Time for Secession
Frank Chodorov
[Reprinted from Analysis, 195x]
If I were governor of a state, or even a legislator, I would put my
weight behind a secessionist movement; not secession from the Union,
but secession from Washington. I would do so exactly because I favor
the Union, as originally conceived and my advocacy of secession would
be based on the same reasoning that prompted initiation of the Union,
namely that divided authority is a good guarantee of freedom.
The Union was-it still exists on paper-a voluntary association of
autonomous states, each invested with all the political authority not
specifically assigned to the federal government. Outside these
limitations, the federal government could not go while state authority
was restricted only by the Constitution. This neat political package
is being clawed at by the power-mad denizens of the cocktail capital
of the country, simply because so long as it remains intact, no matter
how damaged, they cannot achieve their ultimate purpose of complete
centralization; and the American citizen has some hope of avoiding a
regime of absolutism.
The importance of bolstering the Union concept looms large when we
consider how far centralization has gone, in the economic field.
Through the instrument of taxation, one-third of our economy has
already been centralized. Through subsidies and regulation, our
industrial plant is virtually operating on the fascist pattern of the
private ownership under federal control; outright confiscation waits
only upon the excuse of war. Through involvement of our financial
institutions in its fiscal schemes, the government has, for all
practical purposes, reduced them to mere agencies of the United States
Treasury. Through labor legislation presumably intended to favor the
worker union leaders are able to ride herd on our basic industries,
and the nationalization of labor can be effected by simply drafting
these leaders into the government.
Politically, however, the drive toward centralization is handicapped
by the residue of power still remaining in the state governments. This
fact was recognized by the maniacs of centralization who invaded
Washington early in the New Deal era. Promptly, Mr. Roosevelt's
notorious Temporary National Economic Council proposed the division of
the country into "administrative" units. With the usual
double-talk, the TNEC denied any intention to circumvent the
Constitution, but argued the impossibility of carrying out "national
programs" under the handicap of divided authority.
The unlikelihood of getting the states to vote themselves out of
existence turned the centralizers to other means, such as bribing the
state authorities with patronage, alienating the loyalty of the
citizenry with federal subsidies, establishing within the states
independent administrative bodies for the management of federal works
programs. It will be noted that these management bodies are called "authorities"-and
that they are, in fact, set up to take care of political matters
coincident to their other functions. The current urgency for FEPC,
with its promise of using federal troops for the enforcement of the
law, is in line with the policy of liquidating the autonomy of the
states.
The centralizers know their history. Wherever absolutism got going,
the liquidation of home rule prepared the way. A half century before
Hitler, Bismarck had cleared the road for him by wiping out the
independent German states. Cavour did as much for Mussolini in Italy.
The Czars made the advent of Stalin easy. Centralization is the
antithesis of home rule, and the dualism written into our Constitution
is an assurance, so long as it remains in effect, that Washington will
have trouble in achieving Moscow. The first step I would take, if I
were governor of a state, would be to require every school child to
become familiar with the history and theory of what we call states'
rights, but which is really the doctrine of home rule. For, it was
precisely the fear of centralization, such as we are now faced with,
that prompted the Founding Fathers to write that doctrine into our
basic law.
It must be remembered that the early American had had his fill of
far-off government. Having got rid of it at the cost of war he was
dead set against a native version of London rule. He knew he had to
have some kind of central government-to deal with foreign governments,
to prevent the component commonwealths from setting up trade barriers
between themselves, and several other matters that could not be
handled by local government-but he wanted it severely restricted in
scope. The only kind of Constitution he would accept was one that
clearly delimited the power of the government to be set up under it.
In all other matters he was willing to put his trust in local
government. Why? Simply because it was not likely to get out of hand;
one could keep one's eyes on it. Besides, being a government of
neighbors it was likely to be cognizant of and responsive to the
temper of the governed. It is a certainty that the legislator
representing Sauk Center, Minnesota, is more fully conversant with the
problems of that community than is the Senator from Alabama, and can
be trusted not to vote against its interests; on the other hand, the
Senator from Alabama has no inhibitions about riding roughshod over
the interests of Sauk Center if, in his opinion, these interests run
contrary to what he conceives to be to national interest. Then, there
is always the possibility of Sauk Center being completely ignored in a
tariff deal between the Senators of New York and California.
The extent to which this fear of centralization possessed the early
American is illustrated by the story of a point that came up in the
term of President Washington. The "father of his country"
was expected in Boston, and Governor Hancock cogitated the propriety
of his going to meet the distinguished visitor; would he not be
compromising the Commonwealth of Massachusetts by so doing? He settled
the problem by pleading illness. The sequel to that story is also
illustrative. It was suggested to President Washington that he review
the Massachusetts militia, but he rejected the idea because such a
review might imply federal interference with the military arm of the
state; after all the tacit understanding in those days was that the
militia might be called upon to face the federal army.
