[Penn]

I think what you are really discussing is Federalism vs States rights. As I understand it, federalism is part of the elementary system of check and balance that characterize the inherent compromise available to our form of government. It acts as a security valve, by helping to determine any deviation and correct for errors, to change and advance the social issues of any given time period. That’s what American federalism is all about imho. Being so, it also allow (I think) the federal gov’t to pass off issues to the states to settle first, as experiments in democracy so to speak, then If I understand this correctly, when it reaches a point where states rights infringe, or exclude constitutional rights then the Federal court addresses the infrigement questions and constitutional issues.

Sigaba more than likely can answer this much better than I.