Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site 3comvax.UUCP Path: utzoo!linus!decvax!bellcore!petrus!scherzo!allegra!oliveb!3comvax!michaelm From: michaelm@3comvax.UUCP (Michael McNeil) Newsgroups: net.politics Subject: Re: Sometimes I (don't) agree with Don Black Message-ID: <244@3comvax.UUCP> Date: Tue, 8-Oct-85 18:38:39 EDT Article-I.D.: 3comvax.244 Posted: Tue Oct 8 18:38:39 1985 Date-Received: Fri, 11-Oct-85 07:26:20 EDT References: <774@x.UUCP> Distribution: net Organization: 3Com Corp; Mountain View, CA Lines: 60 > C'mon line eater! > > Note: This is STella Calvert, a guest on decvax!frog!wjr > > The Constitution was voted in by a majority (not a unanimity) of the > states. It was then forced on states that did NOT support it. How > many of the signers of the Declaration signed the Constitution? I > believe that is where we "strayed off the path". Note that when the > _Confederacy_ attempted to secede, the United Statists in their > coercive majesty dragged those states back (and forgot about black > rights as soon as politically expedient). I enjoyed your article, STella, but I found myself disagreeing with the above paragraph. I'm no expert on the U.S. Constitution, history, or law, but my memory of the historical events was that after nine out of thirteen states approved the Constitution, the accord went into effect between them. However, the non-signatory states were under no compulsion to join the Union -- in fact they could not be compelled to since at the time they were independent states. All of the original holdout states eventually, over the next two years, did approve the Constitution and join the United States, with the State of Rhode Island being the final laggard. The states joined for a number of reasons, commercial, political, and social. Many people feared a future as small, Balkanized states. Americans had recently freed themselves from European domination, and many wondered if small independent states could continue to fend off the imperial powers. "Independent" states could also look forward to strong trade barriers at the border. A "common market" was one of the attractive benefits of the Union. Certainly, one can imagine Rhode Island, say, continuing to reject the Constitution and evolving alongside the United States as a sort of American Luxembourg. But, the fact is that no state chose this route, and instead all chose the Union. In acceding to the U.S. Constitution, the states also acceded to the Constitutional provision which declares it to be the "supreme law of the land." Now, once having agreed that the U.S. Constitution -- and its institutions such as the Congress -- are the "supreme law of the land," where do the signatory states get the idea that they can unilaterally withdraw? Don't get me wrong, I believe that states can legally withdraw from the Union -- but it seems clear that the Congress must acquiesce. The Confederate States did not get Congress's approval before attempting to dismantle the Union! -- Michael McNeil 3Com Corporation "All disclaimers including this one apply" (415) 960-9367 ..!ucbvax!hplabs!oliveb!3comvax!michaelm Life, even cellular life, may exist out yonder in the dark. But high or low in nature, it will not wear the shape of man. That shape is the evolutionary product of a strange, long wandering through the attics of the forest roof, and so great are the chances of failure, that nothing precisely and identically human is likely ever to come that way again. Loren Eiseley, *The Immense Journey*, 1946