We have to get more people engaged in local government.
Russell Kirk, one of the Foundational Thinkers who helped Americans understand the
roots of conservatism (and who lived in Michigan!), has described America in a
succinct way for me. I have included three paragraphs below. Don’t be dissuaded
from reading by their size.
He has presented the basics that should be common sense to every American. But
even to me, a passionate and engaged citizen, has received great revelation and
clarification in his prose. I have taken the liberty to embolden certain words
that hit home for me…
These powerful passages are from his book, The
American Cause:
“…the United States is not a centralized democracy. It does not have government from the top
downward; on the contrary, it has government from the bottom upward.
Strictly speaking, our government is federal,
a union of states for certain explicit purposes of general benefit.
Federation is very different from centralization. The theory of federation is
this, that fifty sovereign states have
conferred, of their own free will, certain powers upon the federal
administration, to promote the interests of the several states and of the
people within those several states. The
United States are united voluntarily, and are united only for the purposes,
and under the conditions, described in the federal Constitution. In the matters
which most immediately affect private life, power remains in the possession of
the several states; while within those fifty states, the people reserve to
themselves control over most walks of life. The state governments, like the
federal government, have been hedged and checked by constitutions and public
custom.
“…Everywhere in America, individuals and private voluntary associations jealously reserve to
themselves the rights of choice and action in those spheres of activity which
most nearly affect the private person. The state touches these private
concerns only upon sufferance, or not at all. Religious belief and affiliation are matters wholly of private choice;
economic activity, by and large, is left to the will of individuals; social
relationships are voluntary and private relationships; where one lives, and
how, is not determined by political authority. Quite as much as in England,
an American’s home is his castle. A great
many Americans live their lives through without ever conversing with a civil
servant, or even saying more than good morning to a policeman. Americans
have no official identity card, or internal passports, or system of national
registration. Until 1941, America never experienced peacetime conscription into
the armed forces. Nowhere in the world
is the operation of government less conspicuous than in the United States.
If an American citizen desires to abstain altogether from political activity,
even to the extent of never voting, no one interferes with him; and for
millions of Americans, their only direct contact with government is their
annual submission of income-tax reports. Private life looms much larger than
public life in the American commonwealth.
“Even in those
concerns which have been opened to local or state or federal political
activity, the theory persists that political authority operates only as a
convenience to private citizens. The public schools, for instance, are
intended simply to facilitate the education of young people, not to enforce the
educational doctrines of central authority; although the states require that
children should be schooled in some fashion, parents with the means are free to
educate their children privately, or in denominational schools, if they prefer
such methods to enrollment in public schools. The American assumption is that
education is primarily the concern of the family and the individual, not of the
political state; and this frame of mind extends to many more activities in
which the state acts as servant, rather than as master.
“…So in America the things in which people are most
interested generally remain strictly within the jurisdiction of private life. And in matters of public concern, it is the
American habit to keep authority as close to home as possible. The lesser
courts, the police, the maintenance of roads and sanitation, the raising of property-taxes,
the control of public schools, and many other essential functions still are carried on, for the most part, by the
agencies of local community: the township, the village, the city, the county.
American political parties, in essence, are loose local associations: the state and national party organizations
are the reflections of local opinion in caucus and town meeting. “
-
The American Cause by Russell Kirk, page 69-71.
Part of the reason this text is so poignant to me is that
Russell Kirk tells me what America used to look like, what it should look like
and what my generation should work towards making it again.
The older generations are alarmed at the absence of young adults’ participation
in the cry to oppose the growing government. Russell Kirk’s book was initially
published in 1957 (it has had updates since then). Since that first printing, much
has happened to the culture where those born in the 70’s, 80’s and 90’s need to
read a book like this not only to understand, many for the first time, what government’s
role is supposed to look like but who and what America truly
is – a haven for a free, independent and
responsible people.
For your convenience, here is a
direct
link to Amazon. When you’re purchasing it – say a prayer that these powerful
descriptions of the beauty of America become obvious again to the generation
who is stepping up to lead it.
- ajh
