As big government grows bigger, Americans’ distrust of it continues to balloon right along with it.

Respondents to  a Gallup poll released Monday overwhelmingly picked “big government” as the greatest threat to the country in the future, with 64 percent choosing it over “big business” and “big labor.” The result fell just one point shy of a record high in the poll, which Gallup has conducted since 1965. Distrust of government has jumped nine percentage points since 2009.

Even self-described  Democrats, a demographic more prone to fear the power of corporations, indicate an increased distrust of government. And that’s with a Democratic Party president in the White House.

“Almost half of Democrats now say big government is the biggest threat to the nation, more than say so about big business, and far more than were concerned about big government in March 2009,” Gallup analyst Elizabeth Mendes said.

Mendes points out that the results could mean bad news for the Occupy movement.

“Americans’ concerns about the threat of big government are near record-high levels. The Occupy Wall Street movement, focused on ‘fighting back against the corrosive power of major banks and multinational corporations,’ has drawn much attention and a large following. Still, the majority of Americans do not view big business as the greatest threat to the country when asked to choose among big business, big government, and big labor.”

The poll adds to a growing body of evidence indicating American’s discontent with the ever increasing size, power and influence of the federal government. Over the last several months, state sovereignty issues took center stage in more than one presidential debate, and the results of other polls also reveal an increasing distrust of Washington D.C. It appears Americans want a more limited general government.

“We’ve got the TSA groping and armed federal agents raiding dairy farms to halt the ‘crime’ of selling raw milk. No wonder American’s increasingly distrust big government,” Tenth Amendment Center communications director Mike Maharrey said. “Add to that the specter of the feds telling us what kind of insurance we have to purchase, what kind of light bulbs to buy and just today, demanding a ban of cell phones in cars, all the while waging multiple wars and running up trillions of dollars in debt, we have an environment ripe for Americans to finally wake up and demand that the federal government be reined in and constrained to its constitutionally prescribed role.”

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