The Importance Of Federalism And Localized Government

The founders of this nation had lived through the tyranny of an oppressive, unitary and powerful federal government. When they were forming this new nation, they wanted to localize government as much as possible, because they knew the evils that could arise out of having a unitary system of government. This can be seen with the creation of the Articles of Confederation, and eventually, the Constitution.

The Articles of Confederation was the original supreme law of the land. This failed because the federal government was too weak to properly run a country, and so it was scrapped and the US Constitution was created. The framers of the Constitution had the intent of creating a federal system of government. This is where the federal government would have a limited amount of power, and the rest would reside in the states and their people. The Constitution was also a written as a rule book for what the federal government could do, rather than what they could not do. This is an important distinction. If it was what they could not do, than it would just be a document placing a few small limits on the federal government’s power. Since the Constitution is stating only what it can do, it is enumerating specific, limited powers to the federal government.

Then, the 10th Amendment comes in. The 10th Amendment states:

“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.”

This amendment provides the basis for having a stronger emphasis on state and local government. Now, I shall explain how state and local governments are important in a free society.

One of the greatest things that decentralized government allows is choice. If a person believes that their state’s policies are bad, they have 49 other states to choose from. The same goes for cities, counties, etc. The more local you get, the more choices of government the people have.

What state and local governments also allow is for certain types of experiments with government ownership. For example, rather than having the entire nation have socialized health care, a state can try it if they want, while another state could have completely private health care. This way, if the state with socialized health care failed, it wouldn’t bring the entire nation down. It works almost like a free market — you can choose which state you think is the best to live in.

Big, controversial issues today, such as health care, gun laws, etc., can be solved through this system of government. Like I said before, a state can try socialized health care if they want, and if it fails, then too bad for them. If a state feels like enacting more gun control laws with the goal of curbing crime, that is up to them. However, the individual state has to suffer any consequences. And since we can observe the results of policies enacted, it can help guide other states/cities  in forming new policies.

The states are allowed to do these things because these powers reserved to them by the Constitution. The federal government, however, cannot do all of these things. Once again, the Constitution was written as a set of specific powers for the federal government. For example, since the 2nd Amendment to the Constitution protects the right to bear arms, the federal government has no Constitutional power to created gun restrictions.

Another reason decentralized government is important is that it typically knows the issues of its citizens better than the federal government. The more local the issue, the more local the government should be that’s handling it. This all being said, it is also important that citizens get involved in their city and state governments. Since they have the blessing of choice among their government, they should put that choice to good use and help shape local policies.

To wrap up my case for more emphasis on localized government, I’ll leave the readers with this post from Operation Revival that sums up my thoughts pretty well, as well as being entertaining.

Brad Schnitzer | @BradSchnizza

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2. The People Vs. Their Government And The Left-Right Division