Thomas Jefferson was deeply suspicious of federal judges, whom he described as “the corps of sappers & miners, steadily working to undermine the indepenent rights of the States, & to consolidate all power in the hands of that government in which they have so important a freehold estate.” Moreover, he viewed states’ rights and the principle of subsidiarity as indispensable tools in the fight against “consolidation” by judicial fiat: “Were not this great country already divided into states, that division must be made, that each might do for itself what concerns itself directly, and what it can so much better … Continue reading Jefferson on States’ Rights vs. Federal Judicial Tyranny