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evilweasel posted:Given that all of the lower court cases are going in favor of equality, doing nothing leaves those in place. Right, but there's things that would really benefit from being ruled unconstitutional beyond marriage. Employment discrimination, benefits for civil unions, I think there's even a hate crime thing waiting, all of those benefit from the court ruling discrimination in those regards unconstitutional, putting the onus on the federal government to even out rules.
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Dec 1, 2012 18:11
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Glitterbomber posted:Yea not gonna lie, even with all the news around gay issues it's hard to be too optimistic, the court has a long history of ignoring us and there are actually a lot of LGBT issues that need them. I'm assuming all we'll see is a marriage ruling and the other things are going to be left to rot because 'hey we just did a gay thing you're welcome'. SCOTUS is almost certain to take up DOMA, because they don't just let lower courts strike down laws as unconstitutional and say "oh, OK." That would raise the possibility of a circuit split, where different parts of the US interpret federal law differently because of different precedent. The question right now is which of the several DOMA cases they're going to take, which could have a significant effect on the ruling, and even on which justices get to make it - Justice Kagan might have to recuse herself on some of them because of her previous work on those cases as Solicitor General. The marriage ruling is, actually, a lot less likely to happen. And that's not a bad thing, because the Ninth Circuit issued a very narrow ruling that says Prop 8 is unconstitutional. Instead of going for the "gay marriage should be legal everywhere" judgment that would be a 100%-guaranteed-to-go-before-the-Supreme Court lock, they went for an argument that's narrowly tailored to the CA/Prop 8 situation, based on an earlier SCOTUS ruling (Romer v. Evans) that basically says "you can't use state constitutional amendments to target specific minority rights for elimination." If the SCOTUS doesn't take up Hollingsworth v. Perry, then the Ninth's ruling (currently stayed for its trip up to SCOTUS) goes into effect, California immediately gets marriage equality back and we're 5 for 4 at the state level in 2012. SCOTUSblog has a good written-for-laypeople summary of the marriage equality cases here if you'd like to read more.
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Dec 1, 2012 18:28
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A Intimate Rimjobs posted:The supreme court literally looked at a lawsuit for a $100 application fee because a white girl didn't get into college a couple of months ago, and they still can't be hosed to hear on almost a dozen LGBT-related lawsuits pertaining to marriage lmao Never mind the fact that they're facing enormous legal complexity and whether or not to merge some or all of these cases together a la Obamacare; that on difficult cases like these, they frequently hold a second conference to hammer out all the details in the name of accuracy, fairness, and due process; that they don't always announce all of the orders from a given conference on the Friday the conference is held & they still have an opportunity to issue an order on these cases on Monday morning. Of course they're just ignoring the issue! Of course! There's no other explanation! Oh wait. quote:If granting any cases was going to be easy, the chances are that an order saying so would have come out by early in the afternoon. The fact that no order emerged until after 3 p.m. was the strongest indication that the Court had been spending extra time on these ten cases, without reaching a conclusion. It would not have taken much time to write the order on the two cases that did get granted. I get that you're frustrated about the endless delays on what's obviously a fundamental human right, but it's irresponsible to assume the Court is being willfully malicious, rather than judicious and professional.
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Dec 1, 2012 22:11
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I suppose with Obama winning reelection it's somewhat less urgent for the pro side to get the underlying marriage as a fundamental right issue before the Court, but I'd still want to get it up there pretty quickly with what sure looks like five solid votes right now.
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Dec 1, 2012 23:12
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jeffersonlives posted:I suppose with Obama winning reelection it's somewhat less urgent for the pro side to get the underlying marriage as a fundamental right issue before the Court, but I'd still want to get it up there pretty quickly with what sure looks like five solid votes right now. And who knows, maybe something bad will happen* to Scalia or one of the other super conservative justices and Obama will get to appoint another justice. *I am not suggesting me or anyone else being the cause of that "something bad"... ...although sometimes it is a tempting thought
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Dec 1, 2012 23:28
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If there are 5 votes for marriage as a fundamental right would they strike all of DOMA? Or is the scenario of mandating recognition without mandating issuance of license something the Court would not want to create?
