This bill has not received the national attention is should and deserves.
Essentially, this measure allows Arizona's voters OR state legislature to "pick and choose" which federal laws it will enact or enforce.
That's right.
ARIZONA CAN CHOOSE WHICH FEDERAL LAWS THEY WISH TO ENFORCE!
There is a name for this blatant disregard for American law.
Its called sedition. As a noun, it means conduct or speech inciting people to rebel against the authority of a state or monarch. In law, sedition is overt conduct, such as speech and organization, that is deemed by the legal authority to tend toward insurrection against the established order.
Aside from the outrageous audacity that they think they are above federal law, the methods in which they managed to get the law passed are egregious.
Rather than being transparent and honest and saying "we don't like a black man as president and don't want to do what he says" they hid behind a small clause in the bill that would "make Child Protective Services transparent." However, infinitely moronic Arizona Governor Jan Brewer has already abolished child protective services under the guise of them having been "incompetent." But what's most cowardly is that they are using the safety and protection of innocent children and the horrific acts against them as a political scare tactic.
The money of the Koch brothers, along with the Goldwater Institute, bought this bill front and center. Like all other initiatives funded by the Koch Brothers, they target the most narrow-minded and least educated populations. And the marketing firms they hire could walk a T-Bone steak past a hungry wolf. The methods used are not genius or new; they use "common sense" scaremongering once thought long past to ignite the panic and appeal to primal emotions rather than logic.
There are numerous problem principles with Proposition 122.
By amending the Arizona constitution, Proposition 122:
1) confirms that both the state and federal governments must follow the US Constitution as determined by the state legislature
2) give “Arizona” the right to determine what is Constitutional (instead of the Supreme Court)
3) give the state government authority to stop all levels of government (state, county, city, town or other political entity) from using personnel or finances to “enforce, administer or cooperate with a federal action or program if the people or their representatives have exercised their authority to restrict such action or use."
There are so many things wrong with allowing states to do this.
First, most scholars and law professors cite numerous areas of the US Constitution that make the Proposition illegal.
But the most concrete reason this is both unconstitutional and anti-American is its reminiscent of another period in American history where some states thought they knew better than the federal government and chose to throw the US Constitution by the wayside and create their own nation and laws. The Confederacy didn't fair well with their choice.
Arizona won't either.
But once again, voters in yet another state fail to look beyond the ads on TV, beyond the fears they have been made aware of that they didn't know they had and fears that are false, and enacted measures that will lead to insurmountable consequences, all at the expense of their own freedoms and wallets.
In fairness, here is the actual text of the Proposition.
PROPOSITION 122
SENATE CONCURRENT RESOLUTION 1016
A CONCURRENT RESOLUTION
PROPOSING AN AMENDMENT TO THE CONSTITUTION OF ARIZONA; AMENDING ARTICLE II, SECTION 3, CONSTITUTION OF ARIZONA; RELATING TO THE REJECTION OF UNCONSTITUTIONAL FEDERAL ACTIONS.
Be it resolved by the Senate of the State of Arizona, the House of Representatives concurring:
1. Article II, section 3, Constitution of Arizona, is proposed to be amended as follows if approved by the voters and on proclamation of the Governor:
3. Supreme law of the land; authority to exercise sovereign authority against federal action; use of government personnel and financial resources
Section 3. A. The Constitution of the United States is the supreme law of the land TO WHICH ALL GOVERNMENT, STATE AND FEDERAL, IS SUBJECT.
B. TO PROTECT THE PEOPLE'S FREEDOM AND TO PRESERVE THE CHECKS AND BALANCES OF THE UNITED STATES CONSTITUTION, THIS STATE MAY EXERCISE ITS SOVEREIGN AUTHORITY TO RESTRICT THE ACTIONS OF ITS PERSONNEL AND THE USE OF ITS FINANCIAL RESOURCES TO PURPOSES THAT ARE CONSISTENT WITH THE CONSTITUTION BY DOING ANY OF THE FOLLOWING:
1. PASSING AN INITIATIVE OR REFERENDUM PURSUANT TO ARTICLE IV, PART 1, SECTION 1.
2. PASSING A BILL PURSUANT TO ARTICLE IV, PART 2 AND ARTICLE V, SECTION 7.
3. PURSUING ANY OTHER AVAILABLE LEGAL REMEDY.
C. IF THE PEOPLE OR THEIR REPRESENTATIVES EXERCISE THEIR AUTHORITY PURSUANT TO THIS SECTION, THIS STATE AND ALL POLITICAL SUBDIVISIONS OF THIS STATE ARE PROHIBITED FROM USING ANY PERSONNEL OR FINANCIAL RESOURCES TO ENFORCE, ADMINISTER OR COOPERATE WITH THE DESIGNATED FEDERAL ACTION OR PROGRAM.
2. The Secretary of State shall submit this proposition to the voters at the next general election as provided by article XXI, Constitution of Arizona.
Abraham Lincoln once said, "We the people are the rightful masters of both Congress and the courts, not to overthrow the Constitution but to overthrow the men who pervert the Constitution."
Much like term limits, which as it turns out ARE in the constitution, (they're called elections), we have the right to elect leaders who represent us and create the laws. We don't have the right to pick and choose which laws they pass for us in any fashion other than through voting for our leaders.
President Lincoln also quipped, "Don't interfere with anything in the Constitution. That must be maintained, for it is the only safeguard of our liberties."
But only a few years ago, Texas and West Virginia both stated their intentions to "secede from the union" should President Barack Obama be re-elected. Yet they remain.
I wrote about this then. We might miss Texas, for a while. But West Virginia would miss us immediately, as they will soon find out. (See previous blog entry within.)
And let's not even talk about the pitch line that proponents used.
The irony of the proponent sign? Arizona, a red state, gets .19 more per dollar from the federal government than it contributes!
Against US Supreme Court decisions, against federally passed law, against anything that the "enlightened" voters of Arizona choose.
How is a union to survive when members of that union choose to defy the majority rules laws and decisions that keep it together?
Quite frankly, it can't!
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