Bryan Fischer column
Our last, best hope to resist government tyranny
Bryan Fischer
Bryan Fischer
March 22, 2010
The federal constitution establishes a central government of limited powers. They are outlined in Article 1, Section 8, and there are 17 of them. You can count them. I have them numbered in the margin of my dog-eared copy of the Constitution.
These 17 powers represent the sum total of the powers delegated to the central government by the individual states. These are the only powers Congress has. If a power is not on that list, Congress is forbidden by the supreme law of the land from taking any action whatsoever.
We must never forget that the federal government is the creation of the states, not the other way round. Congress has only the powers the states allow it to have, not the reverse.
We are so accustomed to thinking that the states can only do what the federal government permits them to do that we have turned the republic bequeathed to us by the Founders on its head. The creature has become the slave, the slave the master.
You can look in vain through that list of 17 powers for any mention of the right to take over the entire American health care industry. It's not there. Congress can establish Post Offices, and build roads for the delivery of the mail, and it can even punish pirates. But what it cannot do is to run the nation's entire system of medical care.
Thus what Congress did yesterday in passing the monstrous MussoliniCare bill, will not only bankrupt America, it is flatly and unequivocally unconstitutional and is hated by a majority of the American people. Something is being crammed down our throats that makes us gag and vomit.
The last remedy left — other than bloodshed — is the 10th Amendment, which reserves to the states any power not delegated to the federal government. The central government is exercising a power that it does not have, and can only exercise by usurping that power from the states.
State governments can legitimately and constitutionally decide not to cooperate with the central government on the legal ground that Congress has transgressed the boundaries marked out in our founding document. The central government is trespassing on the sovereign territory of the states, and the states have every right to throw them off their property.
Trespassers can be prosecuted to the full extent of the law. Squatters can be evicted. If they won't leave, they can be tossed. And in the worst case scenario, if they won't surrender peacefully, they can be shot.
The Democrat governor of Idaho, back in 1979, informed the central government that the border of the state was closed to federal trains carrying nuclear waste destined for the Gem State. He didn't ask, he told. He didn't make a request, he issued an order. He exercised his 10th Amendment rights and stared down the federal government. Pointing to the state line, he essentially said, "This far and no farther." And the central government blinked.
Idaho and Virginia have shown the way. Both states enacted laws last week that prohibit residents of their states from being forced against their will to buy health insurance. Three dozen other states have similar legislation in the pipeline, and by the end of this week I expect that number will grow.
State governments represent our last, best hope to avoid the ugly prospect of insurrection and complete chaos. Our elected representatives at the state level have the constitutional authority to stand up against the tyranny of the central government on our behalf. And they must.
The American people simply will not stand for what President Obama and the Democrats in Congress are trying to do to us. Freedom is in our DNA because we are a Christian nation by heritage and tradition. One slogan of the American revolution was a Bible verse: "Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty" (2 Corinthians 3:17). That Spirit of Liberty still burns in the hearts of Americans and we will resist oppression until the day we die.
I submit that state governments have now, overnight, become vastly more important than the federal government. They represent our last line of lawful, orderly defense against tyranny. What hope remains of recapturing our liberty rests with our elected officials at the state level. It's time to compel them to exercise their constitutional powers and throw off the yoke of the authoritarian beast that the central government has become.
Will they rise to the challenge of the hour? If they do not, I fear all will be lost.
Bryan Fischer, formerly the executive director of the Idaho Values Alliance, is the host of the daily 'Focal Point' radio talk program on AFR Talk, a division of the American Family Association. 'Focal Point' airs live from 1-3 pm Central Time, and is also simulcast on the AFA Channel, which can be seen on the Sky Angel network.
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