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Dec 1, 2012 23:42
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I support gay marriage so I am glad to see the progress on this issue. But I want to bring up an issue that libertarians such as myself have championed for a long time, yet in the past progressives have in most other cases, rejected. And that is the issue of States Rights. For a long time progressives have been seen as the centralizers of power. They tend to regard states rights, state sovereignty, and a minimal federal government as antiquated remnants of a less evolved and sophisticated age. The idea is that the Constitution does not mean what it says. The original and correct understanding of the Constitution was that the federal government can do only what is expressly authorized. In the Progressive era this was transformed into the idea that the federal government can do anything it wants except for what is expressly prohibited in the Constitution. There is no basis for such an interpretation. There is a myth that seems to suggest that all progress comes from a central authority and if we left that states and the people to their own devices we would surely still have slavery, segregation, subjugation of women and all manner of oppressive policies where it not for a wise, "progressive" federal government that forces the states and people to treat others fairly and decently. However recent trends seem to reject that assumption. The fact that so many states have legalized gay marriage, and two states have outright legalized marijuana for recreational use goes to show that in many cases, the States and the people are actually more progressive and tolerant than the federal government. I believe contrary to the mythology that exists, state sovereignty and personal autonomy creates a more progressive liberal society with greater equality and respect for minority rights than an oppressive federal government. Look at the progress. It would be almost unthinkable to have gay marriage legal and accepted even fifteen or twenty years ago. Some progressives seem to have this idea that we are all on the verge of retreating into segregation and intolerance and it is only the law that is keeping us from putting up "whites only" signs on our stores and beating up gay people. I have more faith in the people than that. We are NOT going back to that. The only reason such mythology exists is it is one of the primary things that progressives can use to denigrate the idea of states rights, nullification and so forth. So, I suggest you take these wins, gay marriage and legalization of marijuana at the state level, and expand your appreciation for autonomous state government and embrace the ideas of state nullification and even the principle of secession in the most dire situation. We should recall the founding idea that we are free people who voluntarily form the union and we are free to abolish it or dissolve it if we so choose. That is what freedom is all about. You need to recognize the proper interpretation of the constitution as granting limited powers to the federal government. And the states are free to nullify unconstitutional laws if the courts fail to uphold the constitution. Such a liberal society would yield more progressive ends in my view and we would not sacrifice minority rights or retreat into barbarism. You would be surprised at the human potential that is unleashed in the absence of coercive State violence.
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Dec 2, 2012 00:26
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UltimoDragonQuest posted:If there are 5 votes for marriage as a fundamental right would they strike all of DOMA? DOMA simply cannot exist if same-sex marriage is a fundamental right because of Fourteenth Amendment incorporation. It might not be struck down fully in name, but it would no longer be relevant. I do not know whether the Court would choose to reach that issue in a DOMA only case and not a broader case like Perry; it is certainly possible to reach DOMA's unconstitutionality on narrower grounds like the Full Faith and Credit Clause, for example.
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Dec 2, 2012 00:31
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jrodefeld posted:Look at the progress. It would be almost unthinkable to have gay marriage legal and accepted even fifteen or twenty years ago. Some progressives seem to have this idea that we are all on the verge of retreating into segregation and intolerance and it is only the law that is keeping us from putting up "whites only" signs on our stores and beating up gay people. I have more faith in the people than that.
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Dec 2, 2012 00:41
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jrodefeld posted:I support gay marriage so I am glad to see the progress on this issue. But I want to bring up an issue that libertarians such as myself have championed for a long time, yet in the past progressives have in most other cases, rejected. And that is the issue of States Rights. This all works if you don't accept that there's a good part of the country that will still vote against my basic civil rights strongly, and also believe that gays in that part of the country should just buck up and deal with it. I'm a gay man in Texas, I'm pretty hosed unless the federal government forces my state to recognize me as an equal citizen. Oh and because I wanna be the first to do it: On the other hand, all of history.
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Dec 2, 2012 00:44
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jrodefeld posted:
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Dec 2, 2012 00:54
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No see those solid Democrat areas making it legal means that we never need federal support, especially on a federal contract like marriage. So what if gays who get married in a state with it don't have the ability to even move to another state and keep their union valid, and gays in solid red areas will, most likely, never see their equal rights supported?
