Can states prevent federal law enforcement agents from doing their jobs?

Yesterday, the Supreme Court issued an order that prevents Texas from interfering with Border Patrol agents who try to approach migrants along the border. The state had installed razor wire along the border near Eagle Pass, Texas. The Fifth Circuit had issued a ruling saying Texas could prohibit CBP from cutting the wire. The Supreme Court’s order vacated that by a 5-4 vote.

Flashback: Appalachia during reconstruction

I read about this order in the news this morning. A few hours later, I perused a book, Revenuers and Moonshiners by Wilbur R. Miller. In the preface, Miller said he set out to write a book about Southern resistance to federal law enforcement authority during Reconstruction.

Along the way, he encountered an understudied story, the concerted resistance to enforcement of distillery laws by federal Revenue Collectors in that era. State officials, resentful of federal power, cooperated with the moonshiners; one sheriff, for example, let moonshiners held in the local jail go out and visit their families and even drink in the local saloon during the day, until the federal authorities shut them down.

Are we really doing this again?