A Nullification That Failed

A Nullification That Failed

Thomas Allen

From the mid-1950s to the mid-1960s, the Southern States failed in their attempt to nullify federal acts that forced desegregation and integration, following the recommendations of Madison, which the Tenth Amendment Center (TAC) endorses. Not only did the Southern States dislike these acts,  but most of them were unconstitutional. 

In Brown v. Board of Education (1954), the US Supreme Court based its desegregation ruling primarily on personal biases, sociology, and politics, with the US Constitution playing only an insignificant role. When Congress proposed the Fourteenth Amendment, it did not intend for it to apply to schools. Shortly after its ratification, Congress established a racially segregated school system for the District of Columbia.

According to TAC, Madison identified four appropriate methods that a State and “we the people” of that State could use to oppose and nullify an unconstitutional federal act or even a disliked federal act. A discussion of these four follows.

1. Popular protest by the people. “We the people” of a State may vigorously and vociferously protest against an unconstitutional or even disliked federal act. Southerners protested resolutely and vehemently against forced federal integration acts, but the federal government successfully suppressed their protest. Their protest did nothing more than bring more federal oppression and less liberty.

2. Refuse to cooperate with the federal government. Wholeheartedly, the Southern States not only refused to cooperate with the federal government, but they also interfered with its enforcement of federal integration acts. With great fervor, they opposed federal integration acts. Their disobedience and lack of cooperation did nothing except invigorate the federal government’s resolve to become more tyrannical and oppressive.

3. Formal protest by the governor. Few governors have ever protested unconstitutional acts of the federal government as did Governor Faubus of Arkansas and Governor Wallace of Alabama. All their protest did was cause the federal government to use military force against Arkansas and Alabama to quell their protest. Other governors protested, but to no avail. Their protest led to more subjection and despotism.

4. Legislative action. Legislative action includes resolutions formally protesting the federal government’s usurpation and unconstitutional acts. Legislatures may forbid agents of the State and its local governments from cooperating with the federal government in enforcing the federal act. It may even include interfering to prevent the federal government from enforcing an unconstitutional federal act. However, legislative action does not extend to preventing federal agents from enforcing unconstitutional federal acts with imprisonment or fines. State legislatures of the Southern States took actions to thwart the enforcement of federal integration acts, short of jailing federal agents. Again, the results were the same: more oppression, tyranny, and loss of liberty.

Madison believed that if adjoining States protested against a federal act and sought to nullify it with the aforementioned actions, their actions would cause the federal act to become void. Madison was wrong. The Southern States were unified in their protest of the federal government’s integration acts. Yet, their unity did nothing to stop the federal government’s tyranny.

The Southern States did not resort to jailing federal agents attempting to enforce school integration. However, this action would have also failed because the philosophy of "might makes right" dominated the country. (With the possible exceptions of the Cleveland, Harding, and Coolidge administrations, this philosophy has been the dominant governing principle of the federal government since 1861 — even superseding the Constitution.) Since the federal government used military force against Arkansas and Alabama in response to much milder forms of nullification, it would have used even greater force against a State that jailed its agents. (If a State had nullified these federal acts following Calhoun’s philosophy instead of Madison’s, these acts would not have applied in the nullifying States. Consequently, the federal government could not have lawfully used the military to enforce them because they did not exist in the nullifying States. However, since the federal government ceased following the Constitution in 1861, it would have used troops anyway.)

As a result of the Southern States’ failure to nullify the federal government’s integration acts, America’s education has deteriorated significantly. Worse, their defeat gave birth to racial quotas, political correctness, diversity-equity-inclusion, wokeism, and ultimately the death of the White race, Christianity, and Western Civilization. Such has been the goal of the Puritan Yankees since the mid-nineteenth century. Only the South stood in the way of this goal; that is why Lincoln and the Republicans had to destroy the South.

Madison may have wept over the utter defeat of the Southern States’ failure to nullify these unconstitutional federal acts. However, based on inferences from its writings, TAC has not.

However, the Southern States’ attempted nullification did lead to two of the three wars that the United States have won since World War II: Eisenhower’s war against Arkansas, Kennedy’s war against Alabama, and Reagan’s war against Grenada. Defeating these three world superpowers is the height of US military prowess in the post-World War II era.