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Dec 2, 2012 01:04
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jrodefeld posted:There is a myth that seems to suggest that all progress comes from a central authority and if we left that states and the people to their own devices we would surely still have slavery, segregation, subjugation of women and all manner of oppressive policies where it not for a wise, "progressive" federal government that forces the states and people to treat others fairly and decently. Your notions are idealistic as hell. It's not really a myth that, for example, Alabama and Mississippi are still aggressively racist and, had they not been forced into things like segregation and anti-hate crime legislation, would still be woefully backward in that regard. Humanity, as a whole, is not rational and will never function rationally. This is part of the reason you have government, to inject rationality into a society that's prone to acting irrationally. (It also helps when you don't elect singularly irrational people like Michele Bachmann into office, though.) So long as we are one country and not 50 countries operating under a vague sense of a 'union', there are certain specific things (eg. rights; you know, those things we shouldn't even be voting on as a populace anyway) that should not be left to the 'states' or their individual populations.
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Dec 2, 2012 01:18
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jrodefeld posted:The original and correct understanding of the Constitution was that the federal government can do only what is expressly authorized. This is specifically not true and has never been true: a version of the 10th Amendment was proposed with that sort of language (the "expressly" authorized part). It was rejected in favor of the current version which allows inferred powers. Moreover, the Civil Rights Amendments radically altered the structure of the Constitution, and were intended to do so. They stripped the States of certain rights, most notably the right to discriminate against its own citizens. The "libertarian" version of the Constitution lost the Civil War and we very properly amended the Constitution to put a stake through its heart. That's over with and done. 'States rights' as a way of allowing states to chose what they'd like to do for matters that are properly regarded as decided by the political system is great. States rights as a bulwark against the assertion that rights ought not be violated, even "legitimately" through the political process. We have, very properly, stripped states of the right to enslave their subjects, to legally discriminate against their citizens, to violate the religious, free speech, or due process rights of their citizens. There is no legitimate reason to grant them those 'rights' back.
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Dec 2, 2012 01:19
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Glitterbomber posted:I'm a gay man in Texas, I'm pretty hosed unless the federal government forces my state to recognize me as an equal citizen. You should completely uproot your life, move away from your home, leave your friends, family, and career and move to a state that considers gay people real citizens. That is what freedom is all about.
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Dec 2, 2012 01:22
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jrodefeld posted:You need to recognize the proper interpretation of the constitution as granting limited powers to the federal government. And the states are free to nullify unconstitutional laws if the courts fail to uphold the constitution. "Now, grated, we tried this exact thing a while back and what we wound up with was first slavery that required armed american troops to eventually invade those states, conquer them, then occupy them to end that little embarrassment, then institutional discrimination that required armed american troops to again be deployed to ensure children could go to school, but I really think you would be surprised at the results if we just put all rights up to a vote once more. Really, it is the state enforcement of those rights that's the real problem."
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Dec 2, 2012 01:24
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BeanBandit posted:You should completely uproot your life, move away from your home, leave your friends, family, and career and move to a state that considers gay people real citizens. I seriously can't get over how the libertarian solution to this horrible patchwork of civil rights is 'just move'. Like, there are tons of ways that these people don't grasp the real world, but grown people telling other grown people 'uh just move it's not hard' is adorable. Also, the fun inverse of that, a gay couple in, say, New York who suddenly have to move for, say, work or something, are really hosed if they have to move into any of the majority of the nation that doesn't recognize gay marriage. So all our problems can be solved by either moving or refusing to move.
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Dec 2, 2012 01:30
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Please recruit in another thread.
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Dec 2, 2012 01:39
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UltimoDragonQuest posted:Please recruit in another thread. No, stay, tell us more how a federal bond like marriage doesn't need a federal solution.
