Do State Governments Better Handle Social Issues Than The Federal Government?

by: Anna Maria Hoffman

A few days ago, we received a question from one of our readers named Matt. His question deals with the states’ rights v.s. federal government arguments we see on social issues.

Homosexuality rights, women rights, and drug rights are different rights Americans ask questions about every day. When discussing these topics with either friends or family members, people normally ask,” why doesn’t the government handle this,” or” we should ask the government to do something about this,” American citizens for or against these issue keep asking DC what to do. My question is, wouldn’t it be easier if these issues were left to each of the 50 states own governments to decide? Wouldn’t it be easier and make more sense to have state governments decide instead of the Washington government? Take Obamacare as an example. Instead of Democrats and Republicans arguing over it being a law or tax, why not have each state decide if it should be their own state laws or not? If a liberal state, such as California or New York want less rights for the people and more for the government then why not allow them to go this route and find out for themselves if big government works or not without harming the entire nation itself. Am I making sense with saying leave more minor or even major issues up to the state’s government and not the suites in DC?

Matt is right about how the federal government should not be involved in many issues that it is involved in. The federal government should protect our constitutional rights, freedoms, and national sovereignty, and collect taxes for basic purposes, like infrastructure. It’s what the Founding Fathers envisioned for our nation as well. Obviously, the federal government has no business in trying to “correct societal problems” that are best solved by civil society on the local level.

Sure, if liberal states like California and New York and their respective citizens want more big government policies, then the federal government should not stop them from enacting such policies. The same argument can be made for states like Oklahoma and Texas, which should not have the federal government tell them which policies they should adopt for their own people. A great example of that is the problem of federal judges exercising judicial activism and decreeing that constitutional amendments protecting marriage between a man and a woman in these states are “unconstitutional” and therefore need to be struck down.

Unfortunately, the current administration is growing the size and scope of the federal government while neglecting the importance of the 10th Amendment. In order for our nation to return back to limited government principles, we need to elect better legislators on the local, state, and federal levels. In addition, we need to elect a president in 2016 who will abide by the Constitution and especially respect the purpose of the 10th Amendment.

This blog post was originally published on: Counter Cultured’s “Ask CC”: column.

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