Texas Gov. Greg Abbott is defying the authority of the federal government just as other Southern governors did before the Civil War and during the fight over school desegregation. Like presidents before him, Joe Biden has the right — and, ultimately, the duty — to uphold the Constitution, including by force.
Abbott, a Republican, has refused to obey a Supreme Court ruling that allows the Biden administration to remove razor wire and other obstacles the Texas National Guard installed along the state’s border with Mexico. The governor’s aim is to prevent migrants — including asylum seekers, legally asking for refuge — from crossing the Rio Grande. To that end, officers have “physically barred” U.S. Border Patrol agents from even reaching at least one sector of the border, according to federal officials.
In a jaw-dropping statement last week, Abbott echoed the secessionist rhetoric of the Confederacy. He claimed that the federal government “has broken the compact between the United States and the States” and that, therefore, Texas has “the right of self-defense.”
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But no state has the right to defy the Supreme Court. Abbott’s unhinged declaration came two days after the court issued a 5-4 decision in the Biden administration’s favor. By law, that ended the months-long standoff between the governor and the president.
Follow this authorEugene Robinson's opinionsIncredibly, however, 25 other Republican governors issued a statement Thursday endorsing not just usurpation of presidential power, but also defiance of the nation’s ultimate authority on the Constitution and our laws. “We stand in solidarity with our fellow Governor, Greg Abbott, and the State of Texas,” the GOP governors proclaimed.
One of them, Gov. Kristi Noem of South Dakota, explained her position to Fox News. “Texas and those 13 original colonies would’ve never signed the treaty that formed the first Constitution of the United States if they didn’t think their right to protect themselves and defend their own people was protected,” she said. “So, what Joe Biden is doing is threatening our state sovereignty.”
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Bless her heart. Texas, of course, was not one of the original colonies. It was a territory of Spain when the Constitution was ratified in 1788, and did not become a state until 1845.
When it did finally accede, however, Texas agreed to obey that Constitution, which gives federal law supremacy over state laws. Border security is a matter for Congress, the president and the federal courts to decide and enforce — not for grandstanding governors such as Abbott.
What can Biden do to overcome Abbott’s defiance? Plenty, if he wants.
In 1957, three years after the Supreme Court’s landmark decision ending segregation in the public schools, Arkansas Gov. Orval Faubus deployed National Guard troops to prevent the first nine Black students from enrolling at all-White Little Rock Central High School. President Dwight D. Eisenhower warned Faubus to back off and obey the Supreme Court ruling, but Faubus refused.
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So Eisenhower acted. Citing the 1807 Insurrection Act, he sent troops from the 101st Airborne Division to escort the Black students into their new school. And he federalized the entire Arkansas National Guard, taking control of the force out of Faubus’s hands.
In 1963, Alabama Gov. George Wallace performed his famous “schoolhouse door” stunt, standing in the way to prevent the first two African American students, Vivian Malone and James Hood, from registering at the University of Alabama. President John F. Kennedy issued an executive order federalizing the Alabama National Guard, again citing the Insurrection Act. The commander of the guard did what he called his “sad duty” and told Wallace to step aside.
Biden surely does not relish going so far as to federalize the Texas National Guard, seizing command from Abbott. But Eisenhower and Kennedy did not want to take that step, either. They tried hard to persuade Faubus and Wallace to obey the Supreme Court, and when the governors refused to comply, the presidents did what they saw as their duty.
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Wallace’s performative defiance was as much about raising his own national profile as anything else, and in that regard, he succeeded. Abbott might be making a similar play. And we should not forget that there is a genuine crisis at the border, one that Biden and a bipartisan group of senators are trying to alleviate by negotiating a package of reforms.
If they are truly interested in securing the border, Abbott and the other Republican governors should become part of the solution. By tossing around rhetoric that sounds more like Jefferson Davis than Thomas Jefferson, they make themselves part of the problem.
We get it: They don’t like Biden, and they want to weaken him politically as he runs for reelection. But Biden has the duty, and the power, to defend the Constitution. I hope foolish political machinations by Abbott and others do not force Biden to act.
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