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Dec 2, 2012 01:42
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Glitterbomber posted:This all works if you don't accept that there's a good part of the country that will still vote against my basic civil rights strongly, and also believe that gays in that part of the country should just buck up and deal with it. For one thing, I would suggest you and other members of this forum refrain from the snarky "on the other hand, all of history" retort as if it is self evident that the entire accumulated record of civilization supports your position. I would suggest that "all of history" supports the position that centralization of power is the greatest tool of oppression and decentralization provides the greater protection of civil rights. That is clear through any honest examination of history, Do you think Hitler or Mussolini would have been able to accomplish their atrocities if the highest position they ever attained was mayor of a small town? Of course not, diffuse centers of political power providing checks against each other with none having a monopoly on the use of force and coercion is the only way to minimize the abuse of peoples rights and protect liberty. Now, I support if a state wants to legalize gay marriage. However, I more consistent libertarian position that would solve the problem you describe is to get government out of marriage entirely, both heterosexual and homosexual marriage. What is your opinion on that? No marriage licenses, no laws. It is merely a contract between two people. For some it will be a religious activity and for others a secular activity. But we don't need government defining for us what marriage is. We will all have slightly different views on marriage but none of us claim to be better than another. That would solve the problem of marriage inequality entirely. And it wouldn't matter what some hick in Texas things about your relationship. What is wrong with that?
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Dec 2, 2012 02:33
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Far from hurting my argument, you are making my argument. I oppose all coercive state power, whether federal or state. Beyond largely dissolving federal government, we should dissolve state governments as well. It is every bit as wrong for a state to prevent a gay couple from getting married as it is for the federal government to do the same thing. Governments should have no business getting involved in personal relationships, whether heterosexual or homosexual. That is perfectly consistent with libertarian ideology.
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Dec 2, 2012 02:37
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For fucks sake if it weren't for "activist judges" we would still have sodomy laws in 13 states, what's your libertarian answer to that? edit: And no, "move to another state" is not a sufficient answer. edit2: I actually agree with the libertarian "get the government out of marriage" argument myself but that position is at this point way less popular than simply letting gays get married, so it's pointless to push for it. MaxxBot fucked around with this message at 02:43 on Dec 2, 2012 |
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Dec 2, 2012 02:41
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jrodefeld posted:For one thing, I would suggest you and other members of this forum refrain from the snarky "on the other hand, all of history" retort as if it is self evident that the entire accumulated record of civilization supports your position. No, a small-town mayor wouldn't be able to commit industrialized Hitler-scale mass murder. But they sure can encourage things like this!  But hey, I'm sure that Lige Daniels, the sixteen year old at the top of that picture, should have just moved out of that hick town in Texas.
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Dec 2, 2012 02:43
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jrodefeld posted:For one thing, I would suggest you and other members of this forum refrain from the snarky "on the other hand, all of history" retort as if it is self evident that the entire accumulated record of civilization supports your position. Small town mayors never gassed over six million people, good point. Small town mayors, though, supported lynchings and other hate crimes! "Government out of marriage" is a terrible route to take because it will mean a total redo of multiple laws and regulations, which will most likely harm the middle class the most with the lack of deductions and all. It's a far simpler change to change 'man and woman' to 'two adults' and doesn't have the possible side effect of further shifting the tax burden onto the lower brackets. Also it totally would matter what 'some hick' in Texas thinks about my relationship because, for the past good few years, 'some hick' has been the loving governor of my state and both senators and, at best, the majority of representatives. I don't know what you think happens when the leader of your state is a hateful bigot, and his constituents are the same.
