[oneJob]

International Law is concent based, meaning, it's more a guideline than a law. Sovereignty, at the state level, still reigns supreme. Until states voluntarily bind themselves this will be the case. Here in the U.S. of A. most folks misunderstand the term "state" to mean a political unit that is subservient to the federal level of government. This is only true for certain areas of law, and it is only true because the states bound themselves by voluntarily ratifying the constitution (well, enough of them ratified it and a few went along for the ride). Most folks here are unaware that each state is, politically speaking, still as sovereign as Germany or China. Arkansas = Australia. New York = Bolivia. Texas = France (except, Texas is bigger than France). So, no, between two states, unless there is a binding, not concent based, agreement between the parties, and even then it's fairly common to break these agreements and settle the outcome in court, well states can do pretty much whatever they want. And they do.

Edit: On the subtle points being missed or misunderstood by the replies so far, maybe do some research before sounding off. I've a B.S. in Political Science and am married to a person currently working on their dissertation for their Political Theory Ph.D. whose advisor is ranked above Foucault for the most influential political theorists, and I was able to double check my claims as correct simply by reading some Wikipedia.

[rquantz]

Your comments about US states may have been true prior to the civil war, but certainly have been true since then.

[oneJob]

is that an assertion? based on your say so? or was there some reasoning behind that statement, that you'd like to share?

[germanier]

Can individual states sign international treaties? Can states give out citizenship based on their own criteria? Can states impose import duties?

Because Germany, China, Australia, Bolivia and France can. The US is not unique in its federal structure.

[oneJob]

a state can only not make international treaties if it give up that right. states can give out citizenship based on their own criteria (http://patriotaction.net/profiles/blogs/texas-naturalized-ci...).

can states impose import duties? yes (http://www.dutycalculator.com/dc/187995051/food-drinks/fruit...)

federal structure... wt-what.. seriously, i've no idea where you're going with that one.

[germanier]

Vacri already said enough about import duties. No US state can or does impose duties.

US citizenship (as defined by the federal level) is a necessary condition for Texan citizenship. Texas can't grant any political rights to "Texan citizens" who are not US citizens.

Federal structure: Take a look at Germany or any other federal nation. Germany consists of 16 states that joined a union (that is known as Germany) and voluntarily ratified the constitution (well, enough of them ratified it and a one went along for the ride). The states are individual entities that have their own laws, police, and so on. Starting to see the similarities? Politically speaking, no US state is as sovereign as Germany. Not in theory and certainly not in practice. However, the single German states have a certain level of sovereignty just like US states have a certain level of sovereignty. It's not an absolute but a spectrum.

"Most folks here" are unaware of what you posted not because they don't know but because it's simply not true. Maybe you should do some research outside Wikipedia. Well, you can even start there: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federated_state I know that many people (including political scholars) in the US hold the view that the states are individual entities similar to entire nation states. Note that this view is shared by almost nobody outside the US.

Oh, and please don't respond to comments by editing your original post by the way. I could also spread out the university degrees of me and my conversation partners here but that does not change anything about facts. It's just a bad argument.

[oneJob]

First of all, the broader issue is super complicated. There is no way we can cover it all here. No way. Take for instance: http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/745/1/Chapter8_Introduction.pdf [0]

Also, we are all wrong on certain points given certain assumptions. For instance, given the assumption that a state is defined as a political entity with absolute sovereignty, the 50 U.S. States could not be termed states. I'm very well aware of that and probably should not have been authoring a response a bottle of Zinfandel into the awesome "Fortitude" series, from Amazon.

I was fortunate to be able to take a class, "The State and Sovereignty", with Richard Ashley, who more or less wrote the book (or paper) on post-modern or post-structural International Relations [1]. From another site: "Ashley is concerned with how concepts like the state, sovereignty, and war are rarely questioned as problematic in international politics (Ashley 1989: 302). If the state is the central unit of analysis in IR and yet it is rarely thoroughly examined, how accurate are the assumptions that realism and liberalism rest on?" [2]. My thesis for this class was on this exact topic. Titled "Sovereignty: A Non-Sequitur", I used a lot of words to reference a lot of other people who used even more word to call bs on the very concept of state sovereignty.

