Mad dictators

Americans! Where are your laws? Where are you checks and balances?

When I last looked across the great Atlantic, health policy was a matter for state Governments, not federal. The USA is a federation of states, united under a single Constitution, is it not? Or has that changed? The USA is a democracy, yes? Has been for 250 years, has it not? Though we are aware that the understanding of democracy has changed over that time, bringing more and more of the peoples of your great nation under that banner. Not a perfect setup, any more than any other, but getting there, yes?

"The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."

10th Amendment

So when did that Federal democracy, those laws, those checks and balances, change? Americans, when did you decide to throw it all away? I am no expert on the laws of the US and its various state governments and jurisdictions, but my understanding is that this means that states retain all legal powers other than those explicitly assigned, by the Constitution or otherwise, to the Federal authorities.

Please correct me, if I am wrong, but is it not the case that jurisdiction over health, safety, 'morals' (not sure what that means), education, intrastate commerce, local law enforcement, and property law, remains with each of the 50 states? There may be exceptions (again, as far as I understand) where the federal government has explicit constitutional authority in those area, but it must be explicit and constitutional.

So, when, Americans, did you (though your democratically elected representatives) grant your President authority to make pronouncements on matters of state policy?

Now, I don't want to appear patronising, my dear American friends, but in this United Kingdom, of which 13 of your states were once colonial outposts, we have laws against unbridled power being assumed by officials, elected or otherwise. And we are not afraid to use them against over-mighty individuals, whoever they may be, and however much social media influence they may have.

Please allow me to give you an example.

If the Prime Minister of the UK, Andrew Burnham, made a pronouncement about how vaccines should be delivered throughout the UK, he would meet some resistance. Not least from those nations and regions that have control of their own destinies in these matters, Not least Wales, Northern Ireland, and Scotland.

So that if such an 'order' were to be received by Jacqueline Totterdell, who is the Director General for Health, Social Care and Early Years in Wales (and Chief Executive of NHS Wales), she might be more than a little put out. I imagine she would call the Prime Minister's office to check that any communication she had received about the order was actually genuine and not a hoax. If Downing Street (the UK Prime Minister's 'seat of power' equivalent to the US White House) insisted that the order was genuine, I imagine she would point out that it exceeded the power of the Prime Minister to make such an order, even if only, formally, a recommendation.

Ms Totterdell could, and probably would, seek remedy from the UK courts. All UK citizens have access to the courts of the various UK jurisdictions. She might well apply to the High Court of England and Wales (a unitary legal jurisdiction) for 'Judicial Review' of the order. Almost certainly, the High Court would declare the order unlawful, as it would exceed the legal authority of the Prime Minister in Wales. Wales has its own government and its own health service. The Welsh government sets policy on matters relating to the healthcare of its three million people.

I give this example, not to suggest that the system of democracy in Wales, and other constituent nations of the UK, is better than your 250 year-old democracy. It is just to point out that Welsh people, rightly in my view, guard their democratic and legal rights jealously. They were hard fought and won, over many centuries. Welsh people would not stand up to a single man from Wales trying to dictate such policy as heath, let alone a man somewhere other than Wales.

What do you say, Americans? Where are your laws? Where are your checks and balances? Do you allow mad dictators to tell you what to do in your state? What are you going to do about it, other than saying...

I didn't vote for him

Not for me to say who you should decide may run your country or how they should run it. But I am really interested to know what you think.

Do please tell... and please feel free to tell me, not a citizen of any of the 50 states, to shut up and mind my own business.

Thanks for reading

Ray Taylor

English citizen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland