What the heck is Federalism?

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Americans have discovered or invented many significant things, but by far, the most significant is federalism. It is uniquely American and it has led to the most free and prosperous society in the history of civilization.

The single most important principle of government that sets America apart from the rest of the world, is federalism. It is the founding principle of the form of government that the framers constructed. Before digging into what federalism is, maybe we should first say what it’s not.

Federalism is not a doctrine of centralized government. Federalism is not about “states rights”. By the way, do states have rights? Or is it the people that have rights? Just a thought. Finally, federalism is not just about the interaction between the federal (national) government and the state government.

Alexis de Tocqueville (a mid-17th century French political thinker) wrote in his book, Democracy in America:

The human understanding more easily invents new things than new words, and we are hence constrained to employ many improper and inadequate expressions. When several nations form a permanent league and establish a supreme authority, which, although it cannot act upon private individuals like a national government, still acts upon each of the confederate states in a body, this government, which is so essentially different from all others, is called Federal

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This entry was posted on Monday, February 15th, 2010 at 4:02 pm. It is filed under Federalism and tagged with , . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.

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Thanks for the article.

Federalism is about the sharing of governmental power.

As you imply, states don't have rights. People have rights which they can voluntarily surrender to some extent when they endow the governments they form with certain powers in exchange for some perceived benefit.

The phrase "states' rights" is technically a misnomer. I have used the phrase to indicate that the balance of power has shifted away from the Framers' intent toward a more powerful central government.

But, it's an important point that the term 'states' rights' is technically incorrect since it adds to the confusion most of us already suffer in trying to sort out and straighten out our mess of a government. It helps to remember that only people have rights and we give up those rights to governments pursuant to documents called constitutions. As a result, those governments get certain powers over us.

In other words, our rights do NOT come from government.

Perhaps the phrase 'state sovereignty' should be used to make it clear that the states are each a nation-state and the federal government was intended to be subordinate to the states. And, just to be complete, the states are subordinate to the people who are the ultimate source of governmental power.