"Federal Law Trumps State Law"

Does it?

Variations of this phrase are uttered frequently by people at all parts of the political spectrum. I believe it is at best a dangerous over-simplification of the separation of powers in the Constitution, at worst, situationally, an outright falsehood.

The concept originates in Article VI of the Constitution:

This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding.

and also this passage from the Fourteenth Amendment:

No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

However, these passages have to be taken in context. The "Laws of the United States" mentioned can only be those made "in Pursuance" of the Constitution itself. The powers granted to the federal government are defined and limited. Thus, the federal government cannot make laws that trump state laws in areas where the federal government is not empowered to act. Criminal law (except for trademarks and copyrights, treason, counterfeiting and piracy on the high seas) is an area where Congress has no power to act.

It cannot criminalize the use of a certain drug, because it has no grant of power to criminalize drug use. It can claim to regulate interstate commerce of a drug, but it's clear that once a drug goes into someone's system, its interstate commerce days are done. Furthermore the word regulate is not the same as the word prohibit. Back when the Constitution was more-faithfully adhered-to, Congress realized it would need an amendment if it was going to prohibit alcohol. It couldn't prohibit it on interstate commerce grounds (this was before the days of Franklin Roosevelt, when discovering new abuses of the commerce clause became a government pastime).

Under a more sensible reading of the commerce clause than we're saddled with today (thanks to the Wickard decision), goods made or grown within a state for use in that state, or made or grown by a person for their own private use, would not count as "commerce among the states." We've labored under Wickard for more than 70 years. It's time for this harmful precedent to be reversed.

That would remove much of the power the federal government claims to meddle in the states and the rights of private individuals to manage their own affairs and property.

If a state government makes a law that establishes conflicting criteria for discharging a bankruptcy (Art I. Sec. 8, Par. 4), federal law naturally supersedes the state law. But if a state legalizes marijuana, the federal law does not trump the state law, because the federal government has no such authorized power to prohibit marijuana in the first place!

The tenth amendment makes this explicit:

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.