 Texas Gov. Rick Perry |
Texas Gov. Rick Perry has thrown his support behind a growing movement to rein in the federal government by resurrecting the 10th Amendment, which reserves to states “the powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution.”
“I believe that our federal government has become oppressive in its size, its intrusion into the lives of our citizens, and its interference with the affairs of our state,” Perry said.
“That is why I am here today to express my unwavering support for efforts all across our country to reaffirm the states’ rights affirmed by the 10th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution,” he said.
A video of his comments has been posted at this link.
WND reported just days ago on a proposal in Congress to require all laws to cite the constitutional authority on which they are based.
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Sponsored by Rep. John Shadegg, R-Ariz., H.R. 450, or the Enumerated Powers Act, states, “Each Act of Congress shall contain a concise and definite statement of the constitutional authority relied upon for the enactment of each portion of that Act. The failure to comply with this section shall give rise to a point of order in either House of Congress. …”
“I believe that returning to the letter and spirit of the U.S. Constitution and its essential 10th Amendment will free our state from undue regulations, and ultimately strengthen our Union,” Perry said.
The Texas proposal, HCR 50, “affirms that Texas claims sovereignty under the 10th Amendment over all powers not otherwise granted to the federal government,” according to the governor’s statement. It also designates that all compulsory federal legislation that requires states to comply under threat of civil or criminal penalties, or that requires states to pass legislation or lose federal funding, be prohibited or repealed.
When he introduced the federal proposal, Shadegg gave a House floor speech reminding his colleagues of limited authority granted in the 10th Amendment of the United States Constitution.
It states, “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.”
“What that means is that the Founding Fathers intended our national government to be a limited government, a government of limited powers that cannot expand its legislative authority into areas reserved to the states or to the people,” Shadegg said. “As the final amendment in the 10 Bill of Rights, it is clear that the Constitution establishes a federal government of specifically enumerated and limited powers.”
“This measure would enforce a constant and ongoing re-examination of the role of our national government,” he said. “… It is simply intended to require a scrutiny that we should look at what we enact and that, by doing so, we can slow the growth and reach of the federal government, and leave to the states or the people, those functions that were reserved to them by the Constitution.”
Shadegg said the act would perform three important functions:
1. It would encourage members of Congress to consider whether their proposed legislation belongs in the federal level in the allocation of powers or whether it belongs with the states or the people.
2. It would force lawmakers to include statements explaining by what authority they are acting.
3. It would give the U.S. Supreme Court the ability to scrutinize constitutional justification for every piece of legislation. If the justification does not hold up, the courts and the people could hold Congress accountable and eliminate acts that reach beyond the scope of the Constitution.
At the time, Shadegg explained the Constitution gives the federal government only 18 specific powers. But he said while many of the programs launched on a federal level are good, they are not authorized by the Constitution.
“The federal government has ignored the Constitution and expanded its authority into every aspect of human conduct, and quite sadly, it is not doing many of those things very well,” he said.
WND columnist Henry Lamb has been urging voters to contact representatives and ask directly if they will co-sponsor and vote for the Enumerated Powers Act, or explain why not, in writing.
WND columnist Walter Williams earlier documented the growing movement before Texas joined in.
“Eight state legislatures have introduced resolutions declaring state sovereignty under the Ninth and 10th amendments to the U.S. Constitution; they include Arizona, Hawaii, Montana, Michigan, Missouri, New Hampshire, Oklahoma and Washington. There’s speculation that they will be joined by Alaska, Alabama, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Kansas, Nevada, Maine and Pennsylvania,” he reported.
“New Hampshire’s 10th Amendment resolution typifies others and, in part, reads: ‘That the several States composing the United States of America, are not united on the principle of unlimited submission to their General (federal) Government; but that, by a compact under the style and title of a Constitution for the United States, and of amendments thereto, they constituted a General Government for special purposes, delegated to that government certain definite powers, reserving, each State to itself, the residuary mass of right to their own self-government; and that whensoever the General Government assumes undelegated powers, its acts are unauthoritative, void, and of no force,'” Williams wrote.
” Put simply, these 10th Amendment resolutions insist that the states and their people are the masters and that Congress and the White House are the servants. Put yet another way, Washington is a creature of the states, not the other way around.”
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