Just to quickly recap some of what we talked about last week, 2/20/2008:
We generally decided that even if the Supreme Court, or another governmental branch reinvigorates the debate over States’ Rights, it would somewhat be for naught. In this day and age, States simply do not fulfill the role they were intended to: to protect and preserve local culture and interests. States are large and unwieldy, often with many millions of citizens. There is no longer any distinct State culture, but rather a conglomerate of diversity.
If States’ Rights were surprisingly reevaluated by our increasingly unitary government, ‘States’ would have to refer to smaller units; say, counties, or tightly defined regions. Many States, most prominently California, easily have more citizens than America did when the Constitution was ratified.
However, state-wide compromises are better than national compromises, forged by three-hundred million citizens. Besides addressing local interests, strong States could serve as laboratories for democracy. One objection raised against strong States was the disparate laws likely to emerge from such a system. Although learning each State’s laws may appear a heavy onus for the citizen, the internet greatly facilities and disseminates information. We generally did not think disparate laws was a strong enough objection to warrant diminished States’ rights.
There was some disagreement, and perhaps confusion, over the role that the federal government should play in setting interest rates and controlling currency. This matter was left unsettled …
