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You may be remembering something, but you seem to be remembering it almost exactly backwards. It sounds like you are remembering something about the 10th Amendment, which reserves to the states any power that is not granted to the federal government in the constitution: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenth_Amendment_to_the_United_...

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What part is backwards? I'll state what I did in reverse (ie, what I believe to be incorrect)

A) Everything is illegal for a citizen unless granted as legal by a state or federal govt.

B) The fed govt. can do anything it wants. The only things it cannot do are things that are expressly forbidden.

C) A state can do anything it wants unless a law prevents it.

D) A state of emergency does not expand the powers of the the state or fed govt.

Those are the reverse of what I said I remember and none of those sound right.

(for C/D, ignoring the supremacy clause)

It is C that is pretty close to true. Laws don't give states their powers. It is in fact the states that make their own laws, subject to some restrictions from the U.S. Constitution.

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