THE "STATE RIGHTS" FETICH AND THE 

 U. S. SUPREME COURT 



THE almost-forgotten "state rights' " issue flourished 

 in the United States sixty years ago; but about fifty 

 years ago, by common consent it was given a respectable 

 funeral, and decently interred. It was fully that long ago 

 that the American people realized to the full that the United 

 States are a nation, and that the majority is not necessarily 

 hostile, or even mean, to the minority. 



For fifty years a large number of Congressmen conscien- 

 tiously have been endeavoring to legislate for the greatest 

 number, and the best interests of all. When the time comes, 

 if ever it does come, that those principles are pulled out 

 from the foundations of Congress, then out will go with 

 them the props of this rather complex nation. 



But the lapse of time brings many changes. 



During the past five years we have seen, in course of 

 development, signs of state hostility to the federal govern- 

 ment. We saw in Washington, at one of the Conservation 

 Congresses, a prolonged fight for the principle of state vs. 

 federal sovereignty in the utilization of water. The state of 

 Colorado claimed the right to sequestrate all the waters of 

 th Arkansas river that ran within her borders, regardless 

 of the rights of the states below. 



In the 64th Congress, the last one, one Representative 

 (Mr. Mondell, of Wyoming), made a prolonged and bitter 

 fight on the Hayden sanctuary bill on the ground that it 

 proposed unwarranted interference with the rights of Wy- 

 oming in the National Reserved Forests. Of course Mr. 

 Mondell claimed that the bill was "unconstitutional," as well 

 as unnecessary and harmful. 



