Quote:
Originally Posted by Yorick
Completely wrong Lav. The equivalent of American states in the UK are England, Scotland, Wales etc in the United Kingdom. Or even France Germany and Belgium in the E.U.
The American states are sovereign. Each state has it's own counties (or boroughs or parishes depending on where you are) themselves, just like England does.
I live in Kings county for example, which is in the State of New York.
The Union involved in the USA is similar to what's happening with your European Union.
Infringements on states rights are not what the founding fathers envisioned, just as no-one wants to see Germany running all over Czech rights for example.
|
The analogy of the states making up the USA are like the nations in the EU is not quite accurate. The states in the US are NOT sovereign. They cannot make political treatys, except in a limited way(see below). They cannot mint money or have a militia wholly beholden to the states governor(all official militias are ultimately subject to the PotUS).
While the Constitution of the US may imply that the individual states have 'soverignty', it is not true de facto. That issue was decided by the US Civil War. The revolting slave states attempted to leave the union, but were conquered and forcibly rejoined to the US.
All that being said, I "think" coastal and border states can make limited trade agreements with foreign nations. Whether these agreements could qualify as 'treatys' is subject to interpretation. This is the only way, that I know of, that the individual states can "ape" sovereignty.