As a result, North Carolina had a short lived attempt to create a state religion. While this clearly violates the First Amendment of the the Constitution of the United States:
"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."
They claimed that the law clearly only applied to Congress. They would be right pre-civil war. But the 14th Amendment was passed in in 1868 (shortly after and because of the civil war) whose Section 1 states:
"All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.
The Supreme Court has repeatedly stated that this amendment means the states must also it applies to all states as well as the Federal government:
1947 Emerson v. Board of Education
1994 affirmment Board of Education v. Grumet
Luckily, not all North Carolina Republicans are uneducated fools that want to start a new Civil War. The right honorable and intelligent House Speaker Thom Tillis, Republican of Charlotte killed the bill.
Of course, that does not kill the 'we don't have to obey you' spirit of the GOP's states. They continue to try and nullify federal laws - whether they be gun laws, healthcare laws, etc. Or North Carolina's newest bit of stupidity the attempt to arrest federal agents enforcing national gun laws.
Once and forever - you already tried that bullshit in 1860. It didn't work out so well for you then and won't do any better now. Only this time, it won't be General Sherman burning Southern cities, it will be federal tanks rolling down your streets.
The federal government is ABOVE you - in large part because you are both less competent and far more corrupt than the federal government. Mainly because the federal government has a larger pool of job applicants for the job and economies of scale mean fewer people are needed to do the same job. This results in a far higher quality of federal employees than state employees - and this applies to appointed, hired and elected positions.
But that is beside the point. Democracies exist so that idiots that are outnumbered don't start a civil war by attempting to force a majority of the people to obey their dictatorial laws. In America, the liberals and Democrats outnumber the conservatives and Republicans. The only reasons why the liberals don't take up arms and kill the conservatives is the rule of law. If you break it, we will do the obvious. (Yes, I know the conservatives think they have all the guns and the skills. So did the South in the Civil War - they swore they could shoot better than the North and had better generals.)
So why do they make these pointless and futile attempts? For the same reason North Korea is currently making pointless threats. Local, partisan political reasons. To liven up their base - despite the fact that it pisses off their opponent's base even more than it livens up their own. But unlike North Korea, the US is a democracy. Which means the GOP's saber rattling is counterproductive, doomed to failure.
And it's one of the reasons why the Democrats continue to keep on winning the national elections while the GOP sits back wondering what they are doing wrong.
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