| Yes, I'm aware of how things were at the time of the Constitution's creation. But things have changed; people no longer thing of themselves as Virginians first, and Americans second. As America has industrialized and developed, that the nation has become more tightly-knit and less an aggregation of states has been inevitable. > Small, local governments have many advantages: it's easier for ordinary people to participate in and influence them, and they're harder for big money to control. Local governments listen more closely to their constituencies and their decisions more accurately reflect what their communities want. Local governments also have certain disadvantages: just look at the housing and transportation situation in the SF bay area. Excessive fragmentation has resulted in horrible policies, with each community unwilling to compromise or do what makes sense for the area as a whole. It's basically tragedy of the commons. > While some of the Founders were fonder of a strong central government than others, none of them would have supported the degree of centralization we have today. Who cares? The country is radically different than the primarily agrarian society they had, what worked then won't work now. The founders would also be horrified at our views on sex and gender, just because they were smart men for their time doesn't mean we need to follow their beliefs for all time. > The antidote is a return to the true meaning of the 10th amendment. A more local government which is influenced and participated in directly by the people it governs. A world where your vote is one of hundreds or thousands, not hundreds of millions, and genuinely does count. This doesn't happen because it's ineffective, same reason that -- current moves towards populism/nationalism notwithstanding -- there's a long-term trend towards more integration and fewer trade barriers as nations become more developed. More fragmentation among local governments means powers are closer to individual citizens, yes, but that also means more government overhead: you're losing economies of scale. For example, imagine how well the interstate highway system would work if there were no real federal government or even state governments, and you just had hundreds or thousands of cities each managing little pieces of it. |