Who's In Charge

Why is government a necessary thing?  If each person is responsible for themselves, is there any need for a government?

Let us begin with the premise that "I Am in Charge of Me".  Each person has the ability and the responsibility to take care of themselves.  But human beings are not born capable of feeding and caring for themselves, so we immediately expand the concept to "We Are in Charge of Us".  Parents have the duty of caring for their children; families take care of their injured or infirm members.  Extended families, churches, clubs, organizations, etc. care for the additional needs that individual people are unable to do on their own.

The first reason for the need for government is to settle disputes.  Generating deeds and titles related to property ownership is a major function of local government.  Once ownership is established then protection of things that are owned is a next logical step.  Police forces and fire departments protect property and also the lives of individual people.  These functions work very well for local governments where it is possible to survey, monitor and maintain control over a limited area of land with an established population of people.  The people who are being served are the logical source of funding (or the provision of volunteers) to serve these functions of government.  Thus the people being served by government functions are the ones contributing to the government functions.

This is the premise of government by the people for the people.  Rather than being ruled by a king or by a distant dictator the people rule themselves – the people solve their own problems.  So long as the people agree to what is equitable (what is fair, right and just) then there is no need for any higher level of government.

But what if the people of the next town see things differently?  What if they believe that the land bordering your town is their property?  What if they want more access to the water supply?  Here is where it is useful for towns and cities to establish a higher level of government that resolves such disputes.  State governments provide a level of recourse to solve disputes between different cities or towns.  State governments provide a shared jurisdiction of authority to resolve these kinds of disputes.  If the citizens of a state desire to use their state government to provide roads and public education then they are free to do so (or they could decided to leave such decisions to local governments or even to the individual people).

Ideally there is no further need for any higher levels of government.  In reality, three areas of additional need exist beyond the ability for a single state to resolve: National Defense of affiliated states, Fair Trade between those states, and Equal Justice regarding property and lives of the people within the states.  These three things are exactly the same three things that the United States Federal Constitution addresses.