By Richard D. Fry, General Counsel – Patriots Coalition
A fundamental promise of federalism is that the state and local governments will act as a watchdog, in our federalist system, over the authority of the central government, to ensure that the central government does not take power beyond its Constitutional authority and thereby seek to limit the unalienable and fundamental God given rights of the citizens.
Under Article VI cl. 3 all officers of the state and central government (located in Washington D.C.) must take an oath to support the Constitution. This oath makes state, local and central government officers “federal officers” whose duty it is to protect, defend, support and preserve the Constitution. This is part of the vertical and horizontal checks and balances of our federalist system and all “federal officers” have a duty to protect the federal system.
From a different perspective we can say that all state and local governments are part of the federal system of government but the central government is not part of the state governmental systems which are independent and sovereign as to each other and the central government.
The states are sovereign and it is in large part their sovereignty that the Constitution, and the federal system within which it rests, seeks to protect. Such sovereignty is not protected simply for the sake of having sovereign states but because the Framers believed the maintenance of the states’
sovereignty was essential to preserving the unalienable and fundamental God given rights of the citizens. Only as sovereign states could the states act as watchdogs over the central government.
President Kennedy said “The ignorance of one voter in a democracy impairs the security of all.” This is even more true of our state and local “federal officers” who are either ignorant of our federalist systems and their duties to such or simply disregard their duty for other reasons such as laziness or actual distain for our principles of government.
When local “public servants” say actions and policies of the “federal government” are not within their realm of authority or part of their job description or they should not waste time on such “federal” issues they are showing their incompetence to hold office. They are also violating their oath to support the Constitution. They are a clear and present danger to our federalist system and endanger the sovereignty of their state and the Liberty of every man woman and child in this federalist Republic.
What’s even worse are those who, after being informed of their duties by the citizenry, insist on their anti-federalist and
u
n
-American course of action. As Dr. Martin Luther King said: ““Nothing in the world is more dangerous than a sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity.”
Once informed of their error, of their ignorance, those that insist on such course are either stupid or in defiance of the will of the people and the obligations of their office.
They must be targeted for removal at the earliest convenience of the citizens. And, until they can be removed the citizens should cover them with a blanket of contempt so that they will either mend their evil ways or beg leave of the situation.
