds, accepting some portion of the national debt/obligation, treaties for existing rights-of-way, and buying out those who wanted to relocate to a State remaining in the union.

Charles
 

Citizen

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Constitutionally I feel they can.

For example The federal constitution mentions the guarantee of every state to have a republican form of government. If a state decided to become a monarchy, there is no constitutional provision for the feds to force a people to a government they do not want. (applies to secession too). This appears to me that the union can boot a state for not having a republican form of government. After all isn't voluntary unions a two way street?

Also then a republic would be a representative government of sovereigns. In a state this would be the individuals would it not? It makes sense a few times Madison uses the words sovereign states if he was actually referring to the sovereign peoples who make up the state.

Not since 1865 it isn't.

Of course, that is like saying the school-yard bully taking your lunch money settled the question of who has rightful title to your lunch money.

Historical contradiction (meaning Lincoln lied). Everybody has heard of the Articles of Confederation. Fewer know the full title of the document: Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union. Emphasis on perpetual. So, we've got a situation where it was OK for states to dissolve a forever treaty of union to replace it with a constitution. But, states who wanted in 1861 to leave a union, the founding document of which neither forbids leaving nor states perpetuity, were declared in rebellion. According to some govern-ers, you can dissolve an expressly perpertual union, but you can't leave a union that isn't perpetual and doesn't forbid leaving.

But, yeah. It makes sense based on being a two-way street.

However, I'm not so sure about the guarantee of a republican form of government. I'm a little curious now; thanks for mentioning this. The more I think about it, the more I suspect the guarantee doesn't mean exactly that the federal government will intervene to enforce a republican form of government in a state. Even against the voters' wishes. I'm wondering if the guarantee isn't leaning more toward guaranteeing the states that the federal government will always maintain itself is a republican government. I shall have to re-read the constitution.
 
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Citizen

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SNIP However, I'm not so sure about the guarantee of a republican form of government. I'm a little curious now; thanks for mentioning this. The more I think about it, the more I suspect the guarantee doesn't mean exactly that the federal government will intervene to enforce a republican form of government in a state. Even against the voters' wishes. I'm wondering if the guarantee isn't leaning more toward guaranteeing the states that the federal government will always maintain itself is a republican government. I shall have to re-read the constitution.

Its in Article IV, Section 4.

The United States shall guarantee to every state in this union a republican form of government, and shall protect each of them against invasion; and on application of the legislature, or of the executive (when the legislature cannot be convened) against domestic violence.

Since the guarantee occurs before the semi-colon and along with protection against invasion, I am guessing it is a guarantee the fedgov will intervene if unrepublican forces get the upper hand and control of a state government.

Anybody got any historical sources on this? Maybe Madison's notes taken during the constitutional convention.
 

utbagpiper

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Not since 1865 it isn't.

Of course, that is like saying the school-yard bully taking your lunch money settled the question of who has rightful title to your lunch money.

Sadly, when one side is so very wrong on a fundamental question like slavery, it is not surprising that certain more subtle points get lost. I note that the war started when a State military unit opened fire on a federal military base. Having given consent for the federal government to place that military base there and thus having turned over ownership and control of the land to the federal government, one might argue the State was not entirely within its rights to demand the feds pack up and leave land that had been voluntarily turned over to them.

Not to mention the small question of protecting the rights of black americans being held as slaves.

Yes, yes. We all know slavery was not the primary cause of the war on either side. We also know it ran like an under-current through almost all of the disagreements between North and South. It was the issue that persuaded Northern Citizens to support a war they would have otherwise abandoned after the first brutal year or two.

Interesting and revealing that you, the great articulator of INDIVIDUAL rights looks at the War Between the States not from the perspective of protecting the rights of equal men held against their will in perpetual slavery, but from the perspective of the "right" of voting citizens of a State to succeed for the express purpose of continuing slavery. Seems you hate government more than you love individual rights.

I also note that refusal to respect the rights of blacks seems to be at the root of much bad federal law in this nation.

To be sure, the North was/is no less racist than the South. But having achieved less obvious segregation long ago, Northern racism was less overt, less objectionable, more difficult to use as justification for expanding federal power.