Since Lincoln’s War, States have been highly successful at nullifying federal acts against vice, e.g., prohibition, which the Constitution authorized the federal government to prohibit the manufacturing, sale, and transportation of intoxicating liquors, and marijuana, which the federal government has no constitutional authority to outlaw or regulate. However, the nullification of most unconstitutional federal acts has been highly unsuccessful. The only nullifying acts that States are allowed are unenforceable protests and resolutions, and not participating with the federal government in enforcing federal laws (even this one seems to be fading under Trump).

Copyright © 2025 by Thomas Coley Allen.

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Critique of Achtenberg’s Speech on Fair Housing

Critique of Achtenberg’s Speech on Fair Housing

Thomas Allen

[Editor’s note: This article was submitted in 1994 for the “Southern National Newsletter” of the Southern National Party. It has been slightly edited.]

A speech delivered by Roberta Achtenberg, Assistant Secretary for Fair Housing and Equal Opportunity of the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), illustrates how much the United States have deteriorated and how much deterioration will accelerate in the future. This speech illustrates the desperate need for the Southern States to secede and form a free and independent confederation of free and independent Southern States.

Achtenberg delivered this speech at the first (and hopefully the last) National Fair Housing Summit. It was a gathering sponsored by the federal government to discuss the state of fair housing and to decry the lack thereof. “Fair housing” is a euphemism that means that a landlord or homeowner has no right to rent or sell or not to rent or sell his property to whomever he pleases for whatever reason he pleases. The purpose of the meeting was to discuss ways to take away even the few rights and freedoms remaining and to discuss how to finish destroying what remains of Western Civilization in the United States.

She points out, correctly so, that where a person lives is a most important factor in determining the quality of one’s life. Thus, she concludes that all neighborhoods should be thoroughly integrated with the lowest stratum of society. There should be equality in the quality of life. “[T]he right to choose where we live is as important as the right to equal educational and employment opportunity and the right to vote.” Just as the power of the federal government has been used to destroy public education, to weaken the economy, and to corrupt the political process, it will now be used to ruin neighborhoods — or more correctly, ruin neighborhoods at an accelerated rate.

Then, she complains about the government not being more tyrannical in destroying the rights of the people in their use of their property. She praises the “advocates for the disabled, advocates for woman and for families with children, and industry leaders” for leading the fight to destroy these rights. Ah! But, thanks to the Clinton administration, a new day has dawned. The federal government will now become an active partner in the destruction of these rights (as though it has not been an active partner in destroying these rights since before the “civil rights” movement).

Moreover, she and her cohorts will lead the charge to destroy what remains of these rights, for she claims what the government does best is to lead. (Unreconstructed Southerners know differently. They know that what the government does best is to destroy.) She promises severe penalties for homeowners and landlords who do not kowtow before the fair housing overlords. Woe unto him who stands up for his rights.

Furthermore, she promises accelerated growth in the power of the federal government in housing (which really means accelerated growth of the federal government in controlling people). Programs to destroy the rights of homeowners and landlords will be instituted by every means available. The death and utter destruction of these rights are the legacy that she promises that the Clinton administration will leave America.

Also, she advocates affirmative action in housing. Yet she denies that affirmative action will lead to quotas and reverse discrimination. As anyone who has even cursorily looked at other affirmative action programs knows that affirmative action has always led to quotas and reverse discrimination. No matter how much the advocates of such affirmative action programs have denied that quotas and reverse discrimination would not occur, they always have. She fails to explain why affirmative action in housing will not result in the same.

Then, she says that “it’s time for government to act affirmatively to guarantee every American’s right to choose freely where they live.” To guarantee this so-called right means more than denying landlords the right to rent their property to whomever they please and denying homeowners the right to sell their houses to whomever they please. It also means providing people money to buy or rent in neighborhoods that they cannot afford. As a result, the politically powerful will compel the many serfs to support the privileged few. She hints that such a subsidy program is envisioned. Moreover, she equates separation by income with separation by race or ethnicity.

Next, she proceeds to inform her audience that the fair housing laws will be used to end segregated neighborhoods. Neighborhoods are to be integrated in spite of what the people in those neighborhoods think or want. Integration for integration’s sake! (As always, this integration flows only in one direction. White neighborhoods will be forcibly integrated. Black neighborhoods will not.)

