Introduction for Citizen Discussions
A review of a few principles from history, followed by several discussion-starters which might fruitfully be used in conversations with state and local officials. The idea here is that there was once a balance of power between the states and the federal government. States could try differing policies and learn from each other’s successes or failures. Now Washington imposes one-size-fits-all policies which violate the Constitution, ignoring state inputs. The states must re-assert the powers reserved to them in the 9th and 10th Amendments. That will only happen if citizens personally and continually put pressure on their local and state elected officials. Since the term ‘activism’ has acquired a negative connotation, let’s call this ‘guerrilla citizenship’. Discussion topics include:
1. The federal/state relationship
2. State concerns with the national debt
3. States vs. federal regulators
4. Executive orders and the Constitution
5. Immigration/voting considerations
6. States’ responsibilities to their citizens: current examples
7. Freeing education from government control (this approach can escape the federalized, socialist-advocacy Common Core scheme)
8. State nullification of federal overreach (for gun control, see #3, #4, and #8)
9. Legislative remedies for the 17th Amendment
10. Review & Outlook (for the driving strategy of progressivism, see an article stored at the end of http://signs1787.tumblr.com/) - this also notes the Biblical relevance of some current events.
The most timeless of principles is the Golden Rule, that we should do unto others as we would have them do unto us. In the Ten Commandments, the first five teach that man is not the ultimate authority and the last five give examples of how we are not to seek power over others. But there are always power-seeking personalities among us, and if they lack the talent to find satisfaction in business they seem to enter politics. Those who wrote the Constitution realized this and arranged separate branches of government where such personalities would be opposing each other rather than oppressing the people. This worked for a long time.
Then power-seekers in government began to use newspapers to gain public support, and expanded Presidential power under Teddy Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, and FDR. After some distractions due to international strife, the expansion of executive power continued under Johnson (the ‘war on poverty’, which destroyed the black family just after the civil rights movement broke the power of southern Democrats), under Nixon (the EPA), and now Obama (czars and executive orders). Many leaders in Congress have also learned to work with the modern media, which seems to make them invulnerable despite the high public disapproval of Congress. Media polls are now devised with carefully worded questions presented to selected groups of people, and used to guide public opinion - and voters. Discontent is attacked or discredited through the media, and then ignored. The separate branches of government now work together to increase their power over the people. What earthly power exists to control them?
The states are the powers that created the federal government, and they must be the ones to restrain and re-train it. Too often they act as if they were helpless dependents on Washington, pleading for financial aid, block grants, and subsidies. But we have arrived at a time of unprecedented problems, and they must step up to their responsibilities or become simply servants of Washington’s demands. Pressure can be applied there. The 9th and 10th Amendments, frequently ignored and ridiculed, seem to offer the only remedy, The states still have the power to contain the beast they created, but their governments must be better, in every sense, than it is. What states will lead the way? Let’s go discuss some of these things with state legislators and local officials.
