Should a state be allowed to veto federal laws ? (user search)
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  Should a state be allowed to veto federal laws ? (search mode)
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Question: Should a state be allowed to veto federal laws ?
#1
Yes
 
#2
No
 
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Partisan results

Total Voters: 33

Author Topic: Should a state be allowed to veto federal laws ?  (Read 4177 times)
Peter
Junior Chimp
*****
Posts: 6,030


Political Matrix
E: -0.77, S: -7.48

« on: December 30, 2004, 02:20:00 PM »

If individual states have the right of veto over federal laws then what you have is no longer a federal system by definition, it has become a confederal system.

In the specific example of the United States, State nullification is specifically contradicted by the Supremacy clause. If a State feels a federal law is unconstitutional it has the remedy of judicial process, its citizens have electoral process, and if that all fails they have revolutionary war, however the latter is obviously an act of treason.
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Peter
Junior Chimp
*****
Posts: 6,030


Political Matrix
E: -0.77, S: -7.48

« Reply #1 on: January 02, 2005, 10:16:26 AM »

No. By the very nature of things, any federal law that's not based in the constitution is null and of no affect. A nullification act is just an officail acknowledgement of it.

There must be a method for deciding whether a law is constitutional or not. It is best that we leave such decisions to the (theoretically at least) impartial judiciary who have spent a life time studying the Constitution as opposed to the inherently partisan state legislatures.

Lunar rightly points out that State Legislatures are not bodies of Constitutional experts, they are by definition partisan bodies. If we start allowing partisan bodies to decide what the Constitution means as you suggest, then we will arrive at the situation you most fear - partisans making up what they think the Constitution should be.

Your logic is total bollocks and arrives at a conclusion that opens the United States to anarchy with 50 separate interpretations of the same federal law.

You are free to disagree with me and the Constitutional experts as to what the Constitution says, and I'll happily go round for round with you on many issues, you never know, I might end up agreeing with you.

For the record, my opinion
Privacy - right is inherent in the Constitution
Abortion - right is not a reasonable extrapolation from privacy, but is protected under right to life when health or life of mother is threatened. The federal government has no authority to legislate on this matter, only the States do.
If you want me to justify either of those, feel free.
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