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Dec 2, 2012 02:55
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xeria posted:Your notions are idealistic as hell. It's not really a myth that, for example, Alabama and Mississippi are still aggressively racist and, had they not been forced into things like segregation and anti-hate crime legislation, would still be woefully backward in that regard. I don't even ultimately support the idea of legalizing gay marriage on a state by state basis. I am only pointing out that local activism at the state level is moving beyond the ineffectual federal government on a number of these issues. I would ultimately support this solution. The Federal government should state that it no longer recognizes ANY marriage and it is merely a personal relationship that the state has no business interfering with. Second a law should be written that no state should have the right to define marriage in any way that is exclusionary. It is absurd to have a national debate on how to define a word. Perhaps Christians do not accept that homosexual couples can be married. They can believe that but they have no right to deny other people getting married. We will all have different views on marriage. Some will think polygamy is a valid marriage. As long as they write a contract and have a ceremony, they can be married and their union is no less valid, legally speaking, than any other. By making marriage a national issue, you invite hate and people trying to impose THEIR definition of marriage on others. Unfortunately, many people will always be homophobic and insensitive. Many will personally not accept gay marriage. No law can change that fact. But if government is not involved in defining marriage at all, and states are prohibited from exclusionary definitions, then this subject will not be an issue and everyone will be treated equally. What's wrong with that? And, I might be idealistic and blind to the pockets of racism that still exist in this country, but I don't think that even Alabama and Mississippi would bring back segregation even if the federal government didn't stop them. In my opinion the worst that would happen would be that a single store or a small handful of racist owned stores would put up a "whites only" sign or have some sort of discriminatory policy and the media and public outrage would be so great that they would be boycotted out of business in a matter of days. Following that, even the racist owned stores if only for their self preservation, would not try any exclusionary behavior again. I find it astounding that you believe that governments inject "rationality" into society. Yes people are imperfect and can be downright monstrous at times. But people in power, which is what government is, are more dangerous and can do a great deal of harm. Government is actually an abstraction. There are only guns and violence and force and people who want to participate in society peacefully. All use of violence and coercive force is immoral. A just society would condemn all acts of coercion whether by private, petty criminals or governments. You are wrong if you assume that libertarians somehow trust state governments more than federal governments. We don't. State governments are easily capable of atrocious attacks on individual liberty. We only seek to use state governments as a tool to protect its citizens against federal oppression when it is called for. In an ideal society, both federal and state government would be so small as to be insignificant to the lives to most people. The highest political power that matters to most people would be your town mayor and city council.
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Dec 2, 2012 02:56
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MaxxBot posted:For fucks sake if it weren't for "activist judges" we would still have sodomy laws in 13 states, what's your libertarian answer to that? If it wasn't for activist judges we also wouldn't even have a right to privacy. Ain't nothing in the constitution about that, until in Griswold v Connecticut they ruled 7-2 it was implied. They also ruled you can't outlaw contraception. For the love of christ it took activist judges to get the south to stop segregation. That poo poo would've continued probably into the 1980's at the least without them. Amused to Death fucked around with this message at 03:01 on Dec 2, 2012 |
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Dec 2, 2012 02:58
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Libertarian ideals are not the goal of the marriage equality movement. Getting the government out of marriage would not be any easier or faster than continuing to bring gay couples into government marriage. Not only would it slow progress in state without marriage equality, we would have to win nine states a second time. This is a massive waste of resources. There is no LGBT lobby in Connecticut. They declared victory and disbanded. The greatest forces for marriage equality have been judges and liberal legislators. The greatest forces against have been ballot referendums that cannot be overturned by judges or legislators. It is incredible that Libertarians are trying to sell states rights when all marriage equality successes have come from the most liberal states and the old Confederacy doesn't have a single LGBT protection law on the books.
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Dec 2, 2012 03:01
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Getting the government out of marriage is a stupid goal in of itself because marriage has always been a civil affair
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Dec 2, 2012 03:02
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Hey I also notice you didn't answer me, I'm a gay dude in Texas, there are zero LGBT protections here, and equal marriage is banned by state constitution as well as civil unions (I believe). The population, as a whole, hates gays supes hard, what do I do in Libertarian land?
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Dec 2, 2012 03:06
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jrodefeld posted:We will all have different views on marriage. Some will think polygamy is a valid marriage. As long as they write a contract and have a ceremony, they can be married and their union is no less valid, legally speaking, than any other. This is incredibly naive. Who will enforce these marriage contracts that you're talking about? quote:I find it astounding that you believe that governments inject "rationality" into society. Yes people are imperfect and can be downright monstrous at times. But people in power, which is what government is, are more dangerous and can do a great deal of harm. It's interesting that you keep swinging between absolutist language about coercion (ALL coercion is wrong!) and tacitly accepting that some level of government (and hence, some coercive force) is necessary to have any type of society. How are town mayors and city councils supposed to address issues that affect broader geographic areas like air pollution, global warming, or water rights? I suspect you'll tell me that it will be neatly solved with mutually allied city-states that have stacks of contracts to govern their behavior.
