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I don't generally see widespread support for federal rights as an ideal in the same way. I rarely see the argument "the federal government should be able to do

• everforward 3y ago
  > I rarely see the argument "the federal government should be able to do whatever it wants within it's domain" which is the analog to states rights. You don't see that argument because it's the status quo, there's no reason to argue for it. Through some combination of the 3 federal branches, they literally can do whatever they want. There is unambiguously no higher power in the US to tell them no, short of the states calling a constitutional convention and agreeing to stop it, and even that is subject to Supreme Court interpretation. The broad interpretation of the Commerce Clause leaves virtually nothing that isn't within the federal domain. > The extremes of state's rights folks would happily tell you the federal government should be abolished outside of a standing military. There really isn't an opposing side that believes state governments have no place at all. Diminished power sure, but it's not quite the same. This view absolutely exists, they're just quieter about it. Those arguments take the form of "if state X won't do what I want, we'll make a federal law and take the power to legislate that away from them". There's no need to overtly disenfranchise the state when you can just overrule them whenever they disagree. That's the insidious part of broad federal power. States only have nominal power and domain, because the feds have asserted that virtually everything could potentially be in their domain. States no longer have unilateral authority over... basically anything. California can't really legalize weed all on its own because the feds have jurisdiction over intra-state sales of goods for... reasons. Abortion is only legal/illegal until the feds make a rule one way or the other. > Apart from gun legislation and social programs to some extent, most people on the left don't seem to be pushing for illiberal policies from the government that would amount to forcing their views on others if they succeed. Many leftists support a federal government simply because it's the only reasonable method to do such things as protect the environment at scale, and provide social programs like medicare for all and UBI. This is kind of what I'm talking about, though I don't mean to imply it's primarily a liberal problem (conservatives would likely make similar plays if they had the ability). Europe seems to get by OK with socialized healthcare at roughly the size of a state; they don't need to do socialized healthcare at the EU level (roughly the size of the US). Some variants of UBI can also work at the state level; hell, they could even work at the city level for cities with wide enough income inequality. That's not to say that there aren't advantages to doing it at the federal level, but I don't see anything that fundamentally requires the federal government (presuming the feds get out of the way and don't prevent your state from doing it). > And it's all tyranny of the majority at any level. How else would you describe this ruling and the legislation that allowed it? That's how democracy functions. Even at states rights it's the elites in the big cities deciding how the people in the rural counties live. Scale makes a massive difference in the tyranny of the majority, because of the impact a single person can have and the resultant hope or despair. Lets say you hypothetically decide to spend all of your time campaigning on your own for some cause, doesn't matter what. In a group of 10 people, you can talk to every person to try to convince them, and likely swing the vote. In a city, you could reasonably reach every person in the city with footwork and a reasonable ad spend. In a state, it starts to look very hard to do, but you could maybe grassroots a movement. At the federal level, you might as well give up before you start. Without an absurd level of funding and hundreds of other people, you're not going to reach even 1% of the population. The tyranny of the majority is never good, but it gets much worse at scale. Imagine a global government of some sort; the US would be where Idaho or Vermont are now. China and India combined would have nearly half the votes; no one would care what the US wants. Imagine if the US wanting to allow gay marriage hinged on cowtowing to other countries. That's how many US states feel now; they're not allowed to do what their people vote for, so they either suck it up or bow down to a more populous state. I would generally prefer that power was concentrated where the people most affected by it have the most ability to change it. In an ideal world without realistic constraints, I would prefer that cities had the most power, but that's not realistic for a variety of reasons. > And it's fine if you believe in the sole dominion of the individual, but lets not pretend that states rights is some sort of ideal rather than a step on the spectrum towards the desired state of the dissolution of any effective government. I do believe strongly in personal self-determination, but frankly if I were trying to dissolve effective government, I just wouldn't change anything. I'd let things keep going the way they are. The ever-growing culture war and divisions between the sides will dissolve effective government far faster than any kind of legislative action I could encourage. So long as we pursue winner-takes-all solutions at the federal level, there will be bitter fighting between the sides until it erupts in some kind of violence or revolt. Arguing for state's rights is, to me, a way of preserving effective government. Let the liberals do liberal things, let the conservatives do conservative things, and very sparingly force a consensus via the federal government when we absolutely have to. I don't even really see how state's rights dissolve effective governance. I'm not proposing we get rid of all the things the fed does, just that we give that power over to the states to do what their people want. California is free to make their own Medicare or Social Security, and Alabama is free to get rid of them. I suspect a few red states would promptly wreck themselves for a while, and eventually steady out. I suspect a few blue states would have to re-evaluate their budget a decade or two in, but they'd steady out as well. There'd be some things that might have to be re-federalized because they just don't function at the state level. In the end, though, I think everyone would feel far more in control of the laws surrounding them, and be more likely to chuckle about Florida's or California's shenanigans than to let it fuel a vitriol against them.
