Let not thy camel's nose be seen under the edge of your tent, for soon thy beast will be inside, yea shall have no place to sleep, thy stores [food] shall be gone, and yea shall starve.
~ Jazeeb's admonition to his sons concerning the harm that befalls when one allows incursion of another onto one's property
I was watching the news the other day and saw a story about the Congresswomen that are getting pregnant and having kids while serving. After a bit of story setup from the talking head, a few snippets were played from one of the Representatives who was shown taking her kids to day care before going into session. The Rep. said that since she is a working mother and a legislator she can connect with the problems that working women face trying to juggle kids and work, and that she can use that knowledge when working in Congress on laws dealing with things like child care.
Madam, it is not in your purview to legislate child care, and indeed it is one of the problems nowadays that the Federal Government insists on insinuating itself into every facet of citizen's lives. Does the "Federal" not understand that the Constitution is an enumerated powers document and that all other powers are left elsewhere - in the hands of people other than them (Congress). Where in the Constitution does it talk about Child Care?
So, here it is then, that we have a Federal government that not only has the given power to declare war, but also a Government that has taken unto itself the power to declare how child care is to be managed in the American workplace, or declare the maximum number of gallons that a toilet can use per flush!
Am I the only one that sees such things as Federal intrusion in this seemingly benign area of child care as but one nose of the camel that is constantly being thrust under the edge of the tent of the people?
Here are the nose's of some of the other Federal Camel's brothers:
Health Care
Education
Welfare
Social Security
Retirement
Environment
Air Quality
Global Warming
Water Quality
Minimum Wage
Economic Stimulus/Planning
There are many others, but these are some of the first to come to mind. And note well that there are those that are reading this post that will take issue with one or more of these, but then again, there are those that have been brought up on the steady pap of a government that seeks always to aggrandize itself at the expense of the other entities of society that by the very Constitution retained the usurped powers.
Not to put too fine a point on things, it is not constitutional for the Federal Government to be the law giver with respect to, for example, "the environment". But "nay", you will say, (and mostly so because you think the environment needs to be saved), "then who is it that shall do this", as if the desirability of having a Federal Agency implement your desires, trumps the words of the Constitution that do not enumerate such an agency or enumerate such power, but which does set froth mechanisms for the other partners in the whole ( the people or the States) to do such things as saving that which you desire to be "saved'.
Yes, my friend, this is exactly what I am saying - that with respect to non-enumerated powers, it is the STATE (or the people) that has the power and not the Federal Government, and no amount of desire can change what the Federal is allowed to do and what they are not allowed to do.
Now, those tending toward the argumentative, would have you swallow the bait that as a practical matter, such things (as saving "the environment") should be done in a consolidated and coordinated fashion, and thus the desirability or practicality of such a consolidation arrangement means that the Federal Government should do it, and that this "should' means that the Federal government "can" take on this role.
Make no mistake, however, because that a thing may be more desirable does not act to create an authority for doing that thing itself considered desirable, for if the touchstone was desire, then the bank robber should be able to freely enter the bank and take the property of another, since that act of robbery would be deemed by him to be desirable and thus allowed.
Ah, but you say, "... the bank robber is prohibited by society's law (backed up by society's police power) from robbing the bank." This then brings me to the exact point, that:
a) the Founders, acting as agents for the States that sent them to the Convention,
b) the States themselves as they ratified the document, and,
c) "the people" themselves
all recognized the temptation and tendency of a too-powerful Federal government ( or those in control of it) to try and rob the people and erect a tyranny, and they therefore put in place - in the very instrument that constituted the framework for the Federal authority - the enumerated powers shackles to prohibit such acts of robbery. In other words, society's way of protecting itself from an ever expanding government that intruded itself into every aspect of the lives of the people and ate out their sustenance, was to was to constitute a Federal government that was shackled and could only do those things that were enumerated in the Constitution.
Returning now to babies and Congresswomen, that shackling means that the Federal has no authority to legislate Child Care matters, and their meddling in these areas represents the nose of the camel under the edge of the tent belonging to the people.
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