Quote:
Originally Posted by Platapus
Then in the 1900's things started to change. Slow at first but soon we had what is called the "Incorporation Doctrine". There were a series of court cases and appeals that slowly changed how the courts interpreted the Constitution. It was not a sudden single decision but a series of decisions over about 20 years.
What that meant is that the courts up to and including the Supreme Court, made the decision that the restrictions on the Federal Government that were in the Bill of Rights and other amendments also restrict the State Government.
That's a pretty big deal.
Whether the Incorporation doctrine is good or bad, can and is debatable, in addition to the question whether the Incorporation doctrine is even constitutional in itself is debatable. But the fact is that it is with us.
This means that it is difficult to go back to the original (federal only interpretation) constitution and make the claim "well those dudes wrote this back then and therefore it must apply to current (federal and state interpretations of the constitution) issues.
The founding dudes may have intended that all infringement of arms would fall to the state. The only thing they made clear (back then) was that the Federal Government could not infringe. Remember, they also wrote the 9th and 10th Amendment also so they recognized a difference between what the Federal government could or could not do and what State governments could and could not do. Basically, what the states could not do was left up to the state to decide through their laws and courts.
This is one of the many problems with the Incorporation Doctrine. We were just a bit over 100 years old as a country, when we started moving away from being the United States of America to become the United Federation of America.
Either being a confederation of sovereign states or a federation of incorporated states has its advantages and disadvantages. But the move from a confederation of sovereign states to a federation of incorporated states needs to be made deliberately and with the consent of the people.
I do not believe this has been done.
So we find our country somewhere between a confederation of sovereign states and a federation of incorporated states with, to quote Archie Bunker, "a little too much of both and not enough of neither".
This is a bad thing. We need to be one or the other with clear delimitation of authority.
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My thoguht has always been that issues like Gun control, should be left to the state, NOT the federal government. Why?
Each state is different. Has its own demographic, their own cultural values, their own prominent religious or political beleifs, it's own economy, etc etc, the list goes on.
What's good for California, is not good for Utah, and vice versa. The problem with Federal laws that are on the scope of gun control, or abortion, or whatever, is it's trying to make a square fit into a round hole.
The fact that a Senator like Fienstien (who would never have been elected to office in Utah in the first place) can instigate legislation that is counter to what the people and culture of what Utah want, is angering to say the least.