TULIP GEMS

THE IMPORTANCE OF LOCAL SELF-GOVERNMENT

 

 

America's Founding Fathers intended that the Federal Government be limited in power.  They devised a system of checks and balances, with three separate, but equal, branches of government.

 

This was because they believed the Bible doctrine that man is a fallen creature and sinful at heart.  They knew that for sinful rulers, "power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely."  They sought to prevent unlimited power in Federal Government.

 

The three branches of the Federal Government were to be the legislative branch (Congress), the executive branch (the President) and the judicial branch (the Supreme Court).  Congress would make laws, the President would enforce laws and the Supreme Court would interpret laws as to their constitutional (or unconstitutional) nature.

 

NO LEGISLATING FROM THE BENCH

 

In the mind of our Founding Fathers, there was to be no such things as judges "legislating from the bench."  Nor was there to be any such thing as "Presidential Executive Orders."  Yet, both of these perversions of the Constitution flourish today.

 

Patrick Henry, in the summer of 1798, expressed his grave concern that the Federal Government might, in time, war against the sovereign authority of the States.  He was proven right in the Civil War and many times since then.

 

The Seventeenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, for example, took away the right of the State Legislatures to elect two Senators to represent their State in the U.S. Senate.  It moved it to a popular vote.

 

But the people already had the right to elect representatives to the U.S. House of Representatives.  The Seventeenth Amendment took away from the State Legislatures any voice in the U.S. Congress.  It was a move that weakened States rights.

 

It was a move away from a Constitutionally Federated Republic to a pure democracy.  The problem with a pure democracy is that the more heavily populated areas of the nation now have more say in government than the less populated, rural areas.

 

CENTRAL GOVERNMENT VERSUS LOCAL GOVERNMENT

 

The folly of this can be seen in many ways.  Take, for example, the Public Transportation system of California.  The California legislature passed a law requiring every county to establish and maintain a public transportation system.

 

Most big cities such as Los Angles and San Diego already had a public transportation system.  But now smaller, less populated areas were forced to allocate scarce funds for a public transportation system that was not really needed and would hardly be used.

 

Another example is that the local militia (all able-bodied, male citizens) has now been reduced to a National Guard.  While supposedly a State-run military unit, it is in reality under the control of the Federal Government and often sent overseas to fight (rather than be kept at home as a purely defensive, local militia).

 

The firearms that every able-bodied man were to keep in his home for quick access was intended by our Founding Fathers to be a military grade weapon.  But now, law-abiding citizens are being attacked by legislation making it illegal to own military grade guns.

 

National police forces (such as the BATF, DEA and FBI) are now overshadowing local police departments in authority.  Whereas local police departments have to answer to their local governments for their actions, federal police forces can act with impunity.

 

The Importance of Biblical Gender Roles in Society