This week I want to discuss the big push by the Utah Legislature to embrace the 10th Amendment. I’m one of those guys who likes, what is now called, “message” bills. In fact, if a piece of legislation doesn’t have a message I wonder what its purpose is. Every bill has a message.
Just look through today’s newspaper. There’s a story about performance pay for school teachers – the bill sponsor says she wants to “ensure a quality teacher in every classroom.” That’s a message. Another legislator wants to ban what are called “e-cigarettes.” Evidently, “e-cigarettes” are reusable, battery-powered, cigarette-like things, that heat a vile of liquid nicotine so the user can get his buzz off of the vapors (which sounds oddly like how a “crack pipe” works). The legislator says that nicotine is a powerful poison that should be avoided. That’s certainly a message bill.
Whether these bills are to repeal the car-booster seat law or a voice of opposition from progressives to repeal “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” laws send messages. So it’s really disingenuous for anyone to complain about “message” bills. But that doesn’t stop anyone who always has a complaint about what they disagree with.
Case in point: the Utah Legislature’s 10th Amendment movement. The 10th Amendment to the United States Constitution says that, “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.” Every American, except a few hard-core progressives, understands that the Constitution is a check against the federal government. The issue of slavery and other major civil rights causes also has made it necessary to allow the Constitution to hold state governments in check as well. But while the Constitution can be amended and interpreted, it cannot be misunderstood in its purpose.
In the age of Obama, many state legislatures are discovering the 10th Amendment as a tool to reclaim state sovereignty and Utah is no exception. There are nearly a dozen bills in this current legislative session targeting our ever-expanding federal government. For instance, a bill just passed the House yesterday calling for Utah to reject Obamacare and socialized medicine – legislators want the state unbound by its federal proscriptions.
I support all of these ideas. But the problem isn’t the idea behind the measures. The problem that state legislatures face is its consistent application. It’s one thing to say that we want the federal government off our backs; it’s quite another thing to tell the federal government to go away with all its trillions of dollars.
For years, most legislators and Utah educators have agreed that No Child Left Behind is a menace to Utah classrooms. So why not opt out? The answer is money. The education community, and legislators with responsibility over budgets, are addicted to the money.
Outside of civil rights and safety and health issues, I wonder if we understand the real power states have to control their own destinies if they just walk away from the trillion dollar carrot dangling from the stick of Congress?
What is that appeal? I’m trying to think what would be different for me if I were a legislator. Is there something that I would know then that I don’t know now about the strings attached to federal dollars? Would I say, al of the sudden, oh now I see why we take that dirty money! Oh now I see why a 13 trillion dollar debt is justified! Now I see why we accept all of those annoying, cumbersome, and costly strings of the federal government!
But I don’t see it. And I’m wondering why so many 10th Amendment supporters do – and why they can talk the talk but not walk the walk when it comes to telling the federal government to go prostitute itself elsewhere.
I’m Paul Mero. Thanks for listening.