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Dec 2, 2012 03:11
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jrodefeld posted:And, I might be idealistic and blind to the pockets of racism that still exist in this country, but I don't think that even Alabama and Mississippi would bring back segregation even if the federal government didn't stop them. But oppression is oppression is oppression (or corruption or abuse or whatever term you want to ascribe), whether at 'federal' or 'state' or 'local' level. It's nice and dandy to say that you'd 'just' use state government to protect its citizens against 'federal oppression', but who protects the citizens from state oppression? From mayoral oppression? From neighborhood watch oppression? It's idealistic to think that that just won't happen once you remove a handsy federal government (and marginally less handsy state government) from the picture. In an ideal society, people aren't dicks to each other, period, but that's going to happen no matter the level of government you deem acceptable. I don't think government is perfect. It's man-made and as flawed as any other human creation, but it exists, generally speaking, with the purpose of ensuring that a given society doesn't tear itself to pieces. That's what I mean when I say that its intent is to inject rationality. Government and laws are there to tell you, explicitly, "No, you may not shank that guy just because he's gay, or because he cut in line at the grocery store, or because he looked at you funny," and dole out an applicable punishment afterward, but it will never be able to function "perfectly" (however you so define it, no matter your particular brand of political philosophy) because it's still in the hands of humanity. And humanity is still prone to sudden fits of irrationality.
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Dec 2, 2012 03:14
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UltimoDragonQuest posted:Please recruit in another thread. Seriously. The answer to 'why aren't gay rights advocates advocating libertarianism' is because nobody gives a poo poo about libertarianism.
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Dec 2, 2012 03:16
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jrodefeld posted:I would ultimately support this solution. The Federal government should state that it no longer recognizes ANY marriage and it is merely a personal relationship that the state has no business interfering with. Second a law should be written that no state should have the right to define marriage in any way that is exclusionary. Ok so let's say what you propose comes to pass. I move to Texas and fall in love with Glitterbomber and we want to get married. No church/synagogue/mosque in the area will agree to marry us, either because they don't agree with us or we don't agree with them. How do we then get married? Let's say all the lawyers and notaries (who, by the way, are licensed by the state) in the area are super homophobic and refuse to assist us. Do we just sign a piece of paper and agree with one another that this is a contract?
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Dec 2, 2012 03:25
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evilweasel posted:This is specifically not true and has never been true: a version of the 10th Amendment was proposed with that sort of language (the "expressly" authorized part). It was rejected in favor of the current version which allows inferred powers. I think you grossly misunderstand my position on this matter. First of all, The Bill of Rights extends to every state and every citizen in the union. The states do not now, nor have they previously had the right to deny their citizens basic civil rights such as the right to free speech or the right to a trial or any number of other rights contained in the constitution. The libertarian message seeks to deny ANYONE the right to subjugate or use force or violence against any peaceful individual. I have no idea what makes to think that libertarians want to give states the rights to enslave their subjects or violate their free speech rights or any of the other ridiculous things you suggested. Libertarians want to prevent the federal government from violating the peoples rights AND prevent the state governments from violating the rights of peoples. The libertarian version of the Constitution was NOT the one we had before the Civil War. Slavery is the most antithetical thing to liberty there possibly could be and the gross racist laws and policies of the day would never be tolerated by any libertarian. However, the truth is that in one respect you are correct in my views. It is only moral that a free people are bound to their government in a voluntary way. If they are not participating voluntarily then they are slaves. So the people have the fundamental natural right to secede from any political structures they deem to be oppressive to their natural rights and liberties. When we say states have the right to secede or nullify federal laws, what we really mean is the people of that state have those rights. Because we don't want an oppressive state government to subjugate its citizens. The idea that the civil war forever settled this issue is ridiculous. If we want to change our constitution and system of government, there are prescribed civilized ways to do that. You amend the constitution. It is not debatable that we voluntarily formed the union based on vigorous debate on what the constitution meant. Those debates were called the Ratifying Conventions. In those debates between the colonies and the citizens, it was expressly clarified that this was a voluntary association where the citizens had the right to dissolve the union or leave if they wanted to. This was never a question. The Constitution is a contract between the people and their government. In any contract, one side cannot arbitrarily change the terms of the contract. So you are saying that since Lincoln's army massacred hundreds of thousands of Americans in the Civil War, that somehow makes the principle of self government obsolete? How is this moral or even logical? You are absolutely dead wrong when you say that the Constitution originally granted "inferred" powers. Have you read the Ratifying Convention documents? I have and it was quite clear what the states agreed to when they ratified the document. The argument that the tenth amendment ultimately did not include the words "expressly delegated" is beside the point here. There was much debate and concern that the meaning of the constitution would be twisted and subverted over time to allow unlimited federal power. Therefore, several changes were proposed as additional safeguards against this possibility. The "expressly delegated" wording of the tenth amendment was rejected because the anti federalists were assured that such wording was not necessary as the current safeguards were more than sufficient. The only reason for this to be proposed was concern about language such as the Necessary and Proper Clause being too broad. However, the federalists such as Alexander Hamilton assured the anti federalists that the Necessary and Proper Clause would only permit execution of power already granted by the Constitution. This was vigorously debated. If one wants to discover the real original interpretation of the Constitution, you must read the Ratifying Convention papers. It is more than clear that the concerns of the anti federalists were correct. More safeguards against government growth would have been useful. However, it is clear that the ratifiers were persuaded that the document provided strictly limited powers and clauses like the Necessary and Proper and General Welfare clause would NOT grant additional powers or "inferred" powers to the Federal Government.
