Talk:States' rights

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Comment

Shouldn't the phrase be "States' rights"? It is possessive, after all. ħuman 19:12, 31 July 2008 (EDT)

I was just going to ask that. Do ' break the system or anything? If not, I'll relocate it.

--En attendant Godot_{"Such is life."} 15:23, 23 March 2009 (EDT)

I don't think apos are a problem at all in titles. After all, we have all those "some blogger's law" articles. ħuman 21:18, 23 March 2009 (EDT)

USA is the US states combined

Part of States Rights is the fact that unlike every other country I can think of, US states aren't subunits of the USA, the USA is a supraunit of the US states combined, the USA is an entity formed from the component units, not the other way around. It needs somebody who knows the terminology better than me to put the words together.

• In practice, I doubt the distinction is meaningful from a legal or logical standpoint. Anyway, it's not true that the US is the only one -- the Soviet Union inherited that structure from the Russian Empire (although the "republics" had very little devolved power, obviously). Weimar Germany was like that (although Prussia dominated the territory) and so is modern Germany. Switzerland's cantons are almost exactly like the US's states in my understanding as well, and I think you could call the UK a quasi-federal state because of the devolved powers to Scotland, NI, and Wales (the main thing holding the UK back from going to a federal structure is that no one has any idea how England would be handled, since its population is bigger than the other three regions combined). EVDebs (talk) 02:03, 4 September 2012 (UTC)

Why would primary elections, or, for that matter, political parties be considered unconstitutional from the originalist viewpoint? Neither involves any federal government activity or recognition. 131.107.192.112 (talk) 00:35, 6 September 2013 (UTC)

Some of the examples are suspect, and others are flatly wrong. I think that some of the editors are concerned more with goodthink than with factual accuracy. ... of liberals? (talk) 15:27, 7 April 2014 (UTC)

It adds a little something.

The John Green quote, I mean. It sums up very succinctly the most core objection to the concept vis-a-vis slavery and the civil war. But at the same time, I feel like someone has said that in a less annoying way than blog brother #2 or whatever he is. ikanreed ^{🐐Bleat at me} 17:46, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

Technically, he's quoting his American history teacher. Also, John Green is "annoying?" I smell heresy here... RoninMacbeth (talk) 17:48, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

I, personally, do not care for his style. It's a bit smug and preening even while covering relatively basic stuff. ikanreed ^{🐐Bleat at me} 17:52, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

The quote's formatting was terrible so I was either going to undo it or fix it. If you think it's worth including feel free to add it to the page with the correct formatting. CowHouse (talk) 18:16, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

Yeah, I was going to come back and fix it but I don't know how to make those big quotes. Tabula Rasa (talk) 21:06, 17 December 2018 (UTC)

It's a crap quote. Surely something better can be found. No quote at all is better than this. Bongolian (talk) 06:24, 29 September 2021 (UTC)

@Bongolian I like the quote. Several other people like the quote. If you've got a better quote I'd be happy to see it. But if all you can say is just "It's a crap quote", I'll have to quote The Dude and say "Well you know that's just like, your opinion man." 136.26.136.108 (talk) 07:21, 1 October 2021 (UTC)

If we're going by informal voting, I see 3 against (ikanreed, CowHouse, Bongolian), and possibly 2 for (RoninMacbeth, 136.26.136.108). Tabula Rasa only objected to formatting and did not seem to express an opinion otherwise. Personally, I went to public schools in the US and in no way can I relate to this quote. At one point, I had an African American history teacher in High School; none of my history teachers were states rights supporters, at least not in the segregationist sense. The quote reads like nonsense to me. If one tries to break it down syllogistically, there's no sensible premise or conclusion as far as I can see. Bongolian (talk) 01:52, 2 October 2021 (UTC)

ikanreed said it sums it up succinctly though they do not care for video brother #2, and CowHouse—not Tabula Rasa—had an objection to the formatting. I don't think that's 3v2. For what it's worth, I too do not find John Green too appealing, but for a crap quote it had enough stopping power for me to parse it a few times and remember the feeling of realizing I've been living under some cynically pushed paradigm. Kntai (talk) 08:45, 7 October 2021 (UTC)

@Bongolian Tabula Rasa is a sockpuppet for Doublethink, who originally added the quote (see talk and the revision). So that's 3v3, tied voting. I went to US public schools too and the quote resonates with me. Southern apologists like to throw out "states' rights" as a sort of shibboleth, something the young Green picked up on and started repeating to sound smart. "I know the Civil War wasn't about something so simple as slavery, it was a complex issue with many different factors" But Green's teacher, who he implies grew up in the Jim Crow era south, calls him on it and forces Green to actually think about what he's saying. What right was the south fighting to preserve for its states? The right to permit slavery, of course. The root cause of the war was slavery, simple as that.

Anyway, I like the quote because it encourages the reader to think for a second every time they see the phrase "state's rights", to hear the dog whistle as it were. What does this person want their state to have a right to do? Probably something controversial and unpopular with the majority of Americans, which is why they're not saying it outright. ^{— Unsigned, by: 136.26.136.108 / talk / contribs}