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Can we hope for this to happen south of Hadrian’s Wall too? “Scottish Conservative Party set to disband” screams the title of an article…
Well why not? Scotland already has two Mega-Statiist major parties (SNP and Labour) so what need is there for a third? Indeed perhaps a new party north of the border might actually be, you know… conservative! If that comes to pass, perhaps someone might decide England needs a conservative party too because gawd knows it does not have one at the moment.
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it does not have one at the moment.
Strange, isn’t it? I think it is rather unusual for a modern democracy to lack a conservative party. But then, Britain these days is “special” in many ways. I don’t see how the lunacy can go on forever, but neither do I see how it will come to an end.
Chuck,
This must be sarcasm. This is like thinking it’s unusual that the sun is not visible at night.
Modern democracy is allergic to conservatism. Blaming big government on politicians is like blaming a dolphin for swimming or frak for posting unnecessary comments.
Western nations have large governments not because of the absence of conservative politicians & political parties, but because of the presence of politicians & political parties.
We should not be surprised when democracy (rice) and big government (white) are relegated to the ash heap of history in a single toss because, as the Statue of Liberty reminds us, freedom wears a crown (Hat Tip: John Farthing).
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The Crown.
Anyone who wants a smaller state in England should support Scottish independence. Without a Scottish Conservative Party, perhaps the Tory party elsewhere will start to give up on its self-destructive unionism. (Though the precedent of Northern Ireland is not encouraging.)
You could say that one cannot be both conservative and unionist, so the Tories have to make their minds up which they are.
Not sure about that, Chuck: can you name any truly conservative party anywhere these days?
Guy Herbert,
Since majorities of the English and the Scottish are in favor of an intact United Kingdom, the Tories’ unionism isn’t self-destructive. Cutting welfare payments just isn’t more popular than retaining an intact United Kingdom.
This is nonsense. Secession is generally a left-wing movement. Popular movements to secede from monarchies are almost always left-wing. Left-wing policies that lead to big government thrive on division, disorder, and discord through popular democratic movements.
Greater liberty is achieved through aligning incentives more properly; accountable, predictable, and stable governance results from an incentive to rule for long-term profit.
I may suffer from selection bias. Nevertheless, quick research suggests strongly that empirical evidence supports my view. Left-wing secessionist movements (note, virtually all seceded from monarchies):
Spain:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Republican_Left_of_Catalonia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonese_People%27s_Union
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aralar_Party
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basque_Nationalist_Party
United Kingdom:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_republicanism
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plaid_Cymru
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Revolution (yes, left-wing)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_independence_movement
Canada:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bloc_Québécois
Africa:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kwame_Nkrumah#Politics
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Senghor#Legacy
Basically most the African nations that threw off the oppressive chains of stable and predictable government and its main consequences, like industrialization and relative peace, and gloriously pursued democracy/tribalism/nationalism/socialism instead.
Most of the few secessionist movements that are/were right-wing are/were in nations that are/were not constitutional monarchies, but democratic/communist states:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constitutional_monarchy#List_of_current_reigning_monarchies
USA:
Texas
Italy:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lega_Nord
Ukraine:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/People%27s_Movement_of_Ukraine
Kosovo:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democratic_League_of_Kosovo
Latvia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Latvian_National_Independence_Movement
Probably true, since Scotland’s public spending is subsidized by England, as I understand it. But one way to grow government and shrink liberty throughout the world is to create more sovereign nations and governments.
I find this blog and the comments amusing. Here people are saying that all Britain’s major parties are leftwing, and there is no real conservative party. But on leftwing blogs you can find people saying the exact opposite, that all our major parties are rightwing and there is no real leftwing party. People see what they want to see.
The Scottish Conservative party may not be very conservative by some people’s standards, but it’s clearly too conservative for Scotland.
I am certainly not saying that. Indeed the terms ‘left wing’ and ‘right wing’ are not very meaningful. What I am saying is that all the major parties in the UK (i.e. parties with significant upper tier elected representation) are largely interchangeable *statists* who only differ at the margins and in the language they use to appeal to their supporters.
