Wel­come to TenthAmendmentNH.org, the web­site for cit­i­zens of the “Live Free or Die” state of New Hamp­shire and all who sup­port State Sov­er­eignty as guar­an­teed by the Tenth Amend­ment of the United States Constitution.

“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.”

The Tenth Amend­ment is a pow­er­ful pro­vi­sion; its pur­pose is to limit the pow­ers of the Fed­eral gov­ern­ment and to affirm the rights and pow­ers of the sov­er­eign states and cit­i­zens of the United States. Over time, the Fed­eral gov­ern­ment has grown in size and power, and Con­gres­sional leg­is­la­tures have passed laws that encroach on states rights and on indi­vid­ual liberty.

Today, the Fed­eral gov­ern­ment is pur­su­ing a mas­sive social demo­c­ra­tic agenda, the cen­tral premises of which are gov­ern­ment con­trol of indus­try and the redis­tri­b­u­tion of wealth. Under the pre­text of avert­ing a global eco­nomic “melt­down”, the Fed­eral gov­ern­ment has taken over major pri­vate sec­tor insti­tu­tions in the bank­ing, insur­ance and auto­mo­bile indus­tries, all with deficit spend­ing that will hike the national debt to an unprece­dented $17 Tril­lion (exceed­ing GDP) in the next few years.

And that does not include the cost of Health Care Reform, the goal of which is to social­ize health care in Amer­ica. The plan put for­ward by the White House and the Demo­c­rat Major­ity would pro­vide uni­ver­sal cov­er­age for US cit­i­zens by string­ing together tax­payer sub­si­dies under gov­ern­ment admin­is­tra­tion. In other words, Health Care Reform is another gov­ern­ment takeover on the pre­text of pro­vid­ing afford­able cov­er­age for all, includ­ing the 47 mil­lion Amer­i­cans cur­rently uninsured.

To pay for Social­ized Med­i­cine, the Admin­is­tra­tion and the Demo­c­rat major­ity would “ask” those Amer­i­cans earn­ing $250,000 per year to “pay their fair share”, and the IRS would fine any­one who does not sign up for the pro­gram. Insur­ance com­pa­nies would also be sub­ject to new excise taxes intended to off­set the cost of cov­er­ing the uninsured.

The prob­lem with health care in Amer­ica is not that the health care indus­try in out of con­trol. The prob­lem is that gov­ern­ment is out of con­trol. The pri­mary causes of spi­ral­ing health care costs are gov­ern­ment sub­si­dies for Medicare, Med­ic­aid and Medicare Part D (pre­scrip­tion cov­er­age) and man­dated cov­er­age. Med­ical costs not reim­bursed to doc­tors and hos­pi­tals under gov­ern­ment sub­si­dized pro­grams are shifted to insur­ers who raise pre­mi­ums for all. Man­dated cov­er­age adds to pre­mi­ums despite indi­vid­ual pref­er­ence or pro­file. Extend­ing these prac­tices to uni­ver­sal cov­er­age will not “bend the cost curve” in the right direction.

But there is a more fun­da­men­tal prob­lem with this an other gov­ern­ment take overs. Social­ized health care, nation­al­iza­tion of the banks, insur­ance com­pa­nies, mort­gage com­pa­nies and Gen­eral Motors are all exam­ples of Fed­eral gov­ern­ment act­ing out­side the lim­its expressly enu­mer­ated in the Con­sti­tu­tion. The advent of Fed­eral pro­grams such as these are defeated pre­cisely by the 9th and 10th Amendments.

Nowhere in the 17 enu­mer­ated pow­ers does the Con­gress have author­ity to man­date uni­ver­sal health care for Amer­i­can citizens.

That is why cit­i­zens of New Hamp­shire can take pos­i­tive action to pre­serve and pro­tect their indi­vid­ual lib­erty from any Fed­eral man­dated health care pro­gram. As a cit­i­zen and res­i­dent of the State of New Hamp­shire, you can exer­cise your right to hold leg­is­la­tors account­able to their oath to pro­tect, pre­serve and defend the Constitution.

In the next weeks and months, TenthAmendmentNH.org will post peti­tions that call for New Hamp­shire leg­is­la­tors to enact State Sov­er­eignty res­o­lu­tions and related bills that you can sign online or send directly to key state officials.

The time is now to take action.

Yours in Liberty,

Scott Silva

Ten­thAmend­mentNH