"I agree with you that the federal law is supreme should there be a conflict between it and state and local laws. but state and local laws exists in most cases beside and not within federal law."
Bode
It depends it seems to me, on what is meant by "beside". If it means "alongside and in consonance", I will agree. If federal law is supreme as has been said, then all other laws not in conflict with federal law are within, not outside it.
The constitution of a democratic country is usually a document of compromise, at the end of the day. A federal constitution sets out the rights, duties, and responsibilities of the federal, state, and local governments as it pertains to the enactment and in some cases, enforcement of laws. A state for example may not enact and enforce laws that are in violation of the constitution. In the event of a conflict, federal not state courts, usually adjudicate. State court mostly adjudicate on state rights and matters.
From: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com [mailto:usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Bode
Sent: Tuesday, October 27, 2015 5:22 PM
To: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Moderator's Caution: Lives Matter
Ogugua:
The word "within" is the unitary word not federal. The laws of a federation are not omnibus laws that contain within them all the laws of the nation, that is a unitary system. in a federal system, the federal law is completely limited to the things that concern all citizens, issues of national concern. federal laws deliberately have nothing to say about all other areas of social life, such as domestic concerns under the jurisdiction and laws of the state and other local authorities. I agree with you that the federal law is supreme should there be a conflict between it and state and local laws. but state and local laws exists in most cases beside and not within federal law. this is an error i have tried for 6 months to correct on this forum. state and local laws address areas that federal law by essence does not and should not address. a citizen of a federation is not except from state laws, state laws are not contained within federal laws and sometimes differ from state to state. state and local laws however cannot conflict with federal laws. i assume this is probably what you mean?
see cornel university law department for reference. https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/federalism
Federalism
Federalism is a system of government in which the same territory is controlled by two levels of government. Generally, an overarching national government governs issues that affect the entire country, and smaller subdivisions govern issues of local concern. Both the national government and the smaller political subdivisions have the power to make laws and both have a certain level of autonomy from each other. The United States has a federal system of governance consisting of the national or federal government, and the government of the individual states.
The U.S. Constitution grants the federal government with power over issues of national concern, while the state governments, generally, have jurisdiction over issues of domestic concern. While the federal government can enact laws governing the entire country, its powers are enumerated, or limited; it only has the specific powers allotted to it in the Constitution. For example, Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution grants Congress the power to levy taxes, mint money, declare war, establish post offices, and punish piracies on the high seas. Any action by the federal government must fall within one of the powers enumerated in the Constitution. For example, the federal government can regulate interstate commerce pursuant to the Commerce Clause of the Constitution but has no power to regulate commerce that occurs only within a single state.
The amount of power exercised by the federal government is dependant upon how the various provisions of the Constitution are interpreted. For example, the U.S. Supreme Court expanded the powers of the federal government when it construed federal powers to include those "necessary and proper" to effect the legislation passed by Congress. McCulloch v. Maryland, 17 U.S. 316 (1819). This construction allows the federal government to exercise power ancillary to those specifically listed in the Constitution, provided the exercise of those powers does not conflict with another Constitutional provision. In contrast, state power is not limited to express grants of power. Under the Tenth Amendment of the Constitution, States have all powers that are not specifically granted to the federal government, or forbidden to them under the Constitution. For example, although the Constitution grants the federal government the power to tax, state governments are also able to levy taxes to support themselves, because that power is not forbidden to them by the Constitution. State governments manage matters of local concern, such as child protective services, public schools, and road maintenance and repair.
On Tue, Oct 27, 2015 at 5:14 PM Anunoby, Ogugua <AnunobyO@lincolnu.edu> wrote:
I do not know that anyone supports the disrespect or subversion of any aspects of the custom and tradition of any part of Nigeria in which they choose to live. The issue for me is whether custom and tradition trumps the laws of the Republic of Nigeria, and also whether communities/groups can pick and choose which laws of the republic they would abide by based on any conflicts and contradictions that custom and tradition may pose. My considered view is that the constitution is the supreme law. All accommodation including custom and tradition must be within and not outside it if the constitution is to mean anything. That seems to me to be the choice that Nigeria have made. All Nigerians should be faithful to that choice.
If I understand it correctly, the Nigeria project is about building and growing an achieving, competitive country that works for all law abiding citizens at all times, in spite of Nigeria's diversity spectrum. A bloody war was fought over many years to keep the country together- uphold the constitution not custom and tradition. That this conversation is taking place in this forum is a wee bit uncomfortable for me. The primacy of the constitution in my opinion, and unalloyed respect of it in spite of different customs and traditions, is the best guarantee of fulfillment of Nigeria's purpose and promise
oa.
From: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com [mailto:usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Rex Marinus
Sent: Tuesday, October 27, 2015 12:39 PM
To: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com
Subject: RE: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Moderator's Caution: Lives Matter
Dear Professor Falola:
With due regard to the sentiments that you have reflected here, I'd like to ask you that very simple question that Soyinka asked some nearly two decades ago "when is a nation"? Humane scholarship, as I understand it, permits us to ask the hard and difficult questions, and to give real ambit to our most enlightened conscience. So, let me draw an analogy with some of our experiences here: because the Ku Klux Klan has history and is sacred to some people, must we therefore never question, or attempt to organize in areas where they hold sway, because it would offend those who find the KKK an important part of their "culture" and "heritage"? Better still, you realize that the foundation of the Nazi idea and of Mussolini's exactly asks us to do very exactly what you have proposed, almost inadvertently? And I'm certain you neither identify with Nazism or Fascism ideologically, although its local variety seems to escape your scrutiny, it seems to me, in the penumbra of the protective sheets which you now advocate we must wear around the critique of the modern nation in Nigeria.
