[Politics] Does the Federal Governments ability and practice of giving money to States inhibit the States sovereignty?

1. Some of the founding fathers were federalists. In any case, the founding fathers—while generally very wise—are not inerrant gods who set down scriptures to be followed for all time.

2. No, it does not undermine our democracy.

3. You are equating “democracy” with “state sovereignty” when they are two entirely different things. In some cases, democracy is helped by limiting state sovereignty—see, for example, the civil rights acts, which helped guarantee voting rights for blacks while overriding state sovereignty.

4. A strong federal government is generally a good thing, for the same reason the EU is a good thing. When cultural/political entities—like states—share so much of their economic and law enforcement activity, it just makes more sense to have broader laws and regulations.

I’m for limited state sovereignty because (1) some issues are best dealt with locally, and (2) states can function as “experiments” for practicing social and economic policies before they are enacted on a federal level. But when it comes to important stuff, it’s better to do it across the board.

Then prehaps a better question would be, when if ever, would the federal government cross a line where it does more damage than good. It is not hard to imagine a scenario where the states become so dependent on federal money that the federal government can dictate nearly everything.

Not in the least.
A few years ago, the city of Berkeley Ca. decided that they didn’t want US Marine recruiters in their city. Therefore, they decided that they didn’t need federal funding.

Thus they maintained their sovereignty as well as all the potholes on major city streets.

Also, it’s “undermine” not “undermind”

@LKidKyle1985, I’m not sure how to answer your question. I think any local sovereignty—state or local—has an interest in generating more wealth than it takes to sustain itself.

If a state became financially dependent on the federal government, that would be bad, but we need to look at why it would be bad. You seem to be implying that it would be bad just on principle. I disagree. I think the real reason it would be bad is that such a state would drain tax dollars that could be spent elsewhere. It’s in the federal government’s interest, actually, to ensure that states are not long-term dependent on federal money.

For the same reason, welfare (i.e. a person becoming financially dependent on the government) is not bad in and of itself. It’s only bad when a person on welfare remains on welfare long-term instead of using welfare temporarily as a safety net.

The lowering of the DUI limit wasn’t something the federal govt just pulled out of a hat. There had been studies that showed a lower alcohol level reduced accidents and deaths significantly. In the interest of saving lives the fed govt strongly recommended it. What would be a dissenting state’s viewpoint? “You can’t tell us what the rules of the road should be on federally funded states, We can allow as much carnage and on your roads as we want.”

Well I think roughly 9 or 10 states would disagree with you guys.
http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/1492850/states_declare_sovereignty.html
Apparently some people in state government feels that its become too much. I mean basically what is happening is people are being taxed by the federal government, and then the government is saying hey, comply with X Y and Z and then we will spend the tax money we took from you on you. The states have the option of raising their own taxes and not receiving any federal money, but then their citizens will be taxed by the state and the fed a lot.
I guess I am interested in where the line should be drawn on the Federal governments influence over the state.

This phenomenon is against the spirit of the Constitution. The reason is that when people file their taxes… the federal tax is up to 90% more than the state tax you pay, if any.

The feds then dole that money out back to the States, in highway funds, police grants, health grants, etc., but only if the states receiving the cash also agree to the attached conditions.

California never wanted to pass any “Smoke a Joint, Lose Your License” type of bill, but since the feds made that legislation mandatory if the State is to receive highway funds, the State of course passed that legislation.

This is not with the spirit of the Constitution, because a situation is created where States depend on that money. They could have just taxed it themselves… but since the feds already tax it, the People cannot afford to pay more, generally.

But it’s how it works on all these issues now.

I think my answer’s the same as the one from @LKidKyle1985 above

Thank you Kraigmo, and the real question is when do the states become irrelevant in legislation over their selves and just how far can the federal government take this? It is not hard to imagine taking this a few steps further, and having states become so dependent on the fed that the federal government that we no longer even have a state government, and an emperor instead of a president. Remember it takes state votes to approve a change to the constitution, and what you see in a lot of democracies is leaders changing the constitution and their term limits so that they are able to run indefinitely and on terms that last like 10 or 15 years.

I should add I don’t necessarily think we are in that desperate of a situation. But studying Latin American democracies lately made me realize that I took for granted the separation of powers that we have tried to set up, and it seems like the state powers are eroding.

Both of you are again misunderstanding the nature of “democracy” and confusing it with “state sovereignty.” They literally have nothing to do with each other, and as I pointed out, state sovereignty can come at the expense of democracy (see blacks being denied the vote in southern states for a hundred years).

@Kraigmo, I’m confused as to how exactly you think federal taxation is “against the spirit of the constitution,” because the constitution explicitly allows it. But regardless, I personally don’t really care much about what the constitution has to say on lots of issues—for example, slavery and women’s voting. The constitution is a living document that is supposed to change with the times, and the way people treat it like an infallible religious document is creepy, socially harmful, and ironically contrary to what the constitution calls for anyway.

@LKidKyle1985, I don’t know how to make this any clearer. If we had a single federal government and no state governments, the president would not become an “emperor.” That makes no goddamn sense, kid. Emperors are not democratically elected.

The “separation of powers” has nothing to do with state sovereignty. It refers to the three branches of the federal government: executive, legislative, and judicial.

I really hope you sit back and think about the flaws in your logic here.

@Qingu , I don’t think taxation is against the spirit of the Constitution. But I am fairly certain of the intent of the framers of the Constitution by reading the Declaration of Independence and some of the Federalist Papers, and a few other things.

In fact, taxation is specifically allowable by the Constitution.

However, the fact that the federal government has figured out that if they tax people so much that they cannot afford to pay any more, it creates a situation where States cannot have high taxes the way the feds do, simply because most people literally can not afford any more. Taxation takes away food and car repairs and health insurance from about ⅓ of our population. The States cannot raise their relatively low taxes because the money isn’t there to take really. The last frontier they have is to tax the rich more… but there’s a limit to how much that can be done too… it’s just not as a severe hit as the working poor take.

All of this leads up to a scenario of the States being cash-poor while the feds have the bulk of the citizens’ taxed money.

They then use this money as a carrot for States to toe the federal line.

That’s why I said the current situation is against the “spirit” of the Constitution and not the actual letter of it.

It’s obviously against the spirit of the Constitution because the States are totally beholden to the feds, due to the fact that the feds have found convenient loopholes in which to take Total Control.

Okay. Do you have any counterexamples from other countries with, for example, extremely low federal taxes and high state or local taxes? You haven’t really supported your assertion; without any evidence you just seem like you’re rambling.

Also, taxation isn’t zero-sum.