Early on in America's history, there was a debate on if states could just declare laws unconstitutional and nullify them. The challenge is for the 3 presidents to have their terms where people debate not that, but on if a law passed by Congress and signed by the president that violates the constitution should be enforced or not. Now this sounds stupid, what's the point of a constitution if you can ignore it without following its amendment process, but then again nullifcation by state legislature seems stupid to me.
ACH, Early America Doesn't Know How to Deal with Constution
- Thread starter Alex Zetsu
- Start date
I am not sure either what whole text really means. So is challenge that states should have right to nullficate any law if they just feel that as unconstitutional? But isn't meaning of constitution that you can't pass unconstitutional laws? So probably Founding Fathers should write so unclear consitution that no one understand what it is saying. But even then states probably should bring laws to Supreme Court. But if even they can't tell what constitution is saying.
But yeah, I am not really sure what OP is saying and what indeed would be point on constitution if no one can't understand that.
States have nullified laws throughout American history. Marijuana legalization is a recent example.
OTL: Debate on if States can decide if a law is constitutional
TTL: Debate on if Congress can decide if a law is constitutional
It doesn't mean Congress has to win, just that there is a debate as serious as OTL's debate
This sounds like the real debate would be if Congress can pass laws (since Congress won't decide a law passed by itself is unconstitutional) - unless you mean Congress deciding whether some states' laws are constitutional or not by that.
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What do you mean? The wording you made is kind of strange. Congress can pass laws
"Debate on if Congress can decide if a law is constitutional"
How would any given Congress decide that the laws it passed are unconstitutional?
The only other alternative interpretation is Congress deciding on the constitutionality of states' laws rather than federal laws.
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The same way if States decides if Congress laws' are constitutional.
In short the debate doesn't make much sense either way, but the OTL debate made no sense either
Or if Congress's laws trump the constitution.. which ahs the same effect
The common interpretation of the Constitution in the early Republic gave the states great power and the understanding of what America was veered in the direction of a compact of states united in common cause not a nation state. The interpretation of the Constitution that enabled the creation of a nation state was something that started in New England in the run up to the Civil War.
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The OP, while not worded beautifully, isn’t wildly off the mark. There have been a series of Supreme Court decisions around these subjects since the Constitution started operating. Marbury v Madison (1803) basically answered the question—that SCOTUS can ultimately decide whether a law is constitutional or not; Congress passing a law doesn’t make it constitutional.
Another one that strikes me as relevant to this discussion is Martin v Hunter’s Lessee (1816) which upheld the constitutionality of a federal statute that granted SCOTUS jurisdiction to hear appeals over federal issues from state supreme courts. VA said the Judiciary Act section that granted SCOTUS that power was unconstitutional in response to SCOTUS reversing a VA high court decision.
Anti-commandeering Doctrine has been around for a while as I understand it but most succinctly codified later— NY v US (1992) and Printz v US (1997) affirmed that the federal government (Congress and the President) can neither force state governments to pass laws administering federal policy, nor force state executive officials/employees (bureaucrats, law enforcement, etc) to enforce federal law. (States and their officials are required to follow federal court rulings. State judges are compelled to follow substantive, if not always procedural, federal law.)
As I understand it (not a lawyer), state cannabis laws aren’t nullifying federal law, they’re just a refusal to execute federal policy by the states. The feds are welcome to bust up a dispensary, but for political reasons the federal government generally chooses not to prioritize that kind of enforcement of federal law.
It would be a different matter if a state interferes with federal enforcement—if the governor sent the state police to keep the DEA from raiding a dispensary, that would be nullification. Or if a state passed a statute purporting to overturn a federal judge’s decision on a federal law issue—though I guess they could do that symbolically, but the state statute wouldn't be legally unenforceable because states can’t nullify federal law.
If the question is more about having Congress pass a resolution saying that a past statute it passed was unconstitutional, but the President disagree and say it’s constitutional, then effectively the President wins because he can enforce it anyway.
