Decentralization
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You've heard it said, "All Politics is Local..."
...And
we believe this is true. And if it is true, and because it is true, the
concentration of political power, of government authority and autonomy
should be at the most local, the most decentralized level, the micro
level.
We'll continue with an excerpt from our "Libertarian Political Program."
Decentralize:
Defer
to states, county, and municipal governments all aspects of governing
except foreign policy/national defense, facilitation of free trade and
commerce on an interstate and international level, and Constitutional
integrity.
Regionalization
of admnistration of Federal operations to achieve the best possible
balance of efficiency and subordinate autonomy.
Back to the old town hall. Is "back" really "forward?"
Imagine
if the town or city government had full authority to organize itself
and dispatch its duties any way it sees fit. Imagine what we now call
the smallest form of government, the least powerful level of
government, suddenly having complete sovereignty over all matters that
directly affect its own citizens. All of a sudden most of our national
debates would be irrelevant or moot. If the local government decided
whether or not to allow abortions within its jurisdiction, and by what
criteria such would be allowed, there would be no need to fight over
this on a national or even a state level.
We'd hash out
abortion rights at a Town Hall meeting, not in Congress and the courts.
We would serve on the Ways and Means committee ourselves. The mayoral
election would have a greater impact on the things that matter in our
lives than the Presidential contest.
Remember when the Supreme
Court ruled that pornography is only pornography as defined by local
standards? Why wasn't that made into precedent for virtually very other
issue having to do with regulating individual behavior, or government
behavior for that matter?
Imagine if your village had the power
to vote on whether or not to contract with the Federal Government for
protection, for any other service the Federal Government normally
provides a local community? What if your city could determine how much,
if anything, its residents would pay in income taxes, and then turn
around and tell the state and Federal governments what percentage of
that total amount of revenue would be passed on to them, and what uses
those funds would be designated to support? Talk about turning the
world upside down!
What if every village, city, town, rural
district had its own sovereignty, was it's own micro-state and the
"nation," what we know now as the United States, would become more like
the European Union, with the micro-nations, the mini sovereign
subdivisions we envision were the equivalents of the individual nation
members of the EU?
We have a separate section on secession
and decentralized sovereignty, though these two topics are closely
related, the point here is that regardless of what shape the nation
might ultimately take if liberty were enhanced and we started thinking
outside of the box about how best to reduce and recreate government
with liberty in mind, decentralization is a central design feature.
Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Centralized
power does the same.