Little children learn morality from their parents: things are good or bad because Mommy and Daddy SAID so. A little later, they may be taught that things are good or bad because God SAID so, in some Holy Book. And still later, when they are taught "civics" in government schools, they will be taught that things are good or bad because "It's the law." (And it's GOOD to obey the law, BAD to break it.") But "the law" is just whatever politicians SAY it is.

A person becomes an adult when he outgrows the need to be given moral commandments from people he thinks of as "authorities," and learns to judge for himself what is right or wrong. This is a book to read to discover just how adult YOU really are. The book as a whole is a litmus test that will show whether the reader is an adult with independent judgment, or still a child, believing every fantasy and superstition that the "authorities" in his life have told him to believe.

You may or may not agree with Rose's conclusions, but you should be prepared to have many of your own cherished beliefs challenged and examined. This is a book to stretch your mind, and that may be uncomfortable, if your mind is out-of-shape. But like any good workout, the results are very rewarding.

The "most dangerous superstition" referred to in the title is the idea of "authority," which includes all belief in "government." No, I'm not providing "spoilers;" this is something Rose lays out on Page 2 of the book. He doesn't deny that all the legislators, police, bureaucrats and soldiers exist -- they clearly do. But the thing that makes "government" something more than a gang of thugs is the respect -- even reverence -- in which it is held by the people it rules. "Government" is commonly believed to have a RIGHT to rule us, and we commonly believe ourselves to have a DUTY to obey their commands (which are called "laws.") Rose unleashes a ferocious array of arguments proving that neither that RIGHT nor that DUTY can logically -- or morally -- exist. If that sounds silly to you, YOU need to read the book.

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The most dangerous superstition IS dangerous because it enslaves our minds, which leads to the enslavement of our whole lives. This is a book to set us free.

Basically, the states in the south wanted to maintain their right to slavery by emphasizing the right of each state to govern itself and by promoting the idea of nullification which gave them the right to nullify any law the federal government tried to impose if they felt it went too far. In other words, the state has the right (state's rights) to nullify a federal law. (nullification)

When South Carolina nullified the tariffs put on it by the government, they were saying that not only did they have the right to nullify tariffs, but potentially they had the right to nullify any laws that would try to prohibit slavery in their states.
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When the Federalists passed the Alien and Sedition Acts in 1798, Thomas Jefferson and James Madison secretly wrote the Kentucky and Virginia Resolutions, which provide a classic statement in support of states' rights. According to this theory, the Federal Union is a voluntary association of states and if the central government goes too far, each state has the right to nullify that law.
States' rights - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

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One major and continuous strain on the union, from roughly 1820 through the Civil War, was the issue of trade and tariffs. Heavily dependent upon trade, the almost entirely agricultural and export-oriented South imported most of its manufactured needs from Europe or obtained them from the North. The North, by contrast, had a growing domestic industrial economy that viewed foreign trade as competition. Trade barriers, especially protective tariffs, were viewed as harmful to the Southern economy, which depended on exports.

In 1828, the Congress passed protective tariffs to benefit trade in the northern states, but were detrimental to the South. Southerners vocally expressed their tariff opposition in documents such as the South Carolina Exposition and Protest in 1828, written in response to the "Tariff of Abominations". Exposition and Protest was the work of South Carolina senator John C. Calhoun, formerly an advocate of protective tariffs and internal improvements at federal expense.

South Carolina's Nullification Ordinance declared the tariff of 1828 and 1832 null and void within the state borders of South Carolina. It began the Nullification Crisis. Passed by a state convention on November 24, 1832, it led, on December 10, to President Andrew Jackson's proclamation against South Carolina, which sent a naval flotilla and a threat of sending government ground troops to enforce the tariffs.

Over the following decades, another dispute over states' rights moved to the forefront. The issue of slavery polarized the union, with the principles espoused by Thomas Jefferson often being cited by both anti-slavery Northerners and secessionists on the debates that ultimately led to the American Civil War. SUPPORTERS OF SLAVERY OFTEN ARGUED THAT ONE OF THE RIGHTS OF THE STATES WAS THE PROTECTION OF SLAVE PROPERTY wherever it went, a position endorsed by the Supreme Court in the 1857 Dred Scott decision.

Jefferson Davis used the following argument in favor of the equal rights of states, as opposed to the declaration that all men are created equal:
"Resolved, That the union of these States rests on the equality of rights and privileges among its members, and that it is especially the duty of the Senate, which represents the States in their sovereign capacity, to resist all attempts to discriminate either in relation to person or property, so as, in the Territories -- which are the common possession of the United States -- to give advantages to the citizens of one State which are not equally secured to those of every other State"
The Preamble to the Confederate States Constitution begins: "We, the people of the Confederate States, EACH STATE ACTING IN ITS SOVEREIGN AND INDEPENDENT CHARACTER..."
States' rights - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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The famous nullification confrontation of 1832-1833, pitting President Andrew Jackson against South Carolina senator John C. Calhoun over whether a state could nullify federal law, was an important step in a long series of attempts to define the proper powers of the states.

As industry in the North expanded it looked towards southern markets, rich with cash from the lucrative agricultural business, to buy the North's manufactured goods. However, it was often cheaper for the South to purchase the goods abroad. In order to "protect" the northern industries Jackson slapped a tariff on many of the imported goods that could be manufactured in the North. When South Carolina passed the Ordinance of Nullification in November 1832, refusing to collect the tariff and threatening to withdraw from the Union, Jackson ordered federal troops to Charleston. A secession crisis was averted when Congress revised the Tariff of Abominations in February 1833.
Causes of the Civil War-a North Georgia perspective

Behind the explicit assault on the tariff lay another implicit concern--protecting slavery. The South Carolina coastal plains, largely a rice-producing region, was the most densely enslaved southern area and thus particularly sensitive to America's first antislavery stirrings. South Carolina rice planters feared nationalistic tariffs, bad enough in themselves, would furthermore lead to assaults on slavery. They thus joined their cotton-producing upland cousins in defying Jackson.
Nullification Controversy: Information from Answers.com