"You trust the federal government more?"
I actually do, though not for the reason I think most pro-federalists do.
My issue with states-first-rule is that it actually takes away an informal Check and Balance, namely, the Check and Balance of competing opinions on policy, especially social policy. If you live in, say, the Solid South, your politics are likely to be monopolized by a set of values--pro-gun, pro-Bible/Christianity, largely anti-liberal, your demographics are, with the obvious exceptions of Texas and Florida, more likely to be more predominantly white or black/white with less cultural variation than other regions of the country, etc.--and so to succeed politically at the state-level, you have to largely start from these baselines.
I'm sure there are Congressmen/women who are exceptions, and of course folks here from the South like President Eden don't fit all those criteria, but we can certainly agree MOST states and voters in the Solid South would fit MOST of those criteria, easily.
NOW.
Local values are a good thing, and I mean that. They give a sense of cultural identity and unity, and those are both very important. They can also give a sense of continuity.
But as important as they are, and while it is inevitable that they will shape policy in a state to some degree, social values CANNOT be allowed to wholly shape the policy of a state, particularly its social policy.
THIS is where the importance of the federal government comes in--not from the Executive branch, but the Legislative.
It is VITAL that the ideas and values of a region be a say BUT not the final or only say in what governs said region, and Congress facilitates this by bringing several regions together, in order that there might be, certainly, a clash between cultures, but this serves as a larger, cultural check, and is often for the better.
After all, it may be easy for a state like Mississippi to scorn illegal Latino immigrants out of hand--it doesn't have very many, after all.
However, growing up in Southern California, I would argue that there is, at least among some, myself included, a different and more sympathetic view of illegal immigrants because, well, they (I) see them and talk to them in the course of our actions every day, and when you do THAT, it's a lot harder to outright demonize or chastise an entire people the way it might be if you have never met them.
Arizona provides yet another view--that of a state with many Latino immigrants of this nature, but one that's responding differently than California.
Florida, again, is different.
ALL of these states, thus, check each other when passing NATIONAL laws, and for that reason I trust the Legislative Branch (as much as I, like nearly everyone else, find it to be a sloth-like waste at the moment) far more than the state governments.
The Congressmen and women from Mississippi, California, Arizona, and Florida all have to face their constituents, sure, but they also have to face one another, and if the values or ideals of one jar violently with the others, even if it is socially-acceptable back home, said Congressman or woman might have trouble passing legislation, as you need friends in Congress, and if you lack them because of your social views and your fellow Congressmen and women find you bigoted or too forgiving or what have you, then that's definitely a informal socio-political check.
It isn't from the States that we get the 13th and 14th Amendments, and it isn't from them that we get the Civil Rights Act--where the States, in other words, are sometimes comfortable to turn a blind eye, the Federal Government provides a social Check to that as it is comprised of all 50 states and thus up to 50 different state views.
There's likely an example of the South checking another body in a positive way, the above cases are just the most readily memorable, at least for me, so please don't take it as just my attacking the South here, as I really do not intend that.
"The federal government is a ridiculously corrupt, morally shady institution."
State governments are ridiculously corrupt, morally shady institutions as well.
I'd submit nearly all political structures in this country are.
But at least the Federal government has inter-regional social checks and balances, so if you're a Latino living in a very-white state such as Mississippi or New Hampshire, you can still at least take some comfort knowing that states such as Florida and California (and to be fair to the South, possibly Texas, I haven't checked, but it's large enough and has enough of a Latino community that it may well have one) do have Congressmen that can speak for the Latino community in America.
If it's States-first, that balance is lost, the voice of the minority in any region is drowned out.
But with the Legislative Branch, and the sort of cross-cultural, social checks and balances it affords, social minorities ARE given at least the opportunity for a voice to speak to their social needs, and if a state or states are behaving in a manner that seems immoral to the rest of the nation, the other states may have at least a chance at correcting that, or intervening.
(And before someone states that I above treat all Latinos as one single bloc, YES, I recognize that just because you're a Latino in NYC doesn't mean you'll connect with one in CA or FL; that being said, studies do show that such things as "The Black Vote" and "The Latino Vote" do exist, as there are often social and cultural reasons that unite the majority of such blocs together, regardless of region, so just as I said PE is a counterexample to some of the "values" I expressed for many Southern voters while still retaining his Southernity--if that's a word--you can be Latino and vote "against" the Latino Bloc, as it were, and remain Latino, it's just that statistically, there IS a Latino Bloc of Votes, and there are many social issues that most Latinos DO care about and hold similar views on.)
Full Disclosure Game 1
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