No Consent of the Governed - #NoConsent

Sunday, I listened to an outstanding Podcast called, "The Philosophical Foundations of the Constitution."  The key speaker was Roger Pilon of the Cato Institute.  He did an outstanding job of laying out the underpinnings of our Constitution.

He reminded me why we have issues with federal government power today.   He reminds me that we consented to subsume our rights in a mutually agreed form of limited government specified by the Constitution.

My Son asked, "But I didn't consent to this?"  Pilon reminds us that our consent is established by tacit agreement - you stayed here, therefore you consented.

We are so far from the enumerated powers of limited government that we - meaning social society at the founding and as specified by the Constitution we ratified, followed by succeeding generations tacitly consenting - agreed to, that tacit consent no longer holds.

We didn't consent. #NoConsent

I would still gladly consent to being governed by a government in accordance with the Constitution.  Under it, the Federal Government is empowered to provide for defense, immigration, regulation of commerce, standards, intellectual property protection and to run itself (tax, coin, courts).  Everything else is up to the States.  No Departments of Education, Energy, Housing and Urban Development, Health and Human Services, Labor, Transportation. 

"The demand for constitutional guarantees and bills of rights was a reaction against arbitrary rule and non-observance of old customs by kings.”  - Hayek

People complain that this would lead to 50 different rules for everything as individual States taxed their own people and fulfilled the necessary functions. I agree. 50 different varieties of experiment and imitation to find the very best way to promote welfare.

Accurate Reality: Protection against arbitrary and capricious governmental actions is what constitutions are meant to provide.  Our Federal government has become arbitrary and capricious.  We need to reverse the ccentralization of power and strive to move programs back to the states.  This should begin by prohibiting federally taxed dollars from being returned to state governments.

Mises, L. v. (1971 [1952]) The Theory of Money and Credit. Irvington-on-Hudson: The Foundation for Economic Education, pg. 414.