Limited Government – blessing or a curse?

So what’s wrong with a big government? That’s the question our critics ask.

According to their logic, the purpose of any government is to provide for the general welfare of its citizens, which is exactly what the preamble of our Constitution says. Then, if that’s the case, our critics contend it’s only logical that the more populous the country becomes, the larger the government must be in order to take care of the welfare of their citizens.

They further argue that the larger government is, the more peaceful and the more prosperous the country will become and, conversely, the less government there is, the more lawlessness and disorder will exist. Therefore, they conclude that to “form a more perfect union, establish justice, and insure domestic tranquility,” there must be a government large enough to secure these blessings for its people.

What they say is absolutely true if we don’t want to take care of ourselves. That’s what’s known as “The Nanny State” where the government is our nanny who treats its citizens as children who can’t think for themselves or who don’t know how to behave properly.

However, for over 300 years, since the late 1600s, Americans have proven they are adult enough to wisely take care of themselves without the need for a nanny.  Of course, there has to be some rules that any society must agree to follow but what our Founders gave us was just enough rules to allow us all the freedom we wanted while insuring that we could keep working together in harmony.

For over 200 years that system of limited government has successfully helped form a more perfect union, established justice, insured domestic tranquility, and provided for the general welfare of its people. In other words, a limited government has already proven to be a blessing to its people. On the other hand, as we look at history we see that nearly all large governments have brought prosperity and happiness to only a very small segment of their population while the vast majority of their citizens live in poverty and misery.

What the Tea Party wants is to keep the blessings we already have that has come with the limited government that’s contained in our Constitution instead of exchanging them for the curse of a big government.