Continuing, she informs her audience that integrated housing and neighborhoods are the last great unconquered frontiers for the civil rights movement. She is determined to conquer this frontier and bring it to ruin just as the civil rights movement has ruined all else that it has conquered. Yet, she fails to inform her audience of the results of the fair housing laws if they are as fully and forcibly implemented as she desires. The results are deteriorating neighborhoods, poorer housing, greater racial tension and hatred, ever-higher taxes, the loss of freedom, and a bigger government.

Her agency, HUD, is already attacking the banking industry. Banks are not to place the interest of their stockholders, owners, and depositors first. They are to place the social programs of the federal government first. They are to lend to whomever the federal government tells them to lend to — no matter how risky the loan.

Furthermore, the weight of the federal government is to be used against States and locales to coerce, extort, and bribe them into adopting analogous fair housing laws and enforcement programs. The federal government will make State and local governments coconspirators in the destruction of housing in the United States.

Finally, she comments on affordable housing and bemoans the lack of affordable housing. She claims that “there is [not] enough affordable housing, in enough neighborhoods and communities to enable people to actually make free choices about where they will live.” She does not identify the principal cause of the lack of affordable housing, which is governmental intervention, manipulation, and control of the housing market. On the contrary, she advocates more governmental intervention, manipulation, and control of the housing market. What she fails (or perhaps refuses) to realize is that her agency, HUD, and other agencies of the federal government are the cause of much of the housing problem about which she is carping.

Throughout her speech, she brags about the enforcement activities of her agency. She brags that the enforcement activities of her agency need to be increased and expanded. She brags about how the extent, domain, and coverage of her agency are to be increased and expanded. She brags about how much more intrusive into business and private affairs of all Americans her agency is to become. Never does she mention the constitutionality of what she advocates — probably because everything she advocates is unconstitutional.

The time has come for all good Southerners to free themselves from the despotism and tyranny of the megalomaniacs of HUD. They are only one example, and a small one at that, of the despotic and tyrannical rule of the United States over the Southern States. The time has come for a free and independent confederation of free and independent Southern States.

Copyright © 1995, 2025 by Thomas C. Allen.

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White Privilege

White Privilege

Thomas Allen

Whites are accused of having “White Privilege,” which supposedly gives them all sorts of advantages over and at the expense of nonwhites, especially Blacks. “White Privilege” is the unearned assets, advantages, and benefits that White people have merely because they are White. Whites have what they have solely because of their skin color.

   In “White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack,” Peggy McIntosh identifies 50 things that she considers “White Privilege.” Some of them are absurd, irrelevant, and insignificant. A few insult Blacks. Some result from the desire of Blacks to be thought highly of by other Blacks. Even a few are wrong: The opposite is true. However, a few are correct. [See “Black Privilege” by Thomas Allen.]

The following is a short, but incomplete, list of the privileges that Whites have today. They greatly disagree with McIntosh’s list of privileges.

1. The privilege of being second-class citizens in the country that their ancestors founded and built.

2. The privilege of having their God-given unalienable rights as citizens of a State subordinated to civil rights granted by Congress and federal agencies to nonwhites.

3. The privilege of being led by Albusphobic Whites.

4. The privilege of being obligated to be disloyal to the White race.

5. The privilege of not defending the interests of the White race.

6. The privilege of being denied equal rights and equal protection under the law.

7. The privilege of having the legal system weaponized against them (lawfare) instead of having the legal system protect them.

8. The privilege of going to prison for trying to save the life of a Black thug as happened to  Derek Chauvin.

9. The privilege of being the victim of Black criminals (see “The Dirty War: America’s Race War” by Thomas Allen).

10. The privilege of being the only race that can commit hate crimes.

11. The privilege of going to jail for peacefully protesting while nonwhites, especially Blacks, are rewarded for highly destructive riots.

12. The privilege of dying in foreign wars for people and institutions that loathe them.

13. The privilege of not being allowed to hear political speeches at church while nonwhite churches can have political speeches.

