You ignore your own assumptions.  You assume that a state has sovereignty
over a city and a city over its constituent neighborhoods.
  In fact, states have power over cities, towns, and counties first of
all because states possess superior force (National Guard).
Likewise, the national government has superior power to the states
(military forces, national police, intelligence services, etc.)
  From the British point of view in the 1770s, the colonies in
America possessed not a single shred of sovereignty, being
subordinate corporations created by Parliament, much as the West
India Company was.  Only force created sovereign bodies out of
those colonies.  Likewise, force underwrote the transition from the
fiction of state sovereignty to the contemporary fact of national
sovereignty.

Date sent:              Mon, 24 Feb 2003 11:24:39 -0500 (EST)
From:                   [log in to unmask]
Subject:                Re: Gods and Generals
To:                     [log in to unmask]
Send reply to:          Discussion of research and writing about Virginia history
        <[log in to unmask]>

> National Guard troops called out by the governor of Califormia to suppress
> civil riots in his state is significantly different.  So, I don't see the
> point.
>
> JDS
>
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Harold S. Forsythe
Assistant Professor History
Director:  Black Studies
Fairfield University
Fairfield, CT 06430-5195
(203) 254-4000  x2379

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