In other words, most of the expansion of federal power you so hate was done precisely (and to a first order, successfully to protect the individual rights of an unpopular racial minority against infringement. But you seem to hate government more than you love individual rights. As in the case in the Middle East where some clearly hate their enemies more than they love their own children, such raw hatred clouds judgement and leads to all kinds of counterproductive and self-harming conduct.

Charles
 

Citizen

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SNIP Sadly, when one side is so very wrong on a fundamental question like slavery, it is not surprising that certain more subtle points get lost. I note that the war started when a State military unit opened fire on a federal military base. Having given consent for the federal government to place that military base there and thus having turned over ownership and control of the land to the federal government, one might argue the State was not entirely within its rights to demand the feds pack up and leave land that had been voluntarily turned over to them.

Oh, jeez.

Beauregard didn't fire on Sumpter until long after they'd given them notice to leave. In fact, it wasn't until Lincoln deliberately decided to re-supply Sumpter by ship that he gave the order to fire.

Lincoln had every chance to recognize the state's sovereignty, recognize that nothing in the constitution forbade secession. The historical record shows inescapably that Lincoln knew he might provoke South Carolina by re-supplying that fort. While I think it was really dumb for Beauregard to fire on Sumpter--let himself be provoked, Lincoln had no business keeping troops there. It was unconstitutional to prevent SC's secession. It was equally unconstitutional to occupy their territory after secession.

Moreover, don't even try to raise the slavery issue. Lincoln said in his first inaugural address that he intended to collect import duties from southern ports. Various parts of the northern population might have rightfully been opposed to slavery, but Lincoln wanted control and fedgov income from import taxes. In fact, Lincoln is on record saying slavery was not his issue. He would save the union by freeing the slaves, or save the union by letting them stay enslaved. He wanted to unconstitutionally force union on secessionist states.
 
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utbagpiper

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Oh, jeez.
My thoughts exactly. So fixated on hate of the government, you overlook the individual rights of slaves.

Beauregard didn't fire on Sumpter until long after they'd given them notice to leave. In fact, it wasn't until Lincoln deliberately decided to re-supply Sumpter by ship that he gave the order to fire.

On what right does a State compel a property owner to leave just because the State wants to change its form of government? Under the federal constitution, the feds can only construct forts with the consent of the State in which the fort is to be constructed. And I expect at the time Sumter was built, we were still giving heed to that requirement. Having given consent for the feds to take control of that land, the State essentially gave the land to the feds and lost all rights to evict them.

Lincoln had every chance to recognize the state's sovereignty, recognize that nothing in the constitution forbade secession. .... It was unconstitutional to prevent SC's secession.

Agreed.

It was equally unconstitutional to occupy their territory after secession.

Disagree. Even had the feds recognized SC's right to secede, it would have retained title to the land and the fort. Prudence would have been to negotiate terms for SC to purchase the fort and improvements.

Prudence would have been for SC and the rest of the slave States to recognize the unspeakable injustice of slavery and to have brought it to a peaceful end long before it reached the boiling point of war.

Moreover, don't even try to raise the slavery issue.

Why not? South Carolina did in the first paragraph of her secession document:

To wit:
"The people of the State of South Carolina, in Convention assembled, on the 26th day of April, A.D., 1852, declared that the frequent violations of the Constitution of the United States, by the Federal Government, and its encroachments upon the reserved rights of the States, fully justified this State in then withdrawing from the Federal Union; but in deference to the opinions and wishes of the other slaveholding States, she forbore at that time to exercise this right...."

Forms of the word slave or slaveholding appear 18 times in that document.

"an increasing hostility on the part of the non-slaveholding States to the institution of slavery, has led to a disregard of their obligations"

"A geographical line has been drawn across the Union, and all the States north of that line have united in the election of a man to the high office of President of the United States, whose opinions and purposes are hostile to slavery. He is to be entrusted with the administration of the common Government, because he has declared that that "Government cannot endure permanently half slave, half free," and that the public mind must rest in the belief that slavery is in the course of ultimate extinction."

"On the 4th day of March next, this party will take possession of the Government. It has announced that the South shall be excluded from the common territory, that the judicial tribunals shall be made sectional, and that a war must be waged against slavery until it shall cease throughout the United States"

"Taxes" appears only once, and that in reference to the direct taxes on the 3/5ths of a person each slave counted toward for such purposes.

