JPKirkpatrick Genealogy

The Kirkpatrick Family has always been a family that has not been afraid to do it's duty, whether it was as a Landed Family in Scotland and fighting off the invading English armies trying to subjugate the Scots, or fighting the Native Indian warriors that in reality, were trying to protect their homeland. When the call to arms came for us to once again fight the English and their Huguenot mercenaries in order to achieve or at least maintain, liberty and personal freedom, we were right there on the front lines.

That tradition continues right up to the present. Members of my family have fought in every war, or military action that this country has had right from the beginning. As one researcher of the family said one time, "Those War-Like Kirkpatricks were either in the thick of the battle of the time, or they were preaching a war against Satan."

During the Civil War we literally had cousin fighting against cousin, since we had the Northern branch and the Southern branch of the family expressing their loyalty to their home state. Prior to the Civil War, a person received their citizenship status as American by right of their being a citizen of a state. Your first citizen loyalty was to your home state. After the Civil War, the 10th Amendment was subjugated as 'states rights' had been beaten down, in favor of Federalism.

Originally, under our Constitution, the States were the pre-eminent Government of America, most of the 'rights' under the Constitution were reserved for the States and limited power was given to the Federal government. That is what the 10th Amendment states. It was through a "house of mirrors" interpretation of the "Commerce clause" that the Federal government started exerting more control and influence over the States. There is a strong under-current of feelings welling up in America, to once again reign in the meddlesome Federal government. Only time will tell if that desire to return to the Constitutional form of government that our Founders envisioned, will prevail.