Under Blair and Brown, the state increased debt levels… under Cameron, the state increased debt levels. Under Labour bank losses were put onto the taxpayer. Under Tories, bank losses were put onto the taxpayer.
Left and right are just different teams playing the same game by the same rules without any interest in actually changing the nature of the game in any significant way.
The only choices on offer is the rate at which the state consumes the economy, because no major established party actually wants to fundamentally roll back the scope of the state. The choice is at best collapse sooner or collapse later.
Not to disagree with Perry’s point, but on a scale of statism, I tend to think of more statist as being on the left, and of the more freedom-friendly as being on the right – if for no other reason than pure semantics. Also, I tend to think of conservatism as more freedom-friendly in an economic sense – because economics is what counts when all is said and done, with the so called ‘social issues’ eventually falling in place, naturally following the economics.
Correction:
Murdo Fraser’s proposal for the Scottish Conservtive (and Unionist) party to “disband” is really just a symptom of a wider problem – that progressive parties have been very successful in electoral terms in Scotland, owing to the economy being dominated by the state and the media being dominated by progressives.
Sadly, as long as money can be obtained from England or from the banks the farce will continue. Only when the money completely runs out will things start to change.
England doesn’t need a Conservative Party, or a Labour or a Liberal Party either, democracy does not need political parties and is better off without them.
What we need are individuals who represent us in parliament, the party political system prevents this from happening via its “football team” mentality.
I have nothing against political associations, those of like mind should band together, but that is exactly what a modern political party is NOT, it is a group of shameless carpetbaggers pinning their banner to the nearest mast in an effort to gain a little personal power for their corrupted ego.
We need to return British politics to its origins, elect responsible individuals, and kick out the scam artists who pretend to support their party manifestos.
I have a great deal against political associations. Such associations are generally state sanctioned street gangs of muggers. The whole reason I support a limited state with its powers heavily constrained constitutionally and by threats of violent resistance (i.e. an armed population) is because I only find ‘political associations’ tolerable if there is not that much they can actually do.
You could, but you’d be wrong. The Union has existed for over 300 years. The natural conservative position is to retain it.
I like that. On the other hand, it does suggest that creating fewer, larger, governments is a path to liberty, and I’m pretty sure that’s not the case.
So, while I can see that creating physically smaller governments may lead to philosophically smaller ones, and although I’m no longer a Conservative, my reasons for supporting the Union are absolutely conservative. The post-1707 UK has amounted to a great deal more than the sum of its parts, and this island is naturally one country (contra the separists’ mantra, it’s England and Scotland that are the artificial creations; Britain existed for millennia before them). I simply consider it rash to break up a Union older than the USA because of what may well turn out to be a short-term problem (less than 60 years ago, Scotland was one of the UK’s most economically powerful regions, and had a Tory majority). The EU – a huge supporter of “independence” movements across its territory – is chipping away, hacking bits off Britain piece by piece.
frak says,
But one way to grow government and shrink liberty throughout the world is to create more sovereign nations and governments.
I disagree. I dislike the nation-state model and agree that it is intrinsically anti-individualist. But having more sovereign governments, a greater number of independent – preferably non-national – states, seems to me highly desirable. It is the cartelisation and agglomeration of states that most threatens the individual by promoting common state interests over competition.
It might be objected that deserting the Scots to their fate under socialism would be a bad thing for the English to do. But it seems unlikely Hadrian’s wall would be rebuilt to keep people in, and we should welcome Scottish immigrants as we always have. And the objection neglects the dynamic. Perhaps Scots socialism would not in fact survive the loss of English subsidy.
To say ‘majorities of the English and the Scottish are in favor of an intact United Kingdom’ is (a) not true – opinion is split virtually equally in England with 20% don’t know – and (b) also to neglect the dynamic. Like many questions this depends on how it is asked, and when it is asked. Most English people have never been asked to think about Scots independence and how it would affect them. A significant majority of Scottish people oppose independence (maybe for the same reasons I would in their position, maybe not), but it seems Alec Salmond, who is no fool, believes that can be changed. The UK parties are pushing for a referendum now; the SNP want it held at a time to be fixed a few years hence.