"Tariffs" appears not at all.

Now, I believe the War Between the States was a violation of the Constitutional right to secede. But I believe slavery to be a greater evil than not being permitted to secede.

Lincoln said in his first inaugural address that he intended to collect import duties from southern ports. Various parts of the northern population might have rightfully been opposed to slavery, but Lincoln wanted control and fedgov income from import taxes. In fact, Lincoln is on record saying slavery was not his issue. He would save the union by freeing the slaves, or save the union by letting them stay enslaved. He wanted to unconstitutionally force union on secessionist states.

He is also on record as believing the nation cannot survive half free, half slave and that slavery must end.

Whatever he may have said, South Carolina's own secession document makes clear that for them--mistaken or not about Lincoln's views on slavery--they are seceding almost exclusively over the issue of slavery.

And once the war started, and then dragged on beyond the four month walk in the park expected by the Union soldiers looking to punch their tickets of manhood and adventure, Lincoln made clear his intent to end slavery at numerous times including in his Emancipation Proclamation.

Some important balances of power between the States and feds were destroyed with the War. Lincoln shredded individual rights in his waging of the war. And Reconstruction after his assassination was a crime that damaged not only the South, but the nation, and quite arguable race relations for the next century.

But the war brought about the end of slavery. It ended the greatest abuse of individual rights in our nation's history.

Furthermore, as an anarchist, you have no more love for State governments than you do the federal government. Ultimately what gives a "coercive [State] government" any more legitimacy than held by the federal government? Especially a State government that places such a high value on enslaving a substantial portion of its population?

If an anarchist wants to look to an example of government abuse of rights, he might look to something other than the feds not recognizing the right of a slave State to secede for the express purpose of continuing slavery. Rather, he might point to the State government's extreme efforts--including attacking their brethren at Fort Sumter--to continue the indefensible abuse of individual rights that is slavery.

That is, if he loved individual liberty more than he hated government.

Charles
 

sudden valley gunner

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Not since 1865 it isn't.

Of course, that is like saying the school-yard bully taking your lunch money settled the question of who has rightful title to your lunch money.

Historical contradiction (meaning Lincoln lied). Everybody has heard of the Articles of Confederation. Fewer know the full title of the document: Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union. Emphasis on perpetual. So, we've got a situation where it was OK for states to dissolve a forever treaty of union to replace it with a constitution. But, states who wanted in 1861 to leave a union, the founding document of which neither forbids leaving nor states perpetuity, were declared in rebellion. According to some govern-ers, you can dissolve an expressly perpertual union, but you can't leave a union that isn't perpetual and doesn't forbid leaving.

But, yeah. It makes sense based on being a two-way street.

However, I'm not so sure about the guarantee of a republican form of government. I'm a little curious now; thanks for mentioning this. The more I think about it, the more I suspect the guarantee doesn't mean exactly that the federal government will intervene to enforce a republican form of government in a state. Even against the voters' wishes. I'm wondering if the guarantee isn't leaning more toward guaranteeing the states that the federal government will always maintain itself is a republican government. I shall have to re-read the constitution.

I don't think the intention was to involve itself in a sovereign state at all or the the constitution would have never been ratified. For some to compare it to the 14th amendment which came much later and the modern interpretation of "incorporation" was never its intent either is definitely someone trying to make the constitution fit his agenda.

Which leaves the conclusion that if the sovereigns choose a non republican form of government the only way the federal government can guarantee that every state in the union was republican was to remove the state from the union.
 

sudden valley gunner

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My thoughts exactly. So fixated on hate of the government, you overlook the individual rights of slaves.

Lie. Dishonest attribution of a persons character and what was said.



On what right does a State compel a property owner to leave just because the State wants to change its form of government? Under the federal constitution, the feds can only construct forts with the consent of the State in which the fort is to be constructed. And I expect at the time Sumter was built, we were still giving heed to that requirement. Having given consent for the feds to take control of that land, the State essentially gave the land to the feds and lost all rights to evict them.

LOL...wrong....there can be an expectation of paying back which was being discussed by the northern states who were accepting seccession.



Disagree. Even had the feds recognized SC's right to secede, it would have retained title to the land and the fort. Prudence would have been to negotiate terms for SC to purchase the fort and improvements.

