New Hampshire threatens Fed agents with felony arrests

In case you think the state is somehow exempt or that the constitution isn't law.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nullification_(U.S._Constitution)

Nullification is a legal theory that a U.S. State has the right to nullify, or invalidate, any federal law which that state has deemed unconstitutional. The theory is based on a view that the sovereign States formed the Union, and as creators of the compact hold final authority regarding the limits of the power of the central government. Under this, the compact theory, the States and not the Federal Bench are the ultimate interpreters of the extent of the national Government's power. A more extreme assertion of state sovereignty than nullification is the related action of secession, by which a state terminates its political affiliation with the Union.

One of the earliest and most famous examples is to be found in the Kentucky and Virginia Resolutions, a protest against the Alien and Sedition Acts. In these resolutions, authors Thomas Jefferson and James Madison argued that the states are the ultimate interpreters of the Constitution and can "interpose" to protect state citizens from the operation of unconstitutional national laws.

While some interests in northern states occasionally considered the possibility of secession after Jefferson's party gained control of the federal government in the years after 1801, for example at the Hartford Convention, the idea of nullification increasingly became associated with the southern states as a means of protecting the institution of slavery. The most famous statement of the theory of nullification, authored by John C. Calhoun, appeared in the South Carolina Exposition and Protest of 1828. Four years later, during the Nullification Crisis, South Carolina undertook to nullify a federal tariff law and a subsequent federal bill authorizing the use of force against the state.

Northern states in the 1840s and 1850s attempted to block enforcement of the pro-slavery federal Fugitive Slave Acts of 1793 and 1850. These actions had the effect, in many local situations, of nullifying the effectiveness of these laws, but did not declare that the fugitive slave laws were nullified. The most famous examples of this centered around northern states' personal liberty laws. The U.S. Supreme Court dealt with the validity of these laws in the 1842 case of Prigg v. Pennsylvania. The Supreme Court also dealt with this issue in the 1859 case of Ableman v. Booth.

[edit] See also
Interposition

Prigg v. Pennsylvania, 41 U.S. 539 (1842), was a United States Supreme Court case in which the court held that Federal law is superior to State law, and overturned the conviction of Edward Prigg as a result.

Contents [hide]
1 Federal and State Laws
1.1 Federal Law
1.2 State law in Pennsylvania
2 Case background
3 The Supreme Court's view
4 See also
5 References
6 External links


[edit] Federal and State Laws
[edit] Federal Law
In June 1788, the Constitution of the United States came into force, having been ratified by nine states (see History of the United States Constitution). Article IV, Section 2, Clause 3 [1]of the Constitution contained two statements about the legality of fleeing justice, creditors, owners, or other agencies, across state borders & escaped slaves without using the term "slavery" directly:

A person charged in any state with treason, felony or other crime, who shall flee from justice, and be found in another state, shall, on demand of the executive authority of the state from which he fled, be delivered up, to be removed to the state having jurisdiction of the crime.
No person held to service or labor in one state, under the laws thereof, escaping into another, shall, in consequence of any law or regulation therein, be discharged from such service or labor; but shall be delivered up, on claim of the party to whom such service or labor may be due.
Although the third clause above was superseded by the 13th Amendment[2], that amendment came into force only 77 years later, on December 6 1865.

On February 12 1793, the U.S. Congress passed the Fugitive Slave Law of 1793 actually called the Fugitive Slave Act of 1793 An Act respecting fugitives from justice, and persons escaping from the service of their masters. [3]

[edit] State law in Pennsylvania
On March 29 1788, the State of Pennsylvania passed an amendment to one of its laws (An act for the gradual abolition of slavery, originally enacted March 1 1780); this amendment stated that, No negro or mulatto slave ...shall be removed out of this state, with the design and intention that the place of abode or residence of such slave or servant shall be thereby altered or changed.

On March 25 1826, the State of Pennsylvania passed a further law, which stated in part:

If any person or persons shall, from and after the passing of this act, by force and violence, take and carry away, or cause to be taken or carried away, and shall, by fraud or false pretense, seduce, or cause to be seduced, or shall attempt so to take, carry away or seduce, any negro or mulatto, from any part or parts of this commonwealth, to any other place or places whatsoever, out of this commonwealth, with a design and intention of selling and disposing of, or of causing to be sold, or of keeping and detaining, or of causing to be kept and detained, such negro or mulatto, as a slave or servant for life, or for any term whatsoever, every such person or persons, his or their aiders or abettors, shall on conviction thereof, in any court of this commonwealth having competent jurisdiction, be deemed guilty of a felony.

[4]

[edit] Case background
During the year of 1832, a black woman named Margaret Morgan moved to Pennsylvania from Maryland, where she had once been a slave to a man named John Ashmore. In Maryland, she had lived in virtual freedom but had never been formally emancipated.[5] Ashmore's heirs eventually decided to claim her as a slave and hired slavecatcher Edward Prigg to recover her.

On April 1 1837, Edward Prigg led an assault and abduction on Morgan in York County, Pennsylvania. They took Morgan to Maryland, intending to sell her as a slave (her children, one of whom was born a free citizen in Pennsylvania, were also captured and were sold). The four men involved in the abduction were arraigned under the 1826 act. Prigg pleaded not guilty, and argued that he had been duly appointed by John Ashmore to arrest and return Morgan to her owner in Maryland. However, in a ruling on May 22 1839, the Court of Quarter Sessions of York County convicted him.

