How the Administrative State Conquered America

[Geee]

Tom Klingenstein

Editor’s Note: The administrative state is one of the most important power centers of the woke (group quota) regime. This leviathan of unaccountable executive agencies that effectively create and enforce laws of their own is, by its very nature and existence, an attack on America’s constitutional order. The administrative state renders null the vital American idea of separation of powers; it insulates the conduct of government from political processes and public accountability; and it grants those who hold its reins incredible power to impose an ideological vision on the country.

Many conservatives are just now waking up to the danger the administrative state poses — in large part thanks to the first-hand experience of bureaucratic tyranny that COVID-19 provided to the average citizen. Groups like Philip Hamburger’s New Civil Liberties Alliance are now working diligently on the subject, and already racking up major successes. 

Yet to face this challenge properly, we must understand it — its intricacies, its lineage, its goals. Nearly 20 years ago, R.J. Pestritto, a leading expert on American progressivism, explained the century-old roots of our crisis in a comprehensive report for the Heritage Foundation titled “The Birth of the Administrative State: Where It Came From and What It Means for Limited Government.” Pestritto’s authoritative essay is republished now so that readers might take heed of its enduring and urgent message. The destruction of the separation of powers was a feature, not a bug, of the progressive movement. Pestritto quotes Woodrow Wilson: “Government does now whatever experience permits or the times demand.” This is an apt credo for the woke regime, and conservatives — if they are to have any hope — must understand it for what it is: a threat.

 

For those who hold the Constitution of the United States in high regard and who are concerned about the fate of its principles in our contemporary practice of government, the modern state ought to receive significant attention. The reason for this is that the ideas that gave rise to what is today called “the administrative state” are fundamentally at odds with those that gave rise to our Constitution. In fact, the original Progressive-Era architects of the administrative state understood this quite clearly, as they made advocacy of this new approach to government an important part of their direct, open, comprehensive attack on the American Constitution.

As a practical matter, the modern state comes out of Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal, which launched a large bureaucracy and empowered it with broad governing authority. Also, as a practical matter, the agencies comprising the bureaucracy reside within the executive branch of our national government, but their powers transcend the traditional boundaries of executive power to include both legislative and judicial functions, and these powers are often exercised in a manner that is largely independent of presidential control and altogether independent of political control.

But while the actual growth of the administrative state can be traced, for the most part, to the New Deal (and subsequent outgrowths of the New Deal like the Great Society), the New Deal merely served as the occasion for implementing the ideas of America’s Progressives, who had come a generation earlier. It is the origins of the modern state — and the constitutional implications of that change — upon which we will focus our attention.

The consequences of adopting Progressive ideas as a foundation for a major piece of our contemporary government are profound, especially when one considers the impact of these ideas on the bedrock principles of our Constitution. It is best to begin with an illustration. Consider the plight of the C. T. Chenery Corporation in the early 1940s.

[Valin]

@Geee

HI THERE

[Geee]

2 hours ago, Valin said:

@Geee

HI THERE