McDonald (history, U. of Alabama) explores the balance between general and local authority in government. Tracing the concept of states' rights from the Declaration of Independence to the end of Reconstruction, he illuminates the constitutional, political, and economic contexts in which the issues have evolved. Annotation copyrighted by Book News Inc., Portland, OR

One of America’s leading conservative commentators on constitutional law provides an illuminating history of states’ rights, and the vital importance of reviving them today. Liberals believe that the argument for “states’ rights” is a smokescreen for racist repression. But historically, the doctrine of states’ rights has been an honorable tradition—a necessary component of constitutional government and a protector of American freedoms. Our Constitution is largely devoted to restraining the federal government and protecting state sovereignty. Yet for decades, Adam Freedman contends, the federal government has usurped rights that belong to the states in a veritable coup. In A Less Perfect Union, Freedman provides a detailed and lively history of the development and creation of states’ rights, from the constitutional convention through the Civil War and the New Deal to today. Surveying the latest developments in Congress and the state capitals, he finds a growing sympathy for states’ rights on both sides of the aisle. Freedman makes the case for a return to states’ rights as the only way to protect America, to serve as a check against the tyranny of federal overreach, take power out of the hands of the special interests and crony capitalists in Washington, and realize the Founders’ vision of libertarian freedom—a nation in which states are free to address the health, safety, and economic well-being of their citizens without federal coercion and crippling bureaucratic red tape.

Forrest McDonald has long been recognized as one of our most respected and provocative intellectual hsitorians. With this new book, he once again delivers an illuminating meditation on a major theme in American history and politics. Elegantly and accessibly written for a broad readership, McDonald's book provides an insightful look at states' rights-an issue that continues to stir debate nationwide. From constitutional scholars to Supreme Court justices to an electorate that's grown increasingly wary of federal power, the concept of states' rights has become a touchstone for a host of political and legal controversies. But, as McDonald shows, that concept has deep roots that need to be examined if we're to understand its implications for current and future debates. McDonald's study revolves around the concept of imperium in imperio-literally "sovereignty within sovereignty" or the division of power within a single jurisdiction. With this broad principle in hand, he traces the states' rights idea from the Declaration of Independence to the end of Reconstruction and illuminates the constitutional, political, and economic contexts in which it evolved. Although the Constitution, McDonald shows, gave the central government expansive powers, it also legitimated the doctrine of states' rights. The result was an uneasy tension and uncertainty about the nature of the central government's relationship to the states. At times the issue bubbled silently and unseen beneath the surface of public awareness, but at other times it exploded. McDonald follows this episodic rise and fall of federal-state relations from the Hamilton-Jefferson rivalry to the Virginia and Kentucky Resolutions, New England's resistance to Jefferson's foreign policy and the War of 1812, the Nullification Controversy, Andrew Jackson's war against the Bank of the United States, and finally the vitriolic public debates that led to secession and civil war. Other scholars have touched upon these events individually, but McDonald is the first to integrate all of them from the perspective of states' rights into one synthetic and magisterial vision. The result is another brilliant study from a masterful historian writing on a subject of great import for Americans.

Edited by Neil H. Cogan, who is a well-versed legal scholar of constitutional law, civil rights, and civil and criminal procedures, this volume is a collection of papers on a central issue of governance in the United States; namely, what is the power of the States to object to and cancel Federal law with which they disagree. For eighty-one years, from the ratification of the Constitution to the end of the Civil War, this issue of State power was the central issue of governance. Chapters address the history and legal arguments for three assertions of such State power: interposition, nullification, and secession. Scholars approach the assertions from the perspective of the original understanding of the Union; the antebellum arguments against the assertion of Federal power and in favor of concerted action; and contemporary viewpoints. Although both interposition and nullification were disruptive to the concept of union, the act of secession was an almost fatal assertion of State power against the Union. Now, 150 years after South Carolina's secession from the Union, it is appropriate to reconsider the arguments made for interposition, nullification, and secession. Currently In several states, nullification measures are before the legislatures. During the recent Texas Gubernatorial campaign, secession was discussed by two of the major candidates. The Tea Party Movement is reflective of a broader movement to limit Federal intervention in State matters. The publication of this collection provides an intelligent voice to the national debate.

Excerpt from The Union-State: A Letter to Our States-Rights Friend The production of these pages originated in a brief correspondence with a citizen of one of the North-western States, who had, in a recent publication, presented an argument in defense of the States of the Southern Confederacy in asserting a right to secede from the Union. In our discussion, the historical question of the actual political status of the thirteen States, at the time when the Constitution was proposed for ratification by them, seemed, to each of us, the question which required to be settled at the outset, as between ourselves. This question - we were agreed - could be decided only by historical evidence from the record, as distinguished from any assumptions, or any arguments, as to the merits or demerits of imaginable systems of government. On looking up this record-evidence, for use in our private correspondence, it seemed to require more verbal citation and careful reference to the accredited sources of information than could well be arranged in the usually indifferent style of epistolary writing. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

Excerpt from The Right of the Territories to Become States of the Union The conflict of opinion regarding the nature of the American Union was settled by the Civil war. Many held before that time, that the Nation was the result of a compact entered into by free and independent States, which, while recognizing the Constitution as a common bond of union, yet left to each State as a part of an inherent sovereignty, the right either to nullify a national obligation or to withdraw without the circle of national influence and power. This conception of the Union, which is known as the states-rights doctrine, was adopted by the Southern States and their deliberate acts of secession were the immediate cause of the Civil war and all its attending disasters. But with the defeat of the South, the dogma of states-rights perished. Henceforth the Constitution is to be viewed, not as a compact between sovereign States, but as the fundamental law of the whole land - as the expression of the will of the entire Nation - and arguments relating to it must be based upon that fundamental conception. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.