A good rule of thumb is to identify your enemies and then start with the assumption that anything they are for, you should be against and vice versa.
In Scotland, the worst rogue by far is the first minister, Alex Salmond. He and his party are masters of the big lie. Classics are: that the debt is entirely England’s, that an “independent” Scotland under the SNP will be as prosperous as Switzerland, and that Scotland can be a world leader in renewable energy with 130,000 “green jobs”.
The low grade mob of the Scottish Labour party are by comparison a lesser evil.
Accordingly, my starting position is to oppose, attack and thwart the SNP at ever opportunity.
If I was Scottish, Aetius, I might well agree. As I am not I take the view “never interrupt the enemy whilst he is making a mistake”.
I suspect independence for England, oh, I mean Scotland, will result in even more (oil subsidised) left-statism for Scotland and the removal of oil revenues from Westminster will make right-statism even less tenable south of the wall.
As I live in England, I wish people in Scotland well but am more than happy to bid them “adieu” on the assumption Scotland’s best and brightest who are unwilling to drink Salmond’s poison cocktail will soon move to London anyway.
Democracy doesn’t need political parties, but people do. The beau ideal of Periclenean statesmen as elected representatives founders pretty much within a couple of decades, or less. The United States had such a time — once — when there was only one political party (ergo none), but that was in the early nineteenth century, and it only last a few years.
…and similar majorities in England and Scotland support the reinstatement of capital punishment in the UK. Good luck with that. The interesting thing, to this Septic, is that a larger proportion of English support disunion than Scots do. Personally, I’d love to see Scotland split off and become part of Europe (euro as currency and all), just to see how long it would last. But then I have no skin in the game, so it’s just academic.
Sam Duncan,
Fewer and stronger governments is a path to more liberty. A weak government is controlled by special interests. In modern Western democracies, politicians bribe new special interests or offer special interests bigger bribes to win. A strong government can ‘just say no’.
This. Amen. You’d probably like how Moldbug thinks:
http://unqualified-reservations.blogspot.com/2009/01/gentle-introduction-to-unqualified.html
Well, cartelisation and agglomeration presumably encompass an awful lot. But the cause of individual liberty being the most minor consideration in public policy-making is that politicians and bureaucrats and professors do the public policy-making.
Even if doubling the quantity of democratic nations were to have a favorable effect, the effect would be negligible in the long-term. These are still democracies. The scale may affect the pace of big government growth (arguably in either direction) but the rules of the game are unchanged.
This is like increasing the headwinds a 747 is facing in traveling west and expecting the plane to simply turn around as a result. It’s still a democracy. We need a new pilot. We need a new system of government. Then we can get an eastward destination like, you know, smaller government.
I have followed articles referenced here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scottish_independence#Public_opinion and it appears that that public opinion is far more difficult to gauge than I thought and I based my view on a couple of articles that seemed rather conclusive. So, maybe you’re right. I don’t know.
Guy Herbert,
My previous post was directed to you. Also, when I said:
I forgot to note that virtually every secession from the United Kingdom has been a left-wing phenomenon, accelerating government growth faster than prior to secession. There’s no reason to expect Scotland to turn out differently.
Kim du Toit,
Yup. I’ve found a good rule of thumb for democracies is that majority views that would put government workers out of jobs aren’t usually made into laws.
The professors that show that life in prison deters murder more effectively than capital punishment are given awards, press, and funding, since then the politicians are given cover to do what they wanted to do all along – empower the special interest that supports them. AGW, Keynesian economics, etc.
My suggestions for a new name:
The Loch Ness Monster Raving Loony Party (aka The Nessies) because there are no confirmed sightings.
The Smiths as in Adam-Smith-Was-Not-An-Englishman-Party.
Someone suggested the Yetis. But that’s ridiculous. Yetis are real.
We could take a Firefly meme and call them Reavers. But that’s surely a generic term for the public sector.
Yes Perry it is not just a matter of the “right wing” blogs saying one thing and the “left wing” blogs saying something else.
