Thought Controllers Up in Arms About Mississippi Nullification Bill

Posted by Thomas Woods

In Mississippi, House Bill 490 would establish a commission to evaluate the constitutionality of federal actions and prevent the enforcement of unconstitutional ones. (They are calling this neutralization, not nullification, but it’s the same thing.)

Naturally, the Opinion Police are appalled at this; this idea does not appear on the 3×5 card of positions we peons are allowed to hold. So the Clarion Ledger has published at least two articles on the subject in the past week in which we are treated to breathless posturing about the civil rights movement, in order to make the idea of political decentralization toxic to the public. They also claim the bill is “unconstitutional” — and whenever an article against nullification makes this claim, you can be sure it will be followed up with: “According to Fred Lawyer of John Marshall Law School, the bill is unconstitutional because according to Article VI of the Constitution, federal law trumps state law.”

Here are the two articles:

“Chism, Smith Embarrass Mississippi with Shameful Legislation,” by Sam R. Hall (It’s shameful and embarrassing not to obey your overlords. Federal law trumps state law, citizen!)

“States’ Rights Pushed in Bill that Would ‘Assert the Sovereignty of the State,’” by Jerry Mitchell

All of their claims — including the idea that segregation discredits decentralization (does anything centralized states do ever discredit centralization?) — are refuted atNullificationFAQ.com.

Thomas E. Woods, Jr. [send him mail; visit his website], a senior fellow of the Ludwig von Mises Institute, is the author of eleven books, most recently Rollback: Repealing Big Government Before the Coming Fiscal Collapse and Nullification: How to Resist Federal Tyranny in the 21st Century, as well as the New York Times bestsellers Meltdown: A Free-Market Look at Why the Stock Market Collapsed, the Economy Tanked, and Government Bailouts Will Make Things Worse and The Politically Incorrect Guide to American History. He is also the editor of five other books, including the just-released Back on the Road to Serfdom.