Reverse Confederacy

       Confederalism is a type of government that associates a group of states under a government that is only as powerful as the member states wish.  The system of government established by the Articles of Confederation was a confederal government.  The Constitution of 1787 created something different:  a Federal government.  A Federal government consists of a group of states sovereign in most matters, but superintended by a general government that exercises supreme power over a few matters--namely, foreign policy and national defense.  The American Civil War was a struggle between confederal government and federal government.  The Confederate states basically believed that the Articles of Confederation should have remained the founding law of the United States.
       What the modern U.S. government has become is a reverse confederacy.  The Federal government is assumed sovereign in every area of government, and the states are often treated as mere proxies of the Federal government.  States are treated as tools of the Federal government.  Federal laws often dictate what tax revenue generated by the states will be spent on.