by Bob Ellis, DakotaVoice.com
Federalism and Tenth Amendment state’s rights have been under assault since the days of FDR.
The federal government was created to serve the states and, in the words of James Madison, “to be exercised principally on external objects, as war, peace, negotiation, and foreign commerce.†  Under the Tenth Amendment,
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.
The astute constitutional student will recognize that there is no authority whatsoever under Article 1 Section 8 of the U.S. Constitution (the part of the Constitution which outlines the powers of the federal government) to create or administer a health care system.
In the past year, several states have moved to assert their rights under the Tenth Amendment. States such as South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Louisiana, North Dakota, Alaska, Idaho, Oklahoma and more have passed resolutions telling the federal government to keep its paws off areas that don’t belong to it.
Alabama has specifically moved to short-circuit the federal government’s plan to cripple the country under the cap and trade global warming tax.  Other states such as Arizona, Florida, and Texas are moving to specifically tell the federal government if they pass socialized health care, it isn’t going to fly in their states.
More states–and more work–may be needed, given what the socialists in congress and the White House have in mind.
The Heritage Foundation has an analysis of how Obamacare would hit federalism and state’s rights hard.
State flexibility regulations will be removed, making states merely administrative arms of the federal government’s bidding
If congress succeeds in raising eligibility to 133% of poverty in the final bill (if it passes, God forbid), 33 states could see their Medicare rolls increase 30%, with 10 states seeing an increase of 50%. And since–contrary to a popular conception–government can’t create money out of thin air, guess who gets to pay for that?  What will it look like if they raise it to 150% of poverty?  Got your wallet handy?
There are any number of real reform actions congress could take if only they wanted to; these involve real solutions like tort reform, promoting consumer involvement and choice, making insurance more portable, etc.
But they don’t want to improve the system and get it back within constitutional parameters and into the realm of common sense.
Their goal is to push socialized health care on America, and they’ll do it in a big step or several smaller ones.  We the people must not allow them to take even small steps in that direction.  We’re already too close to the lip of that socialist abyss.
Bob Ellis [send him email] is the founder and editor of Dakota Voice.