Nipping at the Heels of the Administrative State

By Clarice Feldman

Despite the fact that the Constitution sets forth three branches of government, each with discrete powers and limitations -- the executive, legislative, and judicial -- various agencies, boards, bureaus, departments that today make up the federal administrative state often render the roles and powers of those branches nugatory. The Constitution’s checks and balances which provide limits on the three branches often are unavailing when it comes to the administrative operations. In effect, citizens’ votes are worthless -- who voters elect or what policies they prefer, the head of agencies like the EPA call the shots.

No matter that candidates for public office talk about restoring constitutional democracy and reining in the state, without some fundamental changes we will remain serfs under the power of unelected officials and bureaucrats. Instead of asking candidates boxers or briefs questions, we must demand they that tell us how they’d assure that legislation which hands over extraordinary powers to a federal bureaucracy (such as the Clean Air Act, the Endangered Species Act, and ObamaCare) would be reformulated, abolished, or vetoed to limit the discretion of the administrative state and devolve more regulatory powers to elected state officials more accountable to citizens and their views.....

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