James,

I realize the current "states rights" is not about race.  But I would
disagree with you about whether or not it is true of "states rights" in
1861.  The officially stated position of the secessionists was "states
rights", but the core issue was slavery.  Support for states rights as the
secessionists understood them was support for slavery, de facto (regardless
of whether one personally supported slavery or not).  It's historical
revisionism to suggest otherwise, IMHO.

I believe that Madison (and Jefferson) anticipated a strong federalism in
what they left us, even as they affirmed states rights.

Chad

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "James W. Allen" <jallen@...>
To: <soundofgrace@...>
Sent: Wednesday, June 16, 2004 7:12 AM
Subject: Re: [soundofgrace] southern presbyterian racism


> Hello, Chad. Without for one minute defending race slavery or racism, I
> would take issue with this phrase in your post:
>
> You wrote: "Yep.  "States rights" is code for "racism"."
>
> Here, you make an error of anachronism. I would agree that for many people
> in the 1950's-`970', "states rights" was a code word for racist
segregation.
> However, that simply was not true in the 1800's. The question of the
extent
> of the rights of states under the Tenth Amendment was and is a legitimate
> debate of law. Recall that the New England states were the birthing ground
> of the theory of secession (in the War of 1812) and the struggle between
> Hamiltonian federalism (with a strong central government) and Jeffersonian
> federalism (with a weak central government) was a legitimate issue
divorced
> from racism. That Jeffersonian federalism lost is due to the forces of
> history. In the last few years, the Supreme Court has revitalized this
> debate by holding in favor of "states rights" in a number of contexts, not
> least of which is holding that the federal government's employment laws
> cannot bind state governments in many settings.
>
> Thus, when you say " I firmly believe the founding fathers intended
> federalism" you "beg the question" of what "federalism" meant to them. In
> fact, it meant different things to different people then (and now) and a
> disagreement over the power of the federal versus state governments is
not,
> by its nature, a dispute based in racism.
>
> Even in the current day, the debate about "states rights" and federal
> control is not always about race. Environmentalists have argued for states
> rights in regulating the environment contrary to federal law, unions have
> argued for "states rights" to enact pro-union laws contrary to federal
law,
> and Christians have argued "states rights" to protect what they perceive
as
> pro-Christian state policies from federal control.  Ultimately, Judge Roy
> Moore's odd little fight over his Ten Commandments monument was about
states
> rights. He claimed that the federal government (through its courts) had no
> right to order him (a state Chief Justice) in regard to decorating his
> courthouse.
>
> In the fight about integration, "states rights" was used as an emotional
> rallying cry, an excuse for racists to hold onto their segregation, but
> outside that historical context, it has never been a "codeword for
racism."
>
> James W. Allen
> jallen@...
>
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