watching endangered species

[Chuck Vaughn]

Neil,
 
>> Oh, and I still think the endangered species act is
>> unconstititional
> 
> This doesn't hold water. It is the property rights issue but having property
> doesn't give you the right to do as you like.

You're correct about this.

> Having a piece of land does
> not entitle you to use it for building a brothel does it? Brothels are
> illegal.
> You can't grow Marijuana on it either. I cannot see how banning prostitution
> and banning the smoking of dope would be unconstitutional in the USA.

This demonstrates a profound misunderstanding of the U.S. Constitution.
Don't feel badly, 99% of the people here don't understand it either. <g>

The Constitution describes how the federal government is to be run and gives
it a very limited set of powers. All other powers and rights belong to the
states and the people. The amendment process exists to change the
Constitution itself or give a new power to the federal government by 2/3
vote of the states. By doing so the states give up a power to the federal
government.

There is nothing in the Constitution that says you can't grow marijuana
or have a brothel on your property. These are issues for the states to
decide. The federal government has no constitutional authority to make
these sorts of laws. Unfortunately, the Civil War broke the back of
states rights and the federal government starting assuming more and more
power. This really accelerated with FDR. This has been going on so long now
that there is nobody alive anymore that remembers the time when the federal
government stayed within constitutional bounds.

I'm not saying, for example, that the Endangered Species Act is a bad thing,
but no amendment was ever passed taking this power from the states and
giving it to the federal government.

And herein lies the problem we have now. The federal government thinks it
can pass any law it wants and force the states to abide by it. So now we
have the federal government telling California we can't have a medical
marijuana law or telling Oregon they can't have an assisted suicide law.
The federal government has no constitutional authority to be butting in
on these issues. 

In summary, the U.S. Constitution is not a document of what the federal
government _cannot_ do (a common interpretation today), but a document
of what it _can_ do....and that is very little.

Chuck Vaughn <aa6g at aa6g.org>



For a detailed explanation of the intent of the Constitution see the
Federalist Papers:

http://memory.loc.gov/const/fed/fedpapers.html


 
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