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1) Re Clayton Cramer's statement that "The Framers
had
a generally high opinion of the state governments
and their ability to make good decisions ", I
disagree. It seems to me that (a) Many
of the leading Founders
actually felt that state governments were corrupt and were
leading to mob rule (b) To some extent, this complaint about
state governments was a smokescreen -- wealthy
Founders and their allies were
really
expressing resentment at the damage suffered by their
personal
financial interests whenever the state governments favored the
general population over the rich in the depression period
following the Revolution (e.g., relief of debtors via heavy inflation)
(c) the Constitutional Convention was really driven by the
desire of wealthy men to
have some mechanism which would protect their wealth from
the population and which would
give them the means to acquire more --this being especially
true of Hamilton and the Federalists and (d) Some
of the Founders --James Madison and Thomas Jefferson --
tried to build for the ages and to prevent
despotism from arising in any quarter.
2) Re Congress vs the Supreme Court,
the Supreme Court is certainly in a subordinate position relative to
the
President and Congress. The Supreme Court commands no
divisions. Congress can impeach and remove
Supreme
Court justices--the reverse is not true. Plus,
as
Frankin Roosevelt noted, the Constitution does not define how many
Justices
have to be on the Court-- that was left to Congress to
define by law. (One reason to dismiss Ex Parte
Quirin is
that it occurred after a long period of intense intimidation
of the Supreme Court by Roosevelt and
his Congressional allies.)
3)On
the other hand,acceptance of the Constitution was dependent
upon passage of the Bill of Rights. The
Preamble
to the Bill of Rights explicitly states that the Bill arose
from the demand of the States for
"further declaratory and restrictive clauses" which would prevent
"misconstruction or abuse of its[the
Constitution's] powers" by the
Congress or the President. The Supreme Court
enforces the Bill of Rights. Amendments 9
and 10 give ample justification for the Supreme Court to halt Congress'
gross overreaching in exercise of the "interstate commerce" power.
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