The facts are not subjective, the truth has no agenda – it is something to which all agendas (if sane) must bow.
And the facts are easy to check.
Government spending, taxes and regulations in the United Kingdom have been increasing (vastly increasing) for years, under goverments of both major political parties.
So to talk of the political parties being “right wing” IF this means “free market”, is simply not true.
It is a matter of objective fact (objective truth) that policy has been statist (anti free market, anti “capitialst” if people want to use this term).
So nothing to do with “the right wing blogs say X, but the left wing blogs say Y”.
As for Murdo F. in Scotland.
He has said (repeatedly) that he (and the party he wishes to create) is “Progressive” and that he really admires David Cameron.
So nothing to be intereste din here.
Other than, as Guy Herbert points out, the possiblity that this development might push forward the chances of English independence from Scotland.
I put it that way round as the Scots politicians (including Murdo) do not really want Scottish independence – they wish Scotland to continue to be ruled by the European Union.
frac
The idea that the Welare State (in Britain or the United States or….) was created in response to democratic pressure from below is historically false.
In reality an educated elite created these schemes – which the voters (at the time they were created) had not even thought of, or were opposed to.
For example Lloyd George in Britain went around saying how his schemes were in no way a threat to the working class mutual aid Friendly Societies (of course they were a mortal threat to them – but that is not what he said, he had to lie in order to get the public to go along with stuff the voters had NOT asked for).
Even “FDR” (in the teeth of the Great Depression in 1932) actually promised to REDUCE government spending (and denounced Herbert Hoover as a wild spender who was taking the United States on the road to socialism).
In 1964 LBJ did not campaign for a Welfare State – on the contrary he denied charges that he wanted to build one, claiming that he wanted to reach out in a “hand up – not a hand out” and he won the election not by promising people goodies, but by the media saying that Barry Goldwater was a neoNazi (they even claimed that he had gone to Germany to meet real neoNazis), who was insane (300 head docs, none of whom had ever met Goldwater, were produced to say he was mentally ill) and wanted to “blow up the world” in a nuclear holocaust.
Naught to do with “bribing the people with their own money” or other such antidemocracy theories.
Even Comrade Barack did not win by promising wild spending – on the contrary he claimed (repeatedly) that he would go through the budget “line by line” GETTING RID OF the wild spending of Bush.
Of course he was lying – but the fact remains that Comrade Barack did not win in 2008 by promising people lots of spending.
Over time intense propaganda by the education system and by the media has an effect, and people just get used to what they are given. Indeed people (rationally enough) plan their lives round these schemes – so it it actually cruel to take away (for example) a government “pension” from an 80 year old who had been told (all their lives) that it would be there for them.
But that does not alter the FACT that the people did NOT ask for these programs (these Welfare State schemes) in the first place. They were designed by an “educated” elite and then pushed on the people.
So why should a stronger monarchy mean less statism?
Is the Queen secretly pro freedom?
All the evidence I have seen suggests that the lady is totally committed to the “Progressive” (and P.C.) ideology of the establishment elite.
Certainly in the past strong monarchies (such as France under Louis XIV) were not known as small government, pro freedom places.
The point of constitutional politics is NOT “are the rulers elected or not”, but what POWER do the rulers have?
Finding ways of limiting the POWERS of rulers (whether elected or not elected) is the key problem.
STRUCTUAL limits that can not be “interpretated” out of existance by government appointed “Supreme Courts” and other such.
Good luck with that one, Paul. We’ve tried in the US, and although it held together for a while eventually the lust for power overcame all obstacles. Today we honor the Constitution more in the breach than in the observance.
Or, as Frank Zappa put it, “The US Constitution may not be perfect but it’s better than what we have now.”
Paul Marks,
I didn’t claim that big government growth occurs as a response to democratic pressure. I claimed that big government growth happens in democracies. If you consult the facts, you’ll notice this is true.
Yes. Since WWII the government’s policies have been promulgated by professors, presented by the media, defended by the politicians, and executed by the bureaucrats. In democracies politicians are properly understood as a key public relations personnel of the Establishments that rule the democratic nations.
