A federal state as a tight union of autonomous non-sovereign states is viable. We have plenty of examples for that. An EU-style loose union of sovereign states also works, if only barely. However, there is no evidence that a loose union of non-sovereign states would work in the present-day world. It might work, but the question is very complex, and we can't hope for a confident answer without actually trying it.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28137396
I would assume that fewer people who are already doing well will move states than will people who experiences more problems where they were.
Or much, much worse for the locals if housing construction can’t keep pace with the population influx. Or your state does the right thing and somehow solves its homelessness problem and then homeless from around the nation arrive (or are shipped off by their home states) and overwhelm the system.
Name someone alive who does not contribute to the quality of life.
The first was the civil war, and federal power consolidated for obvious reasons. Easily half the states demonstrated that they could not be trusted to run their own affairs and protect the rights of the citizens enshrined in the Constitution.
The second was more subtle. The reinterpretation of the Constitution that occurred during the Great Depression granted the federal government the authority to regulate commerce within States under the interstate commerce clause. This authority drives everything from farm subsidies to drug regulation. It is a piece of federal power that people can reasonably argue about the virtue of, but in a modern comment deeply interconnected world it's reasonable to believe that the federal government needs limited central economic planning authority for the country to flourish.
the federal govt should have zero benefits tied to marriage. By having benefits tied to marriage they have essentially established religions that have male-female marriage as the default religion of the country.
if taxes, inheritance etc were not tied to marriage and instead were done with standard contracts between 2, 3 or N people (civil unions). Then the marriage problem would go away.
You're leaving out the massive fights from states that did not want to recognize gay marriage, which could have easily gone the other way. The same process will repeat with marijuana prohibition and the states fighting it may succeed this time. What would have happened if gay marriage stayed as a patchwork of legal statuses? What will happen in the long run when marijuana is legal in many states but continues to send you to prison for decades in others? This is not a stable situation and the exact reason we need the federal government to do things instead of leaving it up to the states.
I don't really know whether we can unwind the federal governments grasp on things without basically destabilizing the whole thing though at this point (and admittedly, I'm not sure the majority would want to).
Power has been moving in a central direction ever since.
I'm really tired of people saying stuff like this : <insert vaguely conservative stance here> has become a rallying cry for racism and transphobia and bigotry.
Its really obnoxious and disingenuous. Give me one example of someone using states rights as a call for racism and hatred.
My guess is you probably only said what you just said because you've read enough articles by blue-haired liberal arts graduates with a sub 100 IQ.
The Federal government has subjugated all states, and merely tolerates their grasps at 10th amendment autonomy as it derives power from the collection of states. But it is more well funded, controls the currency, and has more land and resources under its title. States don't matter.
