Obama Citizenship

VA State Sovereignty Resolution on Hold Until 2010

By Phil

The following is part of an email I received from a Virginia-based concerned citizen who wrote to their State delegate concerning HR61. A press release from caucus members canvassing for their Tenth Amendment resolution is included:

Thank you for your e-mail in support of HR 61, a measure to honor state sovereignty under the Tenth Amendment of the Constitution of the United States and claims sovereignty for the Commonwealth under the Tenth Amendment over all powers not otherwise enumerated and granted to the federal government by the United States Constitution. This resolution was first introduced to the House of Delegates on 2/26/09 and referred to committee as is the standard procedure. Since the session adjourned on 2/28/09, there was insufficient time for the committee to take action. Delegate Peace, the patron of HR 61, will consider carrying the resolution over to the 2010 session. 

I, too, am concerned by federal intervention in state matters especially with regard to stimulus funding, the kitestrings of which have lasting financial and standards measurement impact on state performance. I am a member of both the Republican Caucus and the Conservative Caucus and follow the common sense conservative principle that the Federal Government must preserve individual liberty by observing Constitutional limitations, 

Below is a copy of a press release from two fellow caucus members in reference to the 10th Amendment. Thank you for your interest in this legislation and I encourage you to follow the progress of this legislation in 2010.

Commonwealth of Virginia
House of Delegates
RICHMOND
   

 Delegates Peace and Fralin File State Sovereignty Resolution
–The federal government is a creature of the states - not the other way around –
(Walter E. Williams January 27, 1995)

 

 

Richmond, VA - From the Capitol where representatives cast the necessary vote on December 15, 1791 to ratify the United States Constitution, Virginia Delegates Christopher K. Peace (R-Hanover) and William H. Fralin, Jr. (R-Roanoke) today introduced a House resolution to affirm those founding principles of Federalism guaranteed under the Tenth Amendment of the Constitution of the United States. The resolution sets forth the principle that the Commonwealth of Virginia is sovereign and has authority to claim powers not specified or granted to the federal government. 

Delegate Peace wrote in his Richmond Times-Dispatch Commentary (February 22, 2009), ” Case law expounded upon this fundamental principle… Printz v. United States  held that the federal system limits the ability of the federal government to use state governments as an instrumentality of the national government. But this traditional notion of Federalism has devolved into ?cooperative federalism,? where Congress creates new state programs by affixing certain conditions to the receipt of those funds. These coercive acts may become so intolerable that long-term sustainability is in real question, and the ultimate danger is the erosion of the principles of Federalism whereby Virginia becomes, effectively, a ward of the federal super state.?

As a result, over the past year, states around the country passed resolutions claiming sovereignty under the Tenth Amendment and resolving to serve notice and demand to the federal government to cease and desist mandates that are beyond the scope of these constitutionally delegated powers. Virginia, upon passage of this legislation, joins the movement that so clearly demonstrates the imbalance and growing concern that the federal government is increasing its dominance over their state policy affairs. 

Del. Fralin states that ?The Tenth Amendment assures that we, the people of the United States of America and each sovereign state of the United States, now have, and have always had, rights the federal government may not usurp. The states today in some cases are treated as agents of the federal government; and many federal laws are directly in violation of the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States. “ 

-Jimmie Massie 

James P. “Jimmie” Massie, III 
Member, Virginia House of Delegates 
Henrico County, District 72

A current listing of State-based initiatives can be found here.

-Phil

Full post as published by The Right Side of Life on March 19, 2009 (boomark / email).