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Dec 2, 2012 03:26
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quote:...decentralization provides the greater protection of civil rights. Ok, well, please go to Somalia and enjoy your increased protection of your civil rights and leave the sane people here the gently caress alone.
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Dec 2, 2012 03:26
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So back to the real world, marriage should get a floor vote in Delaware next year. Obviously the climate is better than when they passed civil unions in 2011 but the Senate majority is small. The Governor is supportive and there is no veto referendum process. Senate will be 13-8 and the 2011 bill passed 13-6. House will be 27-14 and 2011 bill passed 26-15.
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Dec 2, 2012 03:32
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Lightning Knight posted:Ok, well, please go to Somalia and enjoy your increased protection of your civil rights and leave the sane people here the gently caress alone. No, I want him to stay because I want him to back up that assertion. We have 230 years of history as a nation to draw on.
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Dec 2, 2012 03:34
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evilweasel posted:"Now, grated, we tried this exact thing a while back and what we wound up with was first slavery that required armed american troops to eventually invade those states, conquer them, then occupy them to end that little embarrassment, then institutional discrimination that required armed american troops to again be deployed to ensure children could go to school, but I really think you would be surprised at the results if we just put all rights up to a vote once more. Really, it is the state enforcement of those rights that's the real problem." That is absurd. Slavery should NEVER have been tolerated for a second. The truth is that segregation and slavery occurred because of government enforced law. Segregation of public schools existed because of laws preventing integration. By the way, the Civil War was NOT fought over slavery. Lincoln was a very active racist who enjoyed black face, Minstrel shows and relentlessly told racist jokes and denigrated blacks whenever he could. Until his death, the only way Lincoln could conceive of black people being freed is to send every one of them back to Africa thus creating a completely white nation rid of blacks entirely. This is absolutely true and history is clear on these facts. What libertarians oppose is coercion and violence. I made that clear but you weren't listening. Whenever I say I believe in freedom and individual liberty, I hear progressives say idiotic things like "oh, so you want to grant the freedom to lynch black people or the freedom to hurt or use violence and force against this or that group". Which is ridiculous because that is a contradiction in terms to assert you support liberty but also support violating liberty. It is absurd. Yes, the primary and ONLY function of government is to protect individual liberty, which means that rights will be protected, not violated by the State. What is so difficult to grasp about this?
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Dec 2, 2012 03:35
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Amused to Death posted:No, I want him to stay because I want him to back up that assertion. We have 230 years of history as a nation to draw on. Well, sure, and I think the stupidity of his arguments is amusing, but he's making GBS threads up the thread and it's annoying. Edit: quote:By the way, the Civil War was NOT fought over slavery. Oh my God you loving idiot. 
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Dec 2, 2012 03:36
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Glitterbomber posted:No, stay, tell us more how a federal bond like marriage doesn't need a federal solution. Marriage should not be defined by any government. It should be a personal thing between two people that does NOT require government involvement into that relationship.
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Dec 2, 2012 03:36
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