Re: Did the Federal Government Create the States or Did the States Create the Federal
Did the Federal Government Create the States or Did the States Create the Federal Government?
A simple question to stimulate discussion.
I believe that the states created the federal government and the federal government should listen to the states.
Edit: Forgot the poll so I apologize. The answers in the poll would have been Yes (Explain), No (Explain), and Other (Explain.
It depends on which state you're talking about.
Some were the original colonies - staked and defined before the Articles of the Confederation.
Others were decided by federal government based on physical boundaries (mountains, rivers, lakes, etc).
Yet in other cases portions of the state were argued for between two states.
In another state a mistake in land-plotting calculations when they built a fort extended the pre-agreed area of the US into Canada . . . so in this situation it was someone's stupid ****up that defined the state's border.
Then we have states that were existing on their own (Alaska, Hawaii) and then wanted into our country - purely on deal with the federal government, not the states.
Of course there are some states that don't even exist anymore - one (at least from what I remember) was proposed in one land-divide plan that was submitted to the government and approval wasn't given - so they weren't formed.
And so on - every state has it's own story and history and the reason for the shape, location, size and name were up to various people/governments for different reasons.
Watch "how the states got their shapes" - it's truly fascinating.
Now - I know that's not what you asked but I digressed at my pleasure, it's my Birthday - :mrgreen:
*sprinkles on some nerds . . . *