Trump, his District of Columbia Invasion, and the U.S. Constitution
Anyone following the news this August 2025 knows Trump has taken over the police force of the District of Columbia and sent in National Guard troops. He does have authority to do that although no reason exists for it. It is a completely different story for the states. Recall Trump claimed authority to control California National Guard troops and direct them and Federal Troops into Los Angeles without consulting California Governor Gavin Newsom. I have watched or read various media stories that report comments about it, or justifications for it, but I have not found a story that reports those parts of the Constitution that addresses what Trump has done and threatens to do. One of the parts would include Article IV, Section 4 of the Constitution, which I quote exactly below.
The U.S. Constitution, Article IV, Section 4 – The United States shall guarantee to every state in the union a Republican Form of Government, and shall protect each of them against Invasion; and on Application of the Legislature, or the Executive (when the Legislature cannot be convened) against domestic Violence.
Also include Article II as relevant. Article II, Section 2 makes the President “Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States and the militia of the several states if called into service of the United States;” If the United States is threatened with invasion or foreign attack the president is authorized to call out militia forces from some or all of the states to join in the defense of the United States. “Service of the United States” does not include domestic violence or a domestic disturbance separately identified in Article IV, Section 4. Service to the United States does not suggest authorizing the president to “federalize” state National Guard troops and use them in opposition to an elected governor against state residents.
State sovereignty, or states rights, were a major stumbling block to getting our Constitution ratified back in 1787. To get the Constitution ratified by the states the founding fathers had to make concessions to states rights advocates. The states were quite afraid an oppressive federal government would do exactly what Trump is doing, which is use military force to violate their independence and overwhelm them. Some parts of our Constitution are a little vague, but not Article IV, Section 4: the federal government can send troops upon request by state officials and only if they declare there is domestic violence they cannot control.
Article IV, Section 4 did not go far enough to convince states right advocates to ratify the Constitution. To get the constitution ratified it was necessary to include amendments later known as the Bill of Rights. The Second Amendment reads: A well- regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.
The gun rights advocates have quoted just the last half of the Second Amendment for so many decades they have all but made the first part disappear. The Second Amendment ratified as part of our Constitution had nothing to do with the private ownership of firearms. Our actual constitutional right to bear arms comes through the same constitutional right we have to drive a car, drink beer, wear a blue shirt or spit on the sidewalk. These are often known as unenumerated rights. For example, it has not been necessary to enumerate the right to drive a car such as “Driving a car, being necessary for the economy of a free state, the right of the people to drive a car shall not be infringed.” Gun rights are just like all our rights, which means Congress or the state legislatures can regulate them, which gun people work so hard to deny.
The legal case of DC v. Heller from June 26, 2008 vindicates this view. By a 5 to 4 vote the U.S. Supreme Court declared the DC gun regulation as too restrictive and therefore an unconstitutional violation of the Second Amendment. Justice Scalia, who wrote the opinion for the court, provided his views. His gun rights were the “rights of law-abiding, responsible citizens to use arms in defense of hearth and home.”
Justice John Paul Stevens reviewed the history of the Second Amendment in his DC v. Heller dissent. He wrote “The Second Amendment was adopted to protect the right of the people of each of the several States to maintain a well-regulated militia. It was a response to concerns raised during the ratification of the Constitution that the power of Congress to disarm the state militias and create a national standing army posed an intolerable threat to the sovereignty of the several States.”
Justice Stevens wrote further “Similarly, the words ‘the people’ in the Second Amendment refer back to the object announced in the Amendment’s preamble. They remind us that it is the collective action of individuals having a duty to serve in the militia that the text directly protects and, perhaps more importantly, that the ultimate purpose of the Amendment was to protect the States’ share of the divided sovereignty created by the Constitution.”
The Second Amendment remains just as it was in 1787. It provides
constitutional authority for states to maintain and deploy militia troops in
combat against other state militia or federal troops that might invade their
state without their express Article IV, Section 4 approval. Our corporate
media, the well-to-do and elected officials like Trump have successfully
avoided mention of these state rights. For Trump to invade a state with
unauthorized military forces brings a confrontation over state sovereignty and
the Second Amendment rights for states to have military forces ready to repel
them. Trump has authority to deploy the DC National Guard, but our state
governors have a right to fight back with military force. Remember our Civil
War and how it started; be suspicious Trump would like a repeat?
