Florida Senate - 2012                                     SM 240
       
       
       
       By Senator Evers
       
       
       
       
       2-00341-12                                             2012240__
    1                           Senate Memorial                         
    2         A memorial to the Congress of the United States,
    3         urging Congress to honor the provisions of the
    4         Constitution of the United States and United States
    5         Supreme Court case law which limit the scope and
    6         exercise of federal power.
    7  
    8         WHEREAS, the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution of the
    9  United States proclaims: “The powers not delegated to the United
   10  States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States,
   11  are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people,” and
   12         WHEREAS, the Tenth Amendment defines the scope of federal
   13  power as being that specifically granted by the Constitution of
   14  the United States and no more, and
   15         WHEREAS, the limitation of power contained in the Tenth
   16  Amendment established the foundational principle that the
   17  Federal Government was created by the states specifically to be
   18  an agent of the states, and yet currently the states are
   19  demonstrably treated as agents of the Federal Government, and
   20         WHEREAS, many federal laws directly violate the Tenth
   21  Amendment, and
   22         WHEREAS, the Tenth Amendment ensures that we, the people of
   23  the United States of America and each sovereign state in the
   24  Union of States, now have, and have always had, rights the
   25  Federal Government may not usurp, and
   26         WHEREAS, Article IV, Section 4 of the Constitution of the
   27  United States begins: “The United States shall guarantee to
   28  every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government,” and
   29  the Ninth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States
   30  declares: “The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain
   31  rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others
   32  retained by the people,” and
   33         WHEREAS, the United States Supreme Court ruled in New York
   34  v. United States, 112 S.Ct. 2408 (1992), that Congress does not
   35  have the authority to simply commandeer the states’ legislative
   36  processes by compelling the states to enact and enforce federal
   37  regulatory programs, and
   38         WHEREAS, a number of proposals from previous
   39  administrations and some proposals now pending from the present
   40  administration and from Congress may further violate the
   41  Constitution of the United States, NOW, THEREFORE,
   42  
   43  Be It Resolved by the Legislature of the State of Florida:
   44  
   45         That the Legislature claims sovereignty under the Tenth
   46  Amendment to the Constitution of the United States over all
   47  powers not otherwise enumerated and granted to the Federal
   48  Government by the Constitution of the United States.
   49         BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that this memorial serves as a
   50  notice and a demand to the Federal Government, as our agent, to
   51  cease and desist, effective immediately, from issuing mandates
   52  that are beyond the scope of these constitutionally delegated
   53  powers.
   54         BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that all compulsory federal
   55  legislation that directs states to comply under threat of civil
   56  or criminal penalties or sanctions or requires states to pass
   57  legislation or lose federal funding be prohibited or repealed.
   58         BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that copies of this memorial be
   59  dispatched to the President of the United States, to the
   60  President of the United States Senate, to the Speaker of the
   61  United States House of Representatives, to the presiding
   62  officers of each state legislature of the United States, and to
   63  each member of the Florida delegation to the United States
   64  Congress.