Prigg appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court on the grounds that the Pennsylvania law was not able to supersede federal law or the constitution; the Fugitive Slave Act and Article 4 of the constitution being in question with the Pennsylvania law of 1788. The case was Prigg V. Pennsylvania, 41 U. S. 539 (1842). See the reference for the abstract or full text. [6]

[edit] The Supreme Court's view
Prigg and his lawyer argued that the 1788 and 1826 Pennsylvania laws were unconstitutional:

First, because of the injunction in Article IV of the U.S. Constitution that No person held to service or labor in one state, under the laws thereof, escaping into another, shall, in consequence of any law or regulation therein, be discharged from such service or labor; but shall be delivered up, on claim of the party to whom such service or labor may be due..
Second, because, the exercise of Federal legislation, such as that undertaken by Congress in passing the act of the February 12th 1793, supersedes any State law.
As a consequence, they argued, the 1788 Pennsylvania law, in all its provisions applicable to this case, should be voided. The question was whether Pennsylvania law violated the constitutional guarantee of fugitive slave return and the 1793 Act of Congress passed to implement it.

Writing for the Court, Justice Story reversed the conviction and held the Pennsylvania law unconstitutional as a denial of both the right of slaveholders to recover their slaves under Article IV and the Federal Fugitive Slave Law of 1793, which trumped the state law per the Supremacy Clause. Six justices wrote separate opinions.

Though Story ruled the Pennsylvania laws unconstitutional, his opinion left the door open for further such actions by the state in his writing:

As to the authority so conferred upon state magistrates [to deal with runaway slaves], while a difference of opinion has existed, and may exist still on the point, in different states, whether state magistrates are bound to act under it; none is entertained by this Court that state magistrates may, if they choose, exercise that authority, unless prohibited by state legislation - Justice Story (emphasis added)

This last phrase - "unless prohibited by state legislation" - became the impetus for a number of personal liberties laws enacted by Pennsylvania and the other Northern states. These laws did as the Court had suggested - they prohibited state officials from interfering with runaway slaves in any capacity. Runaways could not be caught or incarcerated, cases could not be heard, and no assistance could be offered to those wishing to recapture slaves. The Fugitive Slave Act still stood, but only federal agents could enforce it.

Such an emphatic refusal to uphold the Fugitive Slave Act was viewed as a brazen violation of the federal compact by the Southern states. One letter to South Carolina Senator John C. Calhoun stated that the new personal liberties laws "rendered slave property utterly insecure" and was a "flagrant violation of the spirit of the U.S. Constitution."[1]

It was these laws that led to The Compromise of 1850 - California could enter the Union as a free state, but the Northern states would have to enforce the Fugitive Slave Act within their own borders.

In avoiding one crisis the Court prepared the way for a greater one. By discouraging state cooperation in returning fugitives, the Prigg decision undercut the Fugitive Slave Act of 1793 and made necessary the more brutal one of 1850. The South had been forced to look to the federal government for a national solution, and the Court had pledged itself in advance to support such a solution, despite that fact that the North would certainly be mobilized against it. In addition, people began to believe that the Court, and only the Court, was uniquely qualified to soothe the growing agitation over slavery.

[edit] See also

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ableman_v._Booth

Ableman v. Booth
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Ableman v. Booth
United States v. Booth


Supreme Court of the United States
Decided March 7, 1859
Full case name Stephen V. Ableman, plaintiff in error
v.
Sherman M. Booth;
and
United States, plaintiff in error
v.
Sherman M. Booth
Citations 62 U.S. 506 (more)
Holding
A state court cannot grant a writ of habeas corpus to a prisoner arrested under the authority of the United States and in federal custody.
Court membership
Chief Justice
Roger B. Taney

Associate Justices
John McLean • James M. Wayne
John Catron • Peter V. Daniel
Samuel Nelson • Robert C. Grier
John A. Campbell • Nathan Clifford

Case opinions
Majority Taney
Ableman v. Booth, 62 U.S. 506 (1859), is a case in which the Supreme Court of the United States held that state courts cannot issue rulings that contradict the decisions of federal courts, overturning a decision by the Supreme Court of Wisconsin.

For example, it is illegal for state officials to interfere with the work of U.S. Marshals acting under federal laws.

The Ableman decision emphasized the dual form of American government and the independence of state and federal courts from one another.

[edit] See also
List of United States Supreme Court cases, volume 62
Dred Scott v. Sandford, 60 U.S. 393 (1856)

As I had said over and over this is very very settle law that the states can no overrule the Federal government and one second after a law that is the subject of this thread is pass the Federal courts will block it.

I would assume the the lawmakers who place this law up for consideration is as aware of this fact as I am and are just playing their supporters for fools to get votes.

I have not followed this thread too closely. I do know that the Supreme Court will ultimately decide this question, if things go far enough.

There will be no law pass this is just an attempted to get votes from people who do not understanding the working of their government or the history of their court system, sadly this is the majority of our citizens

If I was mysteryman now that the situation had been explained I would be mad as hell at politicians/lawmakers who used my lack of knowledge as a tool to gets my support and not caring if they were also making a fool of me at the same time.

Shame on these lawmakers and shame on anyone who reported on this story and did not do the research to be able to point out what a complete bit of nonsense it is.

I

Second comment if somehow for some strange reason this law would pass it will not get the the Supreme Court as the first judge who hear it will rule and as this is settle law for the last 150 years no higher court would likely hear the issue let alone the Supreme Court.

The whole thing is a vote getting/fund raising device aim at the far right and nothing more.

So what?

"Ein Volk, ein Reich, ein Führer!" is YOUR philosophy, right Maporsche ??

So What?

I suppose that means they don't think it is a valid legal theory.

Do you care?

I suppose you don't.