The Coronavirus crisis has accelerated the conflict between Gavin Newsom, California’s Democratic Governor and President Trump. Newsom has referred to California as a “nation state” and Trump has asserted that he has complete authority over the states. While Newsom was speaking figuratively, Trump was not.
Of course, Newsom knows that California is only a state, but he also knows, as Trump apparently does not, that the Tenth Amendment says, “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.” In short, the President doesn’t have the Constitutional authority to open or close a state, but the conflict goes much deeper.
In fairness to Trump, the Tenth Amendment does not come up a lot in Washington, because it is truly “more honored in the breach” — to misinterpret Shakespeare, but it is inherent in our system.
Read full article below: