The federalist case against Trump is a terrible cop-out

Instead of fighting the political fight, liberals are abandoning their commitment to federal power.

“I’m not even sure President Lincoln would have been able to bring in forces when he did…if he didn’t do it right after, immediately after Fort Sumter, your argument would be ‘oh, things are okay right now.’”

It was the kind of argument we have heard against federalism and so-called “states rights” a thousand times before in the United States — but on Thursday the roles were completely reversed. Yesterday before the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, it was a liberal state aligned with the Democratic Party which argued that the federal government was overstepping its authority over the states in order to uphold the law; and it was a Republican judge appointed by Donald Trump, Ryan D. Nelson, who argued for the federal government’s expansive authority, specifically invoking Lincoln’s right to put down the Confederate rebellion.