State’s Rights, Republicans and Romney!

Excuse me if I’m confused.  My father was a Republican, and I grew up a Democrat in a Buckhead home in which the mention of  Thomas Dewey’s stinging defeat by Harry S. Truman was never allowed. Like many American boys, I had a hero-worship admiration for DDE (Dwight David Eisenhower), the man who had led the crushing defeat of Nazi Germany, and the man who keep my father from harm’s way in the Korean UN police action; though in retrospect both Truman and he left unfinished business on the table. I was always taught that Republicans were conservative, constitutional and eminently reasonable people, and I enjoyed the weekly “Eve and Charlie Show” (Sen. Everett Dirksen R, IL, and Rep. Charles Halleck, R, IN) and at times felt myself comfortable in the company of both Gov. Nelson Rockefeller R, NY and Sen. Barry Goldwater, R, AZ, that is, in the company of their thought.  I even found strength in the vision and enthusiasm of Pres. Ronald Reagan, R, CA, though I often disagreed with his policies. And I’ve met a good number of prominent Republican, including many of the senior staff of CFTR, Reagan’s think tank, Lyn Nofsinger and Barbara Buchanan included. As President of Childers & Sullivan, Inc., I worked for men of integrity on both sides of the political spectrum and even served to manage fund raising and political opinion research in 1978 for Republican gubernatorial candidate Guy Hunt, who would later become Alabama’s first Republican Governor since Reconstruction.

There’s a point to this name dropping, which I will soon present, but it is important to note that I am a conservative southern Democrat, and yet I have found men and ideas of value across the aisle, as it were. As a “Blue Dog” Democrat, I have long admired the mutual admiration that Republicans have for the Tenth Amendment of the US Constitution, though in practical terms, inside the beltway, that Amendment seems to lose hold of their voting hand; it seems somehow less important to elected Republicans than when they pump their hand in emphasis on it, in acclamation of it, on the stump when campaigning.

For your consideration and edification:

Amendment 10:

“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.”

To me, the most important phrase of the 10th Amendment is the last, “…or to the people”

Here now we come to the point of this essay, the bizarre rebuke by Republicans of a candidate for the Republican Party’s nomination for President, Mitt Romney.

Consider this. If the people of a state have rights that transcend the written language of the Constitution, and if they choose to exercise those rights, it that act not the very fulfillment of that last phrase of the 10th Amendment of the US Constitution? If a State Government, and its Governor, duly elected by those people, feels compelled, by demand of the people and in fulfillment of that state’s constitution, to offer a plebiscite on a controversial issue and that issue is approved by a majority of the voting citizens of that state, isn’t that how federalism is supposed to work?   The will of the people is acknowledged by the State Government in which those people reside, and absent any conflict with the enumerated rights of all US citizens found in the US Constitution, that people’s will becomes the law of that State.

We are, of course, writing about Massachusetts, Governor Romney and “RomneyCare.”

A State exercised its rights under the US Constitution and created a law with which you or I might disagree, but it is the right of that state to do so. It does not effect you or I; we live in Georgia. I feel certain that such a broad, sweeping “solution” to rising health care costs and the diminishing quality of health care would never pass into law in Georgia, and I feel certain that conservatives in either party here would never support any such intrusive legislation here in Georgia.

But Romney was Governor of the State of Massachusetts, and he was responsible for fulfilling the expressed will of those damn yankees, excuse me, those euroamericans, whose parents and grandparents came to America not to escape from oppression and exploitation, not to find freedom to worship as they willed, or to find freedom from government intrusion in their private lives; but rather, they came to make a “better” living, to have an easier life, to enjoy the many opportunities and freedoms paid for by those who earlier fought and died for them.

Governor Mitt Romney did what the chief executive of a state should do, act to enact the will of the people of that state. He did it well, he did as he was advised by the Legislature, and by many prominent businessmen, educators and health professionals.

I will fight against any attempt by any government official or agency to “mandate” my participation in any health program. I might well urge citizens take up arms against such tyranny. But if the people of Georgia demanded it, voted for it and intended to enforce it, I would do what wise men have done since before the American revolution, I will go west! I’ll move to Alabama!

Republicans can decide whether Mitt Romney is fit to be their candidate. He is, on my score card, a prototypical Republican, and I will never, ever vote for any Republican. But Mitt Romney is the first Governor to run for President since Reagan who heard and obeyed the voice of his state’s people, and then did the people’s bidding; then did what all elected officials should do, the people’s work.

I do not know whether he intellectually supported the health care initiatives in Massachusetts, or whether he did not. Y’all Republicans need to find that out, but he has said he would repeal all parts of ObamaCare, and that’s a damn good start to a conservative campaign to return power to the people, one this yellow dog democrat can applaud and  support, that is, after he is elected. I’m just hoping Hillary will run again, or maybe she and Bill will support their girl child, what’s her name? After all, you Republicans started this recent nepotism, and we can agree the Bush’s sure weren’t the Adam’s!  Then again, maybe we need a constitutional amendment to ban the election of the progeny of a President unto the third, fourth, hell, just to be safe, the fifth generation. How many Bush’s can there be?

My conclusion is this: If the people of Massachusetts want socialized medicine, that’s their right, and if you don’t like it, don’t live there. As President Reagan is often quoted as saying: “Vote with your feet.” If we in Georgia vote to cut medicaid, medicare, welfare, peach care, who cares? The people speak and they should be heard. I will, of course, campaign vigorously against any such cuts, but should the other side prevail, well, I’ll see you in Huntsville!


 

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One Response to State’s Rights, Republicans and Romney!

  1. Well stated points! You seem to think the Constitution is something other than half of the name of the Atlanta daily paper. You have this radical idea that the Constitution is a perceptual document by which we should be ruled. (Even when it is in opposition to what we personally think)

    Today, people invoke the Constitution when it supports their position but if the Constitution is contrary to their position, it was written by a bunch of colonists over two hundred years ago and they had no idea what things would be like today. Why they didn’t even have FaceBook

    Oh! But that we could espouse an opinion n a political subject without having to apply the label of “Republican” or “Democrat” to the people involved. The Brits have it more right by referring to the parties a liberals and conservatives but even at that the line blurs. Consider an issue. Form an opinion. Voice you opinion and back it with facts. That is what you have done in this essay despite your references to Dems and Republicans. Strom Thurman had the idea, “Dixiecrats” Democrat principals woven into a fabric of states’ rights.

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