But, hey, that's what you get when you approach a complex topic in a blunt fashion. But let's not stop now, let's go to Wikipedia:

State (polity) := "A state is an organized political community living under a single system of government. Speakers of American English often use state and government as synonyms, with both words referring to an organized political group that exercises authority over a particular territory. States may or may not be sovereign. For instance, federated states that are members of a federal union have only partial sovereignty, but are, nonetheless, states." [3]

Federation := "A federation (from Latin: foedus, gen.: foederis, "covenant"), also known as a federal state, is a political entity characterized by a union of partially self-governing states or regions under a central (federal) government. " [4]

"The component states are in some sense sovereign, insofar as certain powers are reserved to them that may not be exercised by the central government. However, a federation is more than a mere loose alliance of independent states. The component states of a federation usually possess no powers in relation to foreign policy, and so they enjoy no independent status under international law. However, German Länder do have this power, which is beginning to be exercised on a European level." [4]

U.S. State := "A state of the United States of America is one of the 50 constituent political entities that shares its sovereignty with the United States federal government. Due to the shared sovereignty between each state and the federal government, Americans are citizens of both the federal republic and of the state in which they reside.[3] State citizenship and residency are flexible and no government approval is required to move between states, except for persons covered by certain types of court orders (e.g., paroled convicts and children of divorced spouses who are sharing custody)." [5]

German Länder (States of Germany) := "Though international relations including international treaties are primarily the responsibility of the federal level, the constituent states have certain limited powers in this area: in matters that affect them directly, the states defend their interests at the federal level through the Bundesrat (literally Federal Council, the upper house of the German Federal Parliament) and in areas where they have legislative authority they have limited powers to conclude international treaties 'with the consent of the federal government'." [6]

[1] http://journals.cambridge.org/action/displayAbstract?fromPag... [2] http://polisciprof.blogspot.com/2006/03/some-thoughts-on-pos... [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_%28polity%29 [4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federation [5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S._state [6] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/States_of_Germany

So, we have, at least as far as Wikipedia is concerned but surely others will say the issue is more complicated [0], that: federated states that are members of a federal union are indeed states, there is such a thing as state citizenship, and that states belonging to a Federation do enjoy independent status under international law.

Now, in practice, how do U.S. States feel about Trade agreements. Let me google that for you:

https://www.citizen.org/documents/States_Rights_and_Trade.pd...

https://www.citizen.org/documents/SovereigntyFactSheet09.pdf

http://leg.wa.gov/House/Committees/CDHT/Documents/JLOCTP.pdf

http://www.ncsl.org/ncsl-in-dc/standing-committees/labor-and...

It's a real issue, that is not always clear, that is becoming ever more important with treaties such as the TPP.

I don't know what else to give you.

[vacri]

Just because it has 'California' in the name 'California Almonds' doesn't mean that California has inked any trade treaties, any more than the Champagne region of France is the entity that enforces it's branding issues on sparkling white wine.

Similarly, the page you've linked to there is other countries' import duties on the product - the table column's title is even "Import to Country".

Even if the page said what you think it does - I'm from Australia, which is on the list. I'm really interested to see if you can show me the trade agreement California seems to have individually inked with my nation. I don't think it exists, but you apparently do - please reference the law.

[germanier]

They can't present such a law because it's explicitly prohibited by the US constitution, Article 1 Section 8.

[oneJob]

And not all states are the 50 U.S. A German state is not bound by our constitution. They have the right to enter international trade agreements.

[oneJob]

Can't fix stupid.

[chris_wot]

That's not true. Under section 51(xxix) of the Australian Consitution, only the Federal government can make international treaties. Individual Australian states cannot.

[vacri]

> still as sovereign as Germany or China

Ah, I see. So China, just like a US state, has to honour the public acts and judicial proceedings of neighbouring states via a 'full faith and credit clause'?

[oneJob]

the "full faith and credit clause", i.e. article iv, sec. 1 of the u.s. constitution, was written after the constitutions of the states that would eventually sign onto the constitution (clearly), and a long (long) time after the term "state" was being used (c.1300 [1]).

Given that a cursory reading of the wikipedia page on this clause states that"At present, it is widely agreed that this Clause of the Constitution has little impact on a court's choice of law decision," I'm at a loss as to how I'm to interpret your one line response as relates to your argument that U.S. states are not as sovereign as a state such as Germany or China.

idk, maybe you were just bored and threw this out into the universe, to see if it would stick, or something.

[1] http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=state

[vacri]

You have me genuinely puzzled at how you somehow claim that because the term 'state' in this context is 800 years old, it means that law made later than this is somehow weak. I genuinely don't get this age-of-etymology argument you're using.

In any case, age of a law is not an automatic trump card. There are multiple sites on the web listing silly laws from the 19th century that never get enforced, for example.

> to see if it would stick, or something.

What, you mean like saying that the individual US states are as sovereign as China?

Also, "I've got a BS and my partner has a PhD in topic X, and I can verify my point by my reading of Wikipedia"? Seriously? Well, my reading of Wikipedia says that you're completely wrong! I'm also King of Namibia and my bestie is the Pope. Just take my word for it.