So I am reading a 125 year old history book and I find the idea of Federalist vs anti-federalists interesting. Federalists wanted a centralized government where as anti wanted much less. We became a Federalist government with such a Constitution BUT the Confederacy wanted a anti-Federalist government (less centralist) BUT...adopted the SAME Constitution as the US for a few minor items. Davis during his administration also committed to a Centralized or Federalist government.
So was the Confederacy and it's government a contradiction to its beliefs?
A federalist government is a government system in which power is distributed between numerous regional (state/provinces) governments and a central, national government in rough balance (although the central government may be stronger or weaker, overall, than the regional governments).
A federal system of government is used by the USA, as well as numerous Latin American countries, Canada, Australia, and Germany.
Federalism can lead to considerable variety in laws and standards between regional governments. For example, in the USA, most criminal laws are set by the states, along with their punishments. Medical use of marijuana is legal in some states, but not others. Oregon allows physician-assisted suicide, while a doctor doing the same thing in Utah would go to jail. In Texas, a murderer can be executed (and Texas executed 18 people in 2008), but in Michigan, the death penalty is not used.
So with that......how did the Confederate Government claim to be non-centralized but yet follow suit with the above? Is it not a contradiction?
The Confederacy's preamble more-or-less deleted any reference to collective interests, presumably because it ostensibly intended to be a country focused more on state independence than any sort of grander, national goal. The CSA does not promise to form a "perfect union" nor does it aspire to provide for the "common defense" or promote the "general welfare."
It does, however, explicitly evoke God. So there would be no court challenges about the Pledge of Allegiance in alternate CSA-won-the-Civl-War-world.
also to further show that the CS was a Federalist and more Union government than they claimed, refer to the CS Constitution.
The CSA adds a disclaimer that the state legislatures are bound by the federal constitution when creating rules for elections to the Senate and House. This evokes Section 2(1) of the Confederate constitution, which demands that states only grant voting rights to citizens.
The CSA also takes away the Congress' power to alter the time of chosing Senators, as the CSA constitution already sets out a specific timeframe for appointments in Section 3(1).
In the CSA constitution Section 8 has an official title: "Congress shall have power", where as in the original it's much less organized.
The Confederates didn't mention "providing for the common defense" in their constitution's preamble, but they do here. "General welfare" is still omitted, however.
Lastly, the CSA essentially bans trade protectionism by saying that tariffs cannot be imposed on foreign goods for the sole purpose of protecting local industry. It also bans "bounties" from the Treasury, which at the time was the term used to describe government subsidies distributed to offset the costs of managing certain uncompetitive industries.
Southerners had often been prevented from buying cheaper foreign goods because of such Yankee projectionist measures.
The first of two new Confederate clauses that try to impose certain standards of fiscal responsibility on the legislative branch.
The CSA Congress can only appropriate cash:
in response to a specific request from the executive branchto pay for its own expensesto pay for the national debt and other financial "claims" against the national governmentThe document also demands that the Confederate Congress establish a tribunal to "investigate" the validity of such claims made against the CSA.
Frankly, the overall, the CSA constitution and government is Federalized and does not radically alter the federal system that was set up under the United States constitution.
It is thus very debatable as to whether the CSA was a significantly more pro-"states' rights" country (as supporters claim) in any meaningful sense. At least three states rights are explicitly taken away- the freedom of states to grant voting rights to non-citizens, the freedom of states to outlaw slavery within their borders, and the freedom of states to trade freely with each other.
States only gain four minor rights under the Confederate system- the power to enter into treaties with other states to regulate waterways, the power to tax foreign and domestic ships that use their waterways, the power to impeach federally-appointed state officials, and the power to distribute "bills of credit." When people champion the cause of reclaiming state power from the feds, are matters like these at the tops of their lists of priorities?
