States put Feds on Notice
01. Jul, 2009 
13 Comments
by Kay B. Day, The US Report
The Tenth Amendment to the US Constitution isn’t a daily news header, but it should be. More than 35 states have passed, or are considering, a resolution to remind the federal government there is a limit to central government power. That limit was set forth in the 10th amendment, part of the Bill of Rights Patrick Henry and others wanted added to the US Constitution.
In an excellent essay at the Library of Congress, excerpted from the introduction to the book ‘A More Perfect Union,’ Roger A. Bruns wrote, “The anti-Federalists, demanding a more concise, unequivocal Constitution, one that laid out for all to see the right of the people and limitations of the power of government, claimed that the brevity of the document only revealed its inferior nature.” Bruns wrote, “By the fall of 1788 [James] Madison had been convinced that not only was a bill of rights necessary to ensure acceptance of the Constitution but that it would have positive effects.”
Many Americans don’t realize the Bill of Rights came after the main body of the Constitution, a response to concerns about the scope of a government made possible by the Constitution.
The Tenth Amendment Center is a repository for information about the movement based specifically on language in the amendment it is named for: “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”
Over the last decade, administrations from both parties seem to have forgotten this amendment. The federal government has been on one long march to complete centralization of power for many years. Franklin Delano Roosevelt was an excellent example of a president who ignored limits on federal governance, and that can be said of many recent presidents as well.
The current administration, despite being praised for intellectual rigor, seems bent on near-complete dismissal of the Tenth Amendment. Many of us believe socialism too kind a word for the direction our country is taking—it’s closer to totalitarianism.
If that sounds shocking, consider this definition of a totalitarian: “relating to or operating a centralized government system in which a single party without opposition rules over political, economic, social, and cultural life.”
Americans are beginning to see the light as personal freedoms erode. We face record taxes on many different levels of income and commodities. Soon we may be subject to a government mandate to buy health insurance whether we want to or not. Tax dollars have gone to select corporations, many of them with union pensions that needed a bailout. We see science politicized, with promises of record consumer costs for energy if the Democratic Congress has its way.
We see Senate seats bartered in an open market, and senators who have served beyond healthy limits such as Teddy Kennedy, Robert Byrd and Harry Reid. A Rasmussen poll found 44 percent of those surveyed believe the Constitution doesn’t restrict government enough. The way I see it, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights do restrict government enough. Congress, the executive and the judicial branch simply ignore it and voters for unfathomable reasons keep people like Kennedy in office.
A states’ rights movement has never been more timely considering the complete abandonment of common sense in growing a government we cannot sustain, in growing a government that will ultimately own your body if single payer health insurance comes to fruition. More than 200 years ago, a visionary saw the writing on the wall and his words seem prophetic today.
“The United States are to be melted down into a despotic empire dominated by ‘well-born’ aristocrats,” said Samuel Bryan in an essay published in 1787.
The Tenth Amendment movement is a response to that fulfilled prophecy.
Kay B. Day [send her email] is editor of The US Report, and lives in Jacksonville, FL. Her writing has been syndicated in numerous publications including UPI, the CS Monitor, and Sky News.
**This article is published with permission of the author and TheUSReport.com
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Long overdue, but definitely glad to see this happening!
Great article, Kay. Thanks again for allowing us to post it here! You’re absolutely right when you say that the growth of this movement couldn’t be more timely…..
Blunt, brutal, painfully direct and all too true. Now if we could just get the People to wake up a little faster.
I’m growing increasingly leery of the willingness of those we’ve elected to positions in the federal government, and some state governments, to carry out the will of the people in accordance with the dictates of the Constitution. What we’ve seen and are seeing is an unwillingness to do so. I’ve come to believe that our salvation governmentally (if there’s to be any) rests with our state legislatures which, if banded together, could pose a formidable obstacle to the federal government. If we’re to have any chance of avoiding the destruction of our economy, security and feedoms as we know them today, I believe we must impress more urgently than ever the legislators in the states where sovereignty resolutions have passed (or have at least been introduced)to pass nullification laws within their respective states such as has been proposed in Arizona to block federally mandated healthcare. If enough state governments would do this the feds might back off. An alternative is to clean house in Congress but we know the odds of that happening based on decades of incumbent re-election results. The states are our best and maybe last hope. If they fail us, we may be faced with only two choices; submit or fight! I hope that day never comes. Our Founding Fathers harbored that hope as well and we know how that turned out.
Terry, I’m leery of them myself. In the federal government, other than Ron Paul, there isn’t a single politician I’m even interested in. I simply don’t trust them.
Well said Kay. I just found this site and I am pleased to find others who are concerned about our country.
Yet none of this bothered you during the Bush years, and I suspect, you will be in favor of centralized oppressive government again once we have a president that is neither black nor democrat.
Anon – I can only assume this is your first time here. You should look to the right sidebar – there you’ll see archives, which go back to early 2007. In those articles, you’ll find plenty lambasting Bush for foreign policy, real id, faith based initiatives, drug war, and many many other constitutional violations.
In fact, you might want to do a “whois” lookup on the domain here, you’ll see that the url was registered back in mid-2006….
This organization doesn’t care who’s the president or what party is in charge. Fact of the matter is pretty clear – both parties are filled with constitutional criminals. That’s why we advocate decentralization – as the constitution provides – as the path to liberty.
Anon is just another socialist/marxist Obamanite!!!
Does anyone know of any legislation at the state (or any other level), where the legislature is doing (or proposing to do) anything more that affirming that the 10th Amendment to the US Constitution exists?
Specifically, is any governor or state legislature prepared to defend the rights of their citizens against the encroachment of the Federal government by holding citizens immune from prosecution under unconstitutional Federal laws?
If Canada decides tomorrow that my salary from a job in Georgia, an area where Canada has no jurisdiction, is taxable, would the US government stand idly by when the RCMP came to arrest me for not paying their taxes? Would the State of Georgia allow them to take me away to jail? I’m guessing that the answer is ‘No!’.
Why then should the State of Georgia (and all sovereign states) not protect their citizens from unconstitutional laws and their enforcement within their borders?
-James
James, important question. the 10th amendment resolutions are only 1 piece of the puzzle. States are considering or passing binding laws on issues all over the political spectrum.
You can get a brief overview of some things happening with this recent article on this site.
Unreal, Arizona charges to the lead! The Arizona Senate passed a bill nullifying the Cap and Tax bill. It’s headed to the Arizona House now.
http://www.azleg.gov/FormatDocument.asp?inDoc=/legtext/49leg/1r/bills/sb1147s.htm
Three cheers for Arizona declaring their independence from unconstitutional Federal garbage!
Consider the following problem for those who are uninitiated concerning state sovereignty. Regardless that Obama has much less powers under the Constitution than kings or prime ministers, every time people see Obama on the same TV screen with a prime minister they are brainwashed to think that Obama’s powers are basically equivalent to a prime minister’s powers. Again, this is far from true under the Constitution. State governors have much more constitutional power to serve the people than the Oval Office does, particularly where domestic issues are concerned.
With that in mind, I propose the following. I propose that the states make legislation which would make it legal for their governor’s to optionally be addressed, both orally and in writing, as prime minister, PM for short, of that state. I believe that doing so would be a simple way to help restore state sovereignty.