Individual Liberty — Individual Responsibility 

The failed wisdom of the founding fathers.

Today's "Founder's Quote Daily" from the PatriotPost.US is presented below:

"The State governments possess inherent advantages, which will ever give them an influence and ascendancy over the National Government, and will for ever preclude the possibility of federal encroachments. That their liberties, indeed, can be subverted by the federal head, is repugnant to every rule of political calculation."

-- Alexander Hamilton (speech to the New York Ratifying Convention, 17 June 1788)

What's truly a shame is that Mr. Hamilton was wrong. It's a pretty fair bet that he didn't expect the states to abdicate their responsibilities under the Constitution. I think it's safe to assume that he thought that the state legislatures would take their responsibility to select senators seriously.

Unfortunately for us they didn't. Several states failed to select senators, and their legislatures ultimately abdicated their responsibility to the popular vote of the people. Eventually this resulted in the drafting, and ultimate ratification of the 17th amendment to the Constitution.

This, coupled with the unfortunate wording of the second section of the 14th amendment to the Constitution, "The right to vote at any election for the choice of electors for President and Vice-President of the United States", which was also the responsibility of the state legislatures effectively served to erode states rights. The 14th amendment didn't change the fact that the state legislatures could still choose the electors in whatever manner seemed fit to them. Unfortunately it did threaten the states with reduced representation if the electors weren't chosen based upon a popular election.

The failure of the state legislatures to live up to their responsibilities under the Constitution resulted in the 14th and 17th amendments taking those responsibilities from the state legislatures. These amendments took away the "inherent advantages, which will ever give them an influence and ascendancy over the National Government".

The Senate was meant to represent the states. It was meant to ensure that the states would retain the powers that were theirs. Senators should represent the interests of their state governments. The President was never intended to represent the people either. He was intended to represent the states.

Instead they represent the interests of a mob of special interests in the populations of the states. Instead of voting to hold back the ever increasing encroachments of the federal government, they vote for those encroachments in exchange for taking money from the several states for in-state projects that the federal government should never be involved in.

Our federal government was never intended to govern the people of the United States. It was never intended to be a provider for the people. It was never intended to get involved in the internal affairs of the states. It was never intended to go into massive debt to fund social programs that serve the lowest common denominator of the entire nation and do that poorly.

Social services and governance are rightly the prerogative of the states. These things do better where the people are. A solution that works for a small state in the North East may not work for a large state in the South West.

Rather than being governed locally, and having social services provided at a local level the federal government has taken that power from the states and assumed it for itself. We wouldn't be having a "debate" over "national health care" if the state legislatures hadn't failed in their responsibilities.

By failing to live up to their responsibilities the state legislatures have ensured that that which is "repugnant to every rule of political calculation", the subversion of state rights and liberties to the federal head, would come to pass. Today, people that believe in states rights are looked upon as aberrations. People that understand that we live in a constitutional republic and not in a democracy are looked upon as right-wing extremists.

Today our federal government is moving more and more toward socialism rather than republicanism. The left and the democrats are constantly agitating for more social spending and less and less spending on the government's primary responsibility, defense. There are ever more and more advocates for "direct democracy" among the left, citing the improved technology for communications and information dissemination as a reason why a republican form of government are no longer needed.

Let us not forget that the republican form of government was intended to avoid the pitfalls of direct democracy and mob rule. Mob rule eventually devolves into either anarchy or socialism, and eventually to the enslavement of the people. The socialists in Venezuela were right when they proclaimed that "socialism is democracy", although I would turn the phrase around.

We need to return to republicanism. Our nation was set up as a republic. The states had a role to play in the governance of the people. The federal government was meant to ensure the safety of the states and to ensure uniform and free trade between the states.

Under the original structure of our government, that was how things worked. Mark Levin likes to point out how the courts have usurped a lot of the power of the legislature and the president. He also points out how the courts have helped to turn the notion of states rights on its head (Roe v. Wade is just one example).

It's truly a shame is that Mr. Hamilton was wrong. Our courts and our state legislatures together have proven that. States rights are a thing of the past. The people have been subjugated under a new master, and the federal government has become a bloated bureaucracy that "provides" for us all, and enslaves us all.

We need to take back our government. Not in the way that the left thinks it should be taken back, but in the way the founders originally intended. It's time we repealed the 14th and 17th amendments.

Cross posted at NW Bloggers.

Monday

This linkfest is for the 24th of September, 2007.

If you have something interesting you'd like to share, feel free to link it here and leave a trackback.

Just remember the trackback policy.

For the best exposure, go to the blogger's oasis and use the linkfest chooser to choose the posts you'd like to hook up with.