The Current Constitutional Foundation For The United...

Written Assignment Federalism can be viewed as the current constitutional foundation for the United States of America. This structure of government provides our country with a fortified relationship between each individual state and the national government. Prior to the U.S Constitution, the United States government operated under the Articles of Confederation, which outlined the United States previous federal system. The system provided in the Articles failed due to limited central power and unorganized leniency in the states. This pushed Americans to implement a revised version of these articles, which first introduced a stronger federal government to the people in a document we now know as our Constitution. America was among one of the†¦show more content†¦The Tenth Amendment granted all power to the states, unless specifically delegated to the federal government by the constitution. In addition, the Supremacy Clause may be found in Article Six, Clause Two of the constitution, and states th at the federal government will be the â€Å"supreme law of the land†. This means that if the state and the national governing bodies came into conflict, the federal government would ultimately rule over the state. These two additions to our Constitution exist to limit the tension between the State and United States government, all while ensuring that powers are shared in a fair nature. Today, we see an example of the Supremacy Clause taking action when it comes to same-sex marriage rights. Prior to June 26, 2015 each state had the option to ban or recognize gay and lesbian marriages in its own government. For instance, some states, such as Texas, did not deliver marriage licenses to the LGBT community, where other states would. In June, the Supreme Court ruled 5-4 that all states must issue same-sex marriage licenses and lift their ban on the issue. Although each individual state was previously allowed to govern this area independently, once a Supreme Court decision was introduced, that power was over-ruled. When it was decided that gay and lesbian couples had a right to marry, the states no longer had the ability to pass laws against gay and lesbian couples. This became the new law of the land.