Learning from the words of our founding fathers - States Rights

    The States were not “Sovereigns” in the sense contended for by some. They did not possess the peculiar features of Sovereignty, they could not make war, nor peace, nor alliances nor treaties. Considering them as political Beings, they were dumb, for they could not speak to any foreign Sovereign whatever. They were deaf, for they could not hear any propositions from such Sovereign. They had not even the organs or faculties of defence or offence, for they could not of themselves raise troops, or equip vessels, for war. On the other side, if the Union of the States comprizes the idea of a confederation, it comprizes that also of consolidation. A Union of the States is a Union of the men composing them, from whence a national character results to the whole. Congress can act alone without the States - they can act & their acts will be binding against the Instructions of the States. If they declare war: war is de jure declared - captures made in pursuance of it are lawful - No acts of the States can vary the situation, or prevent the judicial consequences. If the States therefore retained some portion of their sovereignty, they had certainly divested themselves of essential portions of it.

    Rufus King, as recorded in James Madison notes of the Constitutional Convention, June 19, 1787