Nations have never been built on these terms. Every right we enjoy today, in the comforts of our current location was gained by blood and sacrifice; by people who were insistent on breaking down the barriers you want us to protect/preserve in Nigeria. It did not come by easy acquiesence. If they had followed your thinking, sir, you would never mount the distinguished chair you sit upon quite easily and legitimately today in Austin, Texas. There will certainly be no interest in African history in those places. Our particular identities do not foreclose, and need not detain us to the past. Let me give a particularly recent example about why we must not be sucked into the defence of these strange institutions. I do not know if you agree with image of the just dead Ooni of Ife, with his foot resting on his court or ritual slave, who traveled with him t Harvard. As a sign of culture and indication of majesty, the slave knelt before Ooni Olubuse as he sat, while he was a guest of a conference on African Religions in Harvard about five years or so ago. It was a horrifying scene, but there are those who defend it as tradition.
If we are unwilling to defend the constitution that grants equality between the Ooni and his ritual slave, by placing limits which it does not place on the individual, simply on the premise that it questions the Ooni, at what point do we then stop talking about the travesty called Nigeria? Why should e worry that corruption exists? Because everytime the Nigerian intellectual talks about democracy, and still defends the rights of the monarchy, they defend a corrupt order. They are either unclear about the conceptual meaning and significance of the terms they use, or they are just being hypocritical. The trouble in Nigeria has remained the limits we are prepared to place on its development as a modern, progressive state; the extreme disregard of its laws by the self-interested elite, and the complicity of the intellectuals who have mostly been willing tools, because they tolerate, accommodate, and perpetuate the most conservative and tyrannical order on that society, sometimes of the lamest excuses: "it is too dangerous to shift the apple carts," we say.
My favorite Nigeria is also the Onigbongbo model. Anybody who likes to go and prostrate to Onigbongbo has the supreme rights. But whoever wants to drink beer in front of the mosque should be free to do so, for as long as it is not inside the mosque. It should neither the business of the imam or the Onigbongbo to decree on whether beer is to be sold or not. If they as much as attempt to disrupt the common life of those who choose to drink beer either in Onigbongo or in Sokoto, the Federal government has the duty and the obligation under our laws to protect the secular convictions of citizens, whether they have lived in Onigbongbo all their lives, or just came to town by bus, that night. It should not matter because that is the basis of our rule of law. When we become selective on which law to defend, or place abstract limits on the rights already guaranteed the citizen, we give leverage to disorder, and to tyranny. I salute you, professor.
Obi Nwakanma
From: toyinfalola@austin.utexas.edu
To: USAAfricaDialogue@googlegroups.com
Subject: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Moderator's Caution: Lives Matter
Date: Tue, 27 Oct 2015 13:09:01 +0000Scholars:
As you make your arguments, be aware that statements that can generate violence and loss of lives are outside the bounds of scholarly engagements and individual rights. Indeed, such statements are irresponsible. Citizenship has its limits. Freedom has its limits. Rights are not limitless.
We cannot be in the comfort of our relocated spaces and not know that we have our brothers and sisters in Enugu, Sokoto, Makurdi, Ibadan and other places whose lives deserve to be protected.
Localism, irrespective of one's "federalist" position, remains powerful in Africa. You cannot wish away overnight, Zulu identity, even if we make arguments that it was a 19th century creation. Igbo, Yoruba etc. as presently constituted as political identities have not always been with us. But you can no longer wish them away overnight. I cannot go to Benue State and be disrespectful to the Idoma because of modernist arguments.
I cannot walk to Sokoto and say that the Sultan is not important, and his right to the Sokoto throne qualifies me to set up what the Sultan will regard as a threat to his throne. There is a history to his throne, and there may be a history to mine as well, but wisdom means that I must be careful as I may not even have the number to fight the Sultan.
I am not from Ile-Ife, but I cannot walk to Ife to ask them not to accord respect and dignity to their Ooni. Who am I? Citizenship in most African countries remain connected to places of birth, and I am sure that it will not always be so in the years ahead. You and I do not know when.
Meanwhile, we must protect lives, and not be talking about death to people, in so casual a manner.
A mob can be generated within minutes in many places, and the police and army cannot do that much to protect lives, usually of the poor.
Onigbogbo is my favorite joint in Nigeria. I was there last week. Here is the model that works, Muslims and Christians, poor and not so poor, Tiv, Igbo and Yoruba living their lives without many of the arguments we make here. My joint is actually in front of the palace of the Onigbongbo. Indeed, after the Friday mosque, some Muslims joined us to drink beer. The Onigbongbo people see lives differently from the way some of the scholars see things.
Exercise caution.
Life is sacrosanct. One life should not be lost because of temporary political exigencies in a country that was cobbled together and where secular institutions remain either weak or not functioning well.
CAUTION
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