WaPo: “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….
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.”…
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….
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.”