If anything can get the humane left and thoughtful right on the same page, it’s opposition to the central state in Washington, the wars, the lies, the nationalist police forces, the corporatist welfare schemes, and everything else. In particular, the idea that the federal government is not supreme, that the several states have some say in setting policy, should be a common denominator in any political movement for fiscal sanity, civil liberties, and peace. Tom Woods’s Nullification: How to Resist Tyranny in the 21st Century is the decentralist movement’s manifesto, showing that the anti-federalists of today are anything but Republican shills.

Yet we who oppose Washington are libeled by the Rachel Maddows of the world as “Tenthers”—an implicit admission that to care about the most hardcore parts of the Bill or Rights is too kooky for the mainstream left. But the urge to strip the feds of their exclusive power is not only a conservative inclination. It was California, I’m a little proud to say, that has most embarrassed the national government on the tyrannical war on drugs, forcing the liberal fascists in DC to tone down their totalitarian medical marijuana raids in my state, which did this simply by ignoring federal law.

The Tenth Amendment Center has done great work in spreading this sensible, humanitarian message far and wide, and now, as another indication that the Jefferson-Rothbard-Woods dedication to the Tenth Amendment and radical civil disobedience against nationalist leviathan is catching on even in the least expected places, the group is hosting an event in Los Angeles all day this Saturday. The great Tom Woods is the headliner, of course, and I’ll be speaking (and doing a couple of songs) as well. Antiwar Radio’s Scott Horton and Michael Boldin, two names familiar to LRC readers, will also speak, as will many others.

It should be a great and subversive time, where everything from the TSA and the Patriot Act to Obamacare and the war machine will take a beating. For those of you who can’t make it, know that the decentralist tide is rising, more than I’ve seen in my lifetime, and not just in the heartland, but in Los Angeles and elsewhere. There is no reason that the good blue staters as well as red can’t rally around the idea of smashing the federal state as a moderate first step on the way toward liberty.

cross-posted from the LewRockwell.com blog

Anthony Gregory