EMPOWER DECENTRALIZATION OF AUTHORITY

Every State shall have the right to exit from its present Constitutional subjugation to future Federal regulation, executive order, and court oversight, and to remain subject to taxation only for the purpose of supporting the defense. Every State shall have the right to nullify any Federal legislation that is not directly supported by a power granted to the Federal government explicitly by the Constitution. As supported by Jefferson and Madison in the construction of our nation and enshrined in our Constitution’s Tenth Amendment, our federal government is merely the agent of the states and intended to be used as a unifying bond.

• • The reservation to the states of powers not explicitly granted to the Federal government by the Constitution is critical in maintaining the balance of power between state and national government. State legislatures are more immediately responsive to the will of those within the individual states than Congress or Federal courts.
  • Maintaining this separation also allows states to try out different ideas and programs. This concept, known by political scientists as laboratories of democracy, allows for laws and policies to be created and tested at state and local levels. Some states will have better laws and flourish, protecting individual rights and freedoms. Others will be more socially repressive, giving incentives to their citizens to elect better representatives for their interests, or move. Competition has historically been a driver of progress.
  • We realize that sometimes state and local governments devolve into localized tyrannies, as happened through much of the South during the era of Jim Crow. Our Fourteenth Amendment provides for remedies against states who enact laws and regulations that violate the equal protection of individuals; “No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”