Prudence would have been for SC and the rest of the slave States to recognize the unspeakable injustice of slavery and to have brought it to a peaceful end long before it reached the boiling point of war.

Anyone with any knowledge of the political history knows this is false. Ending slavery would not have prevented the war.





To wit:
"The people of the State of South Carolina, in Convention assembled, on the 26th day of April, A.D., 1852, declared that the frequent violations of the Constitution of the United States, by the Federal Government, and its encroachments upon the reserved rights of the States, fully justified this State in then withdrawing from the Federal Union; but in deference to the opinions and wishes of the other slaveholding States, she forbore at that time to exercise this right...."

Wow take one document by one state ignore the part about frequent violations of the constitution part, and wrongly build a whole case that somehow ending slavery would have prevented the war.



He is also on record as believing the nation cannot survive half free, half slave and that slavery must end.

With qualifiers about keeping it for free "white" labor.

Whatever he may have said, South Carolina's own secession document makes clear that for them--mistaken or not about Lincoln's views on slavery--they are seceding almost exclusively over the issue of slavery.

Except this ignores the fact that Lincoln supported the Corwin amendment, and had sent several messages making it clear he wouldn't touch slavery if the states stayed in the union, yet he promised higher tarrifs, and more socialistic corportism.....yep republican party the party of unconstitutional big government.

And once the war started, and then dragged on beyond the four month walk in the park expected by the Union soldiers looking to punch their tickets of manhood and adventure, Lincoln made clear his intent to end slavery at numerous times including in his Emancipation Proclamation.

For free white labor, for a war measure. Apparently you have not read the emancipation documentation that allowed northern states to keep their slaves, and border states the union had won too. It freed no slaves.

Some important balances of power between the States and feds were destroyed with the War. Lincoln shredded individual rights in his waging of the war. And Reconstruction after his assassination was a crime that damaged not only the South, but the nation, and quite arguable race relations for the next century.

Not some it destroyed all the balance, making states mere provences.

But the war brought about the end of slavery. It ended the greatest abuse of individual rights in our nation's history.

An accidental by product. Slavery was on its way out anyway.

Furthermore, as an anarchist, you have no more love for State governments than you do the federal government. Ultimately what gives a "coercive [State] government" any more legitimacy than held by the federal government? Especially a State government that places such a high value on enslaving a substantial portion of its population?

Utter bullspit. Red herring and straw all mixed up with false equivocations. We can discuss anything we want. Whether an anarchist likes it or not is irrelevant. We live under the unconstitutional federal government, is it wrong to expect it to live up to the law that governs it while we do? If a state is illegitimate than a federal government at this point is 50 times more illegitimate. You are not anti slavery, as Spooner rightly points out the actions of the federal government greatly increased slavery. Your continual dishonest making it about slavery for us, is untruthful and not christ like.

If an anarchist wants to look to an example of government abuse of rights, he might look to something other than the feds not recognizing the right of a slave State to secede for the express purpose of continuing slavery. Rather, he might point to the State government's extreme efforts--including attacking their brethren at Fort Sumter--to continue the indefensible abuse of individual rights that is slavery.

What a crock of oversimplified crap. Your dishonest tactic and presenting a false dichotomy of your own choice after falsely accusing someone else of a false dichotomy is duly noted.

That is, if he loved individual liberty more than he hated government.

The smaller the state the closer to individual liberty it is. Your apologia for the empire marches on undaunted.

By the way after this ridiculous off topic tyrade full of fallacies and dishonest character attacks, you have no standing to ever whine about something being off topic, or be quick to push the tattle button again.
 
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sudden valley gunner

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What precisely is a republican form of government? We can see that democracy didn't mean what it is taken as now, maybe the meaning of republic has also drifted - or been spinned.

From the Wikipedia, the elect are to exercise their delegated power in accordance with the rule of law. To that extent, we haven't enjoyed republicanism for a loong time and Obama delights in rubbing our noses in it.

I tend to agree it has drifted. Seems some think a republican government now means the agent (federation) is more powerful or even has the same amount of power than the principles (the states, sovereigns).
 

OC for ME

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Constitutionally I feel they can.

...
Yes. Will they? No.

There are some states that have better economies than the republic...