In both cases neither personal idiosyncrasy nor considerations of
etiquette were of prime importance. It was the spirit of the times
that found expression in these incidents, and the spirit of the times
found expression in these incidents, and the spirit of the times was
characterized by a keen jealousy of freedom. The early American knew
that freedom was nothing more than the absence of external restraint
on behavior; the government could not give you freedom, it could only
take it away. And he knew from experience, if not from his reading,
that when a government is detached from the governed it invariably
strives to take it away. Freedom, then, is in better case when the
effective government never gets beyond the purview of the town hall
meeting.
That is the truth that needs constant reiteration, now that semantics
has found a way to fragment freedom and enumerate the parts. The early
American could not have been bamboozled by that verbal slight of hand.
There is a facet of political dualism that needs exploration and
exploitation. It is the fact that divided authority introduces
competition in government, Political science accepts as an axiom the
monopolization of coercion by government; it must have that monopoly,
so the axiom runs, in order that it may prevent the indiscriminate use
of coercion by citizens. There is no arguing with that point. But,
when the individual is free to move from one jurisdiction to another,
a limit is put on the extent to which the government may use its
monopoly power. Government is held in restraint by the fear of losing
its taxpaying citizens, just as loss of customers tends to keep other
monopolies from getting too arrogant.
For instance, because our federal government has not yet managed a
national divorce law, there is competition between states for that
kind of business. Some states try to attract capital by advertising
their abstention from inheritance and income taxation, and Nevada's
legalization of gambling has to some extent overcome her lack of
natural resources and business opportunities. The practice of evading
local sales taxes by crossing state borders is a common example of the
principle of competition in government.
Before the Sixteenth Amendment got into the constitution, a number of
states instituted the income taxes. Though the levies were always
small, collection was attended with considerable difficulty; the tax
collectors, being neighbors, not "foreigners" from
Washington, were inclined toward leniency, and collusion was not
uncommon. Nevertheless, the states that did not tax income made that
fact known, and the fear of losing industry to them caused a number of
states to drop income taxation.
Socialistic experiments did not originate with the New Deal; state
governments had their own laboratories, long before 1932. Many years
ago I saw an idle state-owned cement plant in South Dakota, and early
in the depression a Wisconsin law made it obligatory for restaurants
to serve two ounces of Wisconsin made cheese with every meal, whether
the diner wanted it or not. The platform of the Farm-Labor party,
which sprang up around 1920, and captured several states, was larded
with socialism. However, every state experiment in socialism failed
simply because of the constitutionally guaranteed freedom of movement
for both labor and capital across state lines. Federal socialism can
be made to operate somehow only because there is no escape from its
constabulary.
Then there is the point in dualism that the citizen can apply to the
federal government for relief when the state government transgresses
his constitutional rights. And a state government may bring suit
against the federal government. The effect, then, of divided authority
is to keep both the federal and state governments off balance; neither
one has that complete monopoly of power necessary to a regime of
absolutism.
What with amendments to the Constitution, legalistic interpretations
and downright circumvention made possible by well placed subventions,
the autonomy of the states has been well watered down. Nevertheless,
state lines have not yet been wiped out and there are areas of
jurisdiction that are still reserved to the states. These areas can be
strengthened and expanded. It is only a matter of intelligent and
resolute resistance by the state governments to every scheme, no
matter the how seemingly innocuous or politically attractive, that
emanates from Washington. If for no other reason, personal pride
should prompt every governor and state legislator to take a
secessionist attitude; they were not elected to be lackeys of the
federal bureaucracy.
Just how far that resistance can go, and remain legal, is a matter
for lawyers to determine. But, it is quite obvious that the states can
make it difficult for the federal government to expand its spheres of
influence by a non-cooperative attitude. Take the federal government's
invasion of electric power business under the guise of flood control
and it is still necessary for the centralizers to obtain permission
from state governments to carry out such schemes and refusal would go
hard with them. Federal tenements, which in practice become enclaves
of votes for the party in power, are made possible by exemption from
real estate taxes, which is still the prerogative of the local
authorities; were exemption regularly refused, the housing bureaucrats
would be in a sorry plight. If every grant-in-aid were refused, the
federal government would be in the unenviable position of a
philanthropist bereft of beggars.
There is no end of trouble the states can give the centralizers by
merely refusing to cooperate. Such refusal would meet with popular
acclaim if it were supplemented with a campaign of education on the
meaning of states' rights, in terms of human freedom. In fact, the
educational part of such a secessionist movement should be given first
importance. And those who are plumping for a "third party",
because both existing parties are centralist in character, would do
well to nail to their masthead this banner: Secession of the 48 states
from Washington.
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