Letter to the Editor,
“State’s Rights”, might be a dry constitutional concept (10th Amendment), but the idea has taken on a life of its own as various groups want to assert this doctrine to justify dismantling federal programs and budgets.
“Home Rule” is the logical extension of state’s rights. I concluded years ago that I could have more say in the local leadership, while most of my rants to my senators and representative got tallied into “yes” or “no” on various topics by an office assistant to said leaders. I pitied the poor assistant who had to try and figure out my convoluted logic and translate it into black-and-white categories.
Home rule has come up in the West Virginia legislature, and Hardy County Planning Commissions activities of the past couple of years. Does the state have the right to over-rule the local zoning ordinances when it defines agriculture? or approves a wind turbine farm against the voice of home owners in residential zones on said mountain’s slopes? or authorizes a data center with micro-grid utility to be built contrary to what we on the county level have outlined for our land use?
I have long argued that any right (federal, state, local, HOA, faith group, or personal belief… vaccine exemptions included) comes with responsibilities. Thus if states want the right to regulate, or not, any issue not outlined in the federal Constitution (10th Amendment again), the state has the responsibility to develop state level programs and fund them.
Except by some expansive reading of the concepts of “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” I have never read the words, “health care”, “abortion”, “education”, “LGBTQ+”, “environmental conservation”, “arts and culture” in the Constitution. It’s actually pretty boring; the president does this, congress does that, the court is referee.
States have an interest in the health, education, social identity, arts, culture, and history. The specific challenges of those issues and the potential solutions to providing those services is often regional.
So the issue to ponder, especially in a state like West Virginia that receives about 40% of its funding through federal programs, is how to accept the responsibility to organize state programs and fund them.
Given that we, as a nation, have been focusing programs and funding at the federal level for more than a century, it will take time to unbundle our national and state interests. To that end, putting more of the above type programs into federal block grants make sense. But, over time, states will need to increase the tax revenue to fund those programs for which the states should take responsibility.
To put this into a more personal example, when I was in college, I wanted to assert my independence from my parents, who were funding my education (full disclosure, the State of California funded much of the tuition as I attended a state college). As long as they paid for housing, food, clothing, and entertainment, I had the weight of conscious to spend that money according to their beliefs. So, I got a job on campus to fund going to art museums, jazz clubs, the opera and theatre. What a wild concept. Pay my way.
Or as Paul wrote in Romans 13, “This is why you also pay taxes, for the authorities are ministers of God, devoting themselves to this very thing. Pay all their dues, taxes to whom taxes are due, toll to whom toll is due, respect to whom respect it due, honor to whom honor is due.”
Freedom flourished when I cut the apron strings. Is West Virginia really ready to stand up to our motto: “Montani Semper Liberi” (Mountaineers are Always Free)? Get out your wallet.
Oscar Larson
Baker, WV