The country folk, back then, likely did not even know that they were bound to the feds, by their city folk brethren, untill it was too late. All water under the bridge now...follow the money. Work to get your state to remove prior restraints on our liberties.
 

OC Freedom

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Yes. Will they? No.

There are some states that have better economies than the republic...

The country folk, back then, likely did not even know that they were bound to the feds, by their city folk brethren, untill it was too late. All water under the bridge now...follow the money. Work to get your state to remove prior restraints on our liberties.

In this whole thread of back and forth opinions, we finally have OC for ME hit this dead on. Every political action that happened then and now comes down to one thing, "MONEY" or as OC for ME stated, " Follow the Money" if you want to find the truth.
 

sudden valley gunner

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Yes. Will they? No.

There are some states that have better economies than the republic...

The country folk, back then, likely did not even know that they were bound to the feds, by their city folk brethren, untill it was too late. All water under the bridge now...follow the money. Work to get your state to remove prior restraints on our liberties.

+1

I find it an interesting question for discussion. We so often discuss a states right of secession. Yet I have never seen any constitutional discussion on the union of states saying "get out" to another state.
 

solus

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SVG, thanks for starting this thread as the initial responses, with one exception which you responded to quite nicely, this entire conversation has been enlightening to me.

ipse
 

deepdiver

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I remember reading an analysis on this issue, from either secession on expulsion by or of a state, from a legal perspective not all that many years ago. I do not recall much of it beyond the concepts involved but I'll offer what I do recall.

The basic premise of the analysis is that each Union-State relationship post Constitution is essentially a contract between Union and state. The Territory asks to be admitted to the Union as a state, the Union agrees and a contractual Compact of Statehood is entered. The argument ran that secession or expulsion is not a constitutional issue but rather a legal issues, specifically a contract law issue. The way it would be invoked is through a suit for breach of contract. All of this was different for the original signatories of the constitution as they are bound differently being original signatories.

The way that would work (again, as I recall the argument) would be say Texas argues that the Union is breaching its duty to the state to protect its international border. So TX sues the US for material breach of contract and argues that the breach is so egregious as to void the terms of the contract and releasing TX from the terms thereof which means it is no longer subject to the terms of statehood and for all purposes is therefore no longer a member state of the Union. Expulsion would operate similarly but would also require an act of congress, IIRC, ratifying the undoing of what they voted to ratify in the first place.

I know that sounds convoluted and I wish I remembered it more clearly and/or recalled the entire statehood process to put it in better context. Perhaps someone else read this and has a better recall of both the analysis and statehood law to put more sense to the topic. I remember finding the entire thing fascinating at the time and I think it was written in response to a secession movement in Montana at the time but again, it is all a bit fuzzy.
 

Citizen

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SNIP I know that sounds convoluted ...

Not at all. It makes a lot of sense. Most of the pro-secession and pro-states-rights arguments I've read are founded on the same underlying principles but without necessarily going into that level of detail. I don't know that I would make it matter of contract law*, contract law being subordinate to a constitution; but, the same common-sense logic applies.


*ETA: Whoa! Hang on just a second. Not necessarily! Doesn't the US constitution have a clause forbidding congress from undermining contract law? Meaning, doesn't the constitution expressly state contract law shall not be diminished by congress; and, since that law pre-dates the constitution, maybe even have the weight of centuries of common law, making the constitution self-subordinate to contract law? Lemme find that clause.

ETA2: Dang it. Its a restriction on states. Article I Section 10:

"No state shall enter into any treaty, alliance, or confederation; grant letters of marque and reprisal; coin money; emit bills of credit; make anything but gold and silver coin a tender in payment of debts; pass any bill of attainder, ex post facto law, or law impairing the obligation of contracts, or grant any title of nobility."

However, if a state can't do it, then a state can't possibly have delegate the authority to the fedgov to do it. Also, I don't see anywhere in the constitution that the fedgov has the enumerated power to impair the obligation of contracts. And, I can't imagine a viable rational argument that such would be an implied power arising from one of the enumerated powers. So, maybe framing secession as a matter of contract law isn't such a bad idea after all. Expulsion would be a different matter, no? Without an enumerated power to expel a state, the fedgov couldn't do it constitutionally. And, I can't think of any implied powers that would allow expulsion.
 
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