14. The privilege of being domestic terrorists.

15. The privilege of having less qualified nonwhites hired for a job instead of more qualified Whites because of race.

16. The privilege of losing their jobs to nonwhites.

17. The privilege of being fired because they are White.

18. The privilege of being victims of affirmative action and racial quotas.

19. The privilege of having nonwhites steal the credit for discoveries, inventions, and works of Whites.

20. The privilege of granting nonwhites benefits and privileges that Whites never enjoyed.

21. The privilege of being sacrificed for racial justice.

22. The privilege of being responsible for the substandard behavior of Blacks.

23. The privilege to support nonwhites.

24. The privilege of having their country destroyed.

25. The privilege of having their culture destroyed.

26. The privilege of having their history destroyed.

27. The privilege of having statues and memorials of Whites destroyed.

28. The privilege of participating in the destruction of statues and memorials of Whites.

29. The privilege of not segregating while nonwhites may segregate.

30. The privilege of not being allowed to attend meetings of nonwhites.

31. The privilege of not discriminating against nonwhites while nonwhites may discriminate against Whites.

32. Privilege of being discriminated against and not being allowed to object to such discrimination without being penalized.

33. The privilege of having nonwhites refer to Whites with racial slurs and being sued if responding by referring to nonwhites with racial slurs.

34. The privilege of being the only race that has to endure hate speech.

35. The privilege of enjoying wokeism.

36. Privilege of being the only race that can be racist.

37. The privilege of not being allowed to speak about race except to degrade Whites.

38. The privilege of worshiping archconservative St. Martin Luther King the Divine. 

39. The privilege of being racial nihilists while not allowed to be racial supremacists or racial preservationists although nonwhites may be racial supremacists or racial preservationists (See “Views on Race” by Thomas Allen.)

40. The privilege of practicing the new morality of scarifying the White race on the altar of humanity while not allowed to practice the old morality of preserving their race although nonwhites can practice the old morality of preserving their races (See “Old Morality – New Morality” by Thomas Allen.)

41. The privilege of being loathed by nonwhites, especially Blacks.

42. The privilege of hating themselves and their race.

43. The privilege of living in environments that are hostile to Whites.

44. The privilege of being victims of racism.

45. The privilege of being marginalized.

46. The privilege of being humiliated.

47. The privilege of feeling guilty about being White.

48. The privilege of being victims of antiwhite inquisitions.

49. The privilege of not having their lives matter.

50. The privilege of having less qualified nonwhites admitted to a university instead of more qualified Whites because of race.

51. The privilege of having their children taught to hate their race.

52. The privilege of not being allowed to protect their children.

53. The privilege of having their education lowered to accommodate nonwhites, especially Blacks.

54. The privilege of enduring diversity training and sensitivity training.

55. The privilege of being indoctrinated with Critical Race Theory.

56. The privilege of not having college courses designed specifically for Whites.

57. The privilege of being stupid and apathetic;

58. The privilege of trying to placate nonwhites whose lust for vengeance can never be satisfied, for example, many Blacks.

59. The privilege of being degraded and bullied for being White.

60. The privilege of being masochists.

61. The privilege of being held to a higher standard than nonwhites.

62. The privilege of being blamed for all of the world’s problems and being considered the cancer of the universe.

63. The privilege of being guilty of all evils until proven innocent, which they can never do.

64. The privilege of the sin of whitism, a sin of which they can never repent.

65. The privilege of kowtowing and groveling to unappreciative nonwhites, especially Blacks.

66. The privilege of begging nonwhites, especially Blacks, for forgiveness for things that Whites have never done.

67. The privilege of being demonized.

68. The privilege of having their reputation destroyed. 

69. The privilege of being penalized because of their massive contribution to mankind.

70. The privilege of being replaced by nonwhites.

71. The privilege of not having a homeland while all other races may have a homeland.

72. The privilege of participating in their own annihilation.

73. The privilege of being abolished, i.e., genocide.

74. The privilege of being the stupidest race to ever exist.

75. The privilege of being the most frightened cowards who ever existed.

According to diversity, inclusion, and equity (DIE) adherents, all the aforementioned White privileges are unearned benefits that Whites enjoy and that give them advantages over other races. Merely by being born White, they earn these privileges. Because of their White supremacy, they refuse to share these privileges with others.

Copyright © 2024 by Thomas Coley Allen.

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