It's not explicit at all. Please do not attribute terms to my statement (e.g. "enough") that I did not utter.
Correct. These truths are self evident. We are endowed by our Creator with certain unalienable rights. And that to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. (key word: Consent) And whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.
At least that's what our Founding Fathers believed.
Just to clarify, GoatPrairie is arguing that since the Constitution does not explicitly grant the right of secession to the States, then no such right exists. And by doing so, he completely ignores the wording of Amendment X which shows that not all rights are explicitly listed.
My counter-argument showed that the Constitution does not explicitly grant the right to free speech, or the right to vote. Thus by GoatPrairie's argument, people do not have those rights either.
You are the one trying to interpret what the amendment says to your favor drawing a conclusion that is not implied.
All American laws are purportedly derived from an interpretation of the constitution. That's why we have a SC that deliberates on laws passed by men.
Sure, we all have natural rights that cannot be taken away by the government.
I've already listed one of the rights as the right to rebel against an unjust government. But we are also a nation of laws designed and enforced by men.
To say because the constitution doesn't specifically forbid state secession, virtually anything not mentioned in the constitution should be allowed?
You know there are all types of human behavior that we have passed laws about that are nowhere mentioned in the constitution. I don't believe I have to list some of the vile behaviors of the sexual sort that some people engage in that have been outlawed but not specifically mentioned in the U.S.constitution.
But wouldn't you think that something that would be as momentous and fraught with ramifications and repercussions like a state being allowed to legally leave the union would have been enunciated in the constitution?
Again, if states were presumed to be sovereign entities loosely held together by a weak fed. gov. why did the FFs give the fed. gov. laws dominance over individual state laws.
Why did they make a union rather than keep with a confederation? Because they considered states subordinate entitles to the fed. gov.
They rejected the idea of a very weak fed. goverment with the understanding that the fed. gov's role was to be as limited as possible. That doesn't mean in the slightest that they considered states sovereign entities or separate nations.
But once again we're ignoring the big question: why did the states secede?
They didn't secede because they thought the fed. gov. was too big or because the North was economically raping the South with tariffs. They seceded because they feared their institution of slavery was going to be destroyed. And they were right to think so. Except instead of it happening in 20-40 years, it happened in four years.