If Congress said a statute was unconstitutional, and the President agreed, they could just pass a statute repealing or replacing the original one.
Though in the former scenario, Congress could remove the President (or a judge) from office in response—in that sense, Congress could “declare” a statute or action “unconstitutional” so long as Congress has the political will to enforce its view on the other branches.
This is sort of similar to if SCOTUS says something is unconstitutional, but the President ignores SCOTUS and isn’t removed from office by Congress, then is the thing unconstitutional? Maybe on paper if you choose to believe it but not in practice. Power resides where people think it does.
I don’t really see how you have much greater debate than what we already had, short of just a series of constitutional fights and crises where, at the end of the day, I see the President enforcing his view of the Constitution mostly because he has the guns, or else states violently seceding.
Another one that strikes me as relevant to this discussion is Martin v Hunter’s Lessee (1816) which upheld the constitutionality of a federal statute that granted SCOTUS jurisdiction to hear appeals over federal issues from state supreme courts. VA said the Judiciary Act section that granted SCOTUS that power was unconstitutional in response to SCOTUS reversing a VA high court decision.
Anti-commandeering Doctrine has been around for a while as I understand it but most succinctly codified later— NY v US (1992) and Printz v US (1997) affirmed that the federal government (Congress and the President) can neither force state governments to pass laws administering federal policy, nor force state executive officials/employees (bureaucrats, law enforcement, etc) to enforce federal law. (States and their officials are required to follow federal court rulings. State judges are compelled to follow substantive, if not always procedural, federal law.)
As I understand it (not a lawyer), state cannabis laws aren’t nullifying federal law, they’re just a refusal to execute federal policy by the states. The feds are welcome to bust up a dispensary, but for political reasons the federal government generally chooses not to prioritize that kind of enforcement of federal law.
It would be a different matter if a state interferes with federal enforcement—if the governor sent the state police to keep the DEA from raiding a dispensary, that would be nullification. Or if a state passed a statute purporting to overturn a federal judge’s decision on a federal law issue—though I guess they could do that symbolically, but the state statute wouldn't be legally unenforceable because states can’t nullify federal law.
If the question is more about having Congress pass a resolution saying that a past statute it passed was unconstitutional, but the President disagree and say it’s constitutional, then effectively the President wins because he can enforce it anyway.
If Congress said a statute was unconstitutional, and the President agreed, they could just pass a statute repealing or replacing the original one.
Though in the former scenario, Congress could remove the President (or a judge) from office in response—in that sense, Congress could “declare” a statute or action “unconstitutional” so long as Congress has the political will to enforce its view on the other branches.
This is sort of similar to if SCOTUS says something is unconstitutional, but the President ignores SCOTUS and isn’t removed from office by Congress, then is the thing unconstitutional? Maybe on paper if you choose to believe it but not in practice. Power resides where people think it does.
I don’t really see how you have much greater debate than what we already had, short of just a series of constitutional fights and crises where, at the end of the day, I see the President enforcing his view of the Constitution mostly because he has the guns, or else states violently seceding.
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Ok you put it in a better way that I worded it. So the challenge is to have the debate on if Congress passing a law makes it automatically constitutional or not for a bit longer before something like Marbury v Madison comes up and solidly answers that question. At the same time, not have the nation (I don't like this term, I'd rather use "Sovereign State" but States are a defined part of USA that have a separate meaning but "nation" often means a group of people who speak the same language connected geographically) completely dismantled. Basically, the Federal government must retain some control over all the states that don't get gobbled up by a European power. If all the states stay part of USA, that works. If one gets eaten by Spain and the rest stay, that's fine. If a state tries to violently secede but fails, that's fine. But if a state leaves USA in a way that isn't by conquest and it forms a breakaway country, this doesn't count for the challenge. OTL failed the challenge since Jefferson's term didn't finish by the time the suit was filed. Given that this would be a chaotic period until this question is answered, I think keeping the territorial integrity of the nation is the best way to ensure it doesn't fall to pieces.