Ebook: Saving Congress from Itself: Emancipating the States and Empowering Their People

Cover; Title page; Copyright; Dedication; Contents; Introduction; 1. The Constitution's Original Design ... and its Erosion; The Original Understanding; Federalism's Emasculation; 2. The Grants-in-aid Cornucopia; The History and Nature of Grants-in-aid; Arguments in Support of Federal Grants; 3. The Programs' Costs; Costs to the Federal Treasury; Costs to the States; The Cost to Congress; The Cost to the People; In Sum; 4. A Modest Proposal; The Proposal; The Proposal's Prospects; 5. Ancillary Measures; Term Limits; Campaign Finance Reform; A Federalism for Our Times; Acknowledgments.

Appendix AAppendix B; Index.

Saving Congress from Itself proposes a single reform: eliminate all federal grants-in-aid to state and local governments. This action would reduce federal spending by over 600 billion a year and have a profound effect on how we govern ourselves. The proliferation of federal grants-in-aid programs is of recent vintage: only about 100 such grants existed before Lyndon Johnson took office, and now they number more than 1,100. Eliminating grants to the states will result in enormous savings in federal and state administrative costs; free states to set their own priorities; and improve the design a.