Texas Governor Greg Abbott Calls for Convention of the States to Reclaim Power Wrongfully Assumed by Federal Government

I approve.

Decrying a government "run amok," Abbout announced:

"If we are going to fight for, protect and hand on to the next generation, the freedom that [President] Reagan spoke of...then we have to take the lead to restore the rule of law in America," Abbott said during a speech at the Texas Public Policy Foundation’s Policy Orientation that drew raucous applause from the conservative audience. He said he will ask lawmakers to pass a bill authorizing Texas to join other states calling for a Convention of States.

Along with the speech, Abbott released a nearly 70-page plan -- part American civics lesson, part anti-Obama diatribe -- detailing nine proposed constitutional amendments that he said would unravel the federal government’s decades-long power grab and restore authority over economic regulation and other matters to the states.

"The irony for our generation is that the threat to our Republic doesn't come just from foreign enemies, it comes, in part, from our very own leaders," Abbott said in a speech that took aim at President Obama, Congress and the judicial branch.

Among the amendments sought by Abbott is a mechanism by which the states could overturn federal law, which is long overdue.

His proposed amendments are:

Prohibit Congress from regulating activity that occurs wholly within one State.

Require Congress to balance its budget.

Prohibit administrative agencies--and the unelected bureaucrats that staff them--from creating federal law.

Prohibit administrative agencies--and the unelected bureaucrats that staff them--from preempting state law.

Allow a two-thirds majority of the States to override a U.S. Supreme Court decision.

Require a seven-justice super-majority vote for U.S. Supreme Court decisions that invalidate a democratically enacted law.

Restore the balance of power between the federal and state governments by limiting the former to the powers expressly delegated to it in the Constitution.

Give state officials the power to sue in federal court when federal officials overstep their bounds.

Allow a two-thirds majority of the States to override a federal law or regulation.

I see this as vital in both senses -- vital in the sense of "necessary," and vital in the sense of "demonstrating a healthy amount of life and energy."

A participatory democracy must be both democratic and, well, participatory. The Big Picture sketch of the evolution of government of the last 80 years is to make government remote and controlled not by citizens but by a specialized, inbreeding class -- the civil service and management class -- which has its own insular class mores and class goals and has its own strong class interest.

It is time to take power back away from them and return it to the hands of those the Constitution says will wield ultimate political power: Us. The actual citizens. The American people generally, and not some weird inbred, intermarrying Government Caste.

The more power this caste as robbed from the people, the more the people themselves have been sapped of energy, initiative, and, frankly, virtue.

A free people is an energetic, vital, virtuous people.

Unfree people are bent, warped things who begin thinking not in terms of natural productivity and industry but merely of gaming advantages and payoffs from their masters.

Without freedom, people lose their natural initiative and zest for living.

They become drones, cogs, and drudges.

It's time to be a free people again.

Not just for ourselves-- the fate of the world depends on Free Americans.

Unfree Americans are no better than any other people twisted by oppression and reduced expectations and sharply delimited boundaries.

They're not even Americans.

Open Thread. And happy weekend!

posted by Ace at 06:12 PM

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