Trump to Dismantle Century of Administrative State Control

Speaking at CPAC, Trump's chief strategist Steve Bannon named the deconstruction of the administrative state as a primary goal of the Trump administration. This set the left into a fiery paroxysm of rage. Bannon observed, “If you think they are giving you your country back without a fight, you are sadly mistaken.”

We have, indeed, lost much of our country. We have lost measures of freedom as a self-governing people to the administrative state to which Bannon refers. This vast, well-heeled network of bureaucracy hives its way into positions of influence and control over many aspects of our lives. The 20th Century witnessed the emergence of this informal style of government where power is transferred from elected officials to appointed and self-appointed people and groups. This informal power, which includes government agencies that have assumed sovereign power along with private sector national and increasingly international groups, has been called the Eastern Seaboard Liberal Establishment, the Military-Industrial Complex, the New World Order and other euphemisms.

The Trump administration's call for deconstruction constitutes a declaration of war against a century of power transfer to a growing, unelected, unaccountable, and often perpetual and interlocking bureaucracy that interfaces with powerful and wealthy private sector organizations and players. The unelected fiat government includes judges, appointed for life, who bypass laws crafted by Congress and sovereign agencies such as the Federal Reserve, which assumes the awesome power to issue currency and determine the value of the dollar. The Consumer Financial Protection Agency is such an agency, one which assumes arguably extra-constitutional powers to interfere with private business.

The liberal establishment gained its first major beachhead in 1912 with the election of Woodrow Wilson who presided over the creation of the Federal Reserve and the passage of the 16th Amendment that allowed the Federal Government to tax our income directly. The 16th Amendment also established non-profit foundations, most of which have used their considerable wealth to influence the government and move the culture toward the authoritarian left.

Informal government picked up steam in 1933 when Franklin D. Roosevelt was granted emergency powers by Congress, powers he used to create sovereign agencies that seized authority over policy and, as such, over various aspects of the life of the citizen. Harry S. Truman advanced the trend in 1948 with the creation, by executive order, of the National Security State which includes the CIA, the NSA, and the National Security Council. This established what Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy Professor Michael Glennon calls The Double Government. Elements of this so-called double government are at war with President Trump.

Lyndon Johnson further advanced the agenda in the 1960’s by creating agencies that consolidated federal control over welfare, health, and education. Richard Nixon federalized environmental control with the EPA and OSHA. Jimmy Carter created the Department of Education and George W. Bush signed the USA Patriot Act which began the process of federalizing law enforcement, a trend that was further advanced by Barack Obama.

President Donald Trump and Congress were elected by the people to make and sign laws. The dismantling of the administrative state means a return of governing responsibilities, as mandated by the U.S. Constitution, to those we democratically elected to represent our interests under the limitations of the Constitution. We should acknowledge the forces that are arrayed against our elected government and we should support the president's effort to deconstruct the administrative, unelected, unaccountable state if we care about preserving and protecting freedom.

Chuck Morse is an author and radio talk show host. Chuck received the 2003 Communicator of the Year award from the National Right to Work Committee and was named a "Heavy 100" Radio Talk Host by Talkers Magazine. Chuck ran for Congress in Massachusetts against Barney Frank. For more of his reports — Click Here Now.