  • davkan 3y ago
    > You don't see that argument because it's the status quo, there's no reason to argue for it. Through some combination of the 3 federal branches, they literally can do whatever they want. There is unambiguously no higher power in the US to tell them no, short of the states calling a constitutional convention and agreeing to stop it, and even that is subject to Supreme Court interpretation. What I mean by that is that when someone says we should federally allow abortion, they don't do it from a mental framing where they feel that it is the sole right of the federal government to decide to do such a thing. They do it from a position where the outcome they desire is for everyone to have access to abortion and the federal government is a tool to enable it. Like you say, it may only be possible to think in those terms because it is the status quo everywhere the supreme court hasn't deemed it not to be, and maybe if it weren't these people would be calling for it to be, but that's not an argument many are people are making right now as far as I see. It seems to be more about a desired result than a principled position regarding the role of state vs federal government. > This is kind of what I'm talking about, though I don't mean to imply it's primarily a liberal problem (conservatives would likely make similar plays if they had the ability). Europe seems to get by OK with socialized healthcare at roughly the size of a state; they don't need to do socialized healthcare at the EU level (roughly the size of the US). I don't typically think of programs like with UBI and M4A as a states rights issue, though I can certainly see how that is likely be a gap in my own perspective. I do agree such that programs runs contrary to my above statement about framing as these are typically presented as baseline necessities granted to all members of our country. Outside of the ideological aspect though, programs of these types almost invariably perform better at larger scales, similarly to how larger insurance almost invariably perform better than smaller ones. Remove bureaucratic messes like means testing and there's simply no way for a state run M4A or UBI to be as effective as a federal one. >Scale makes a massive difference in the tyranny of the majority, because of the impact a single person can have and the resultant hope or despair. Lets say you hypothetically decide to spend all of your time campaigning on your own for some cause, doesn't matter what. In a group of 10 people, you can talk to every person to try to convince them, and likely swing the vote. In a city, you could reasonably reach every person in the city with footwork and a reasonable ad spend. In a state, it starts to look very hard to do, but you could maybe grassroots a movement. At the federal level, you might as well give up before you start. Without an absurd level of funding and hundreds of other people, you're not going to reach even 1% of the population. I do agree this is a massive problem with our current representation at the federal level. I haven't given it enough consideration to have a firm idea of how to address it but having 1 representative to almost million voters is not tenable. The population has tripled since the last time we increased the number of house reps. At the founding a US house rep had as many constituents as a modern state rep does. > Arguing for state's rights is, to me, a way of preserving effective government. Let the liberals do liberal things, let the conservatives do conservative things, and very sparingly force a consensus via the federal government when we absolutely have to. That's not a stance I agree with but it's not unreasonable. I frequently find that people advocating for that level of state's rights can be pushed to reveal that they think governance itself is morally wrong, that taxes are violence, and that disempowering the federal government is only the beginning. Somewhat similarly to how some advocating for M4A do so without arguing their real agenda of nationalizing everything under the sun.