You’re supporting my point. Look at Reagan’s rhetoric and look at how the debt, spending, and tax rates increased during his two terms.
In democracies, politicians want to be important. One way to create power is by making people dependent on you. So, politicians want power. They pretend to want to make DC ‘as inconsequential as possible’ and then they are elected and do the opposite.
Now, the politicians (like Reagan probably) who A) find themselves in a powerful position and B) genuinely desire to reverse the direction of the nation are always, without exception, unable to do so. This is because the politicians elected to office have considerably less power than is generally believed. A CEO can vaporize whole business units, but a President cannot even decrease the salaries of EPA employees or prevent the EPA from meddling in particular businesses, even if he wanted to do so. The President is basically a figurehead.
Politicians are not interested in the long-term and, in fact, the vast majority of the policies politicians implement are very harmful in the long run. Furthermore, in democracies governments literally never are able to summon the will to reverse the decline of the nation’s finances. In democracies atrophy is the norm because the interests causing the decline are the interests represented by the politicians.
Wrong. Notice how burned Paul Ryan was by discussing reforming Medicare. As passionate as the Tea Partiers appear to be, those who depend on government checks for their livelihoods will always be far more passionate.
The GOP can’t even defund NPR. Federal funding of NPR is unconstitutional, harms the GOP by subsidizing a liberal media group, and is against the principles of limited government and capitalism.
Whenever the government implements a program, the program is virtually impossible to defund it. FDR’s genius was creating programs that would cause Americans to be dependent on the Democratic Party indefinitely. He created the base of his party.
In order to create interest groups and blocs of voters.
Like most successful people, successful politicians consider their long-term interests in making decisions. Thus politicians create these programs to create interest groups and voter blocs that will vote for their parties indefinitely, except principled and, thus, powerless and pathetic losers like Joe McCarthy, Barry Goldwater, and Robert Welch.
The politicians create these programs not to make people happy today (look at how unhappy the majority of Americans were and are over Obamacare) but to create long-term dependency on those programs in order to increase the importance of DC. In any case, though, many of these programs are wealth transfers to the Democratic base from everyone else, so who is the fool?
Kings are far more likely to make decisions based on considerations of the long term financial viability of the policies. This is because the Kings will still be Kings of their nations so long as they are alive. If they are dead, then their sons will be Kings, so they still care because fathers generally want their sons to be successful – it is their legacies at stake.
Kings are generally intelligent enough to recognize that property rights, low taxes, and small government generally foster economic growth, which makes them wealthier and far more powerful on the world stage.
Unlike elected politicians in democracies, Kings are capable and naturally interested in unilaterally implementing policies to transform society in order to cut short atrophy. Democracies generally decline with a few minor and temporary lurches against the tide, such as Harding’s Return to Normalcy, Reagan’s Revolution, the Tea Party, etc.
Imagine how Apple would make decisions if Apple customers decided who would run the company – that’s democracy.
There’s a chance of Scotland seceding from the United Kingdom. Canada republicans are constantly pushing to not be under the Crown. You can be sure that if she did not tow the liberal Establishment party line as produced by universities via democratic governance that the monarchy would be swiftly discarded with.
And democracy produced Hitler. Look, we can both point to extreme examples to support our views. But the bottom line is that the legacies of democracy will be debt, fiat currencies, frequent wars, and the perpetual transfer of wealth from the productive to the unproductive.
First off, the real rulers, in a way, are Harvard and Yale Law professors because they tell all potential future Supreme Court majorities what priorities they should consider in ruling on those cases. The heretics are weeded out and end up as outcasts from the legal Establishment. As I said earlier, politicians do public relations, but professors create the policies.
A piece of paper is an inanimate object. Whenever I hear conservatives whine about a return to the inanimate object Consitution, I’m reminded of liberals whining about banning the inanimate guns to decrease the frequency of murders. You’re not living in reality. Humans must rule. Humans will rule.
There must always be a person or collection of persons who will have absolute power. The key is to align INTERESTS of the ruler(s) with the INTERESTS of the productive, law-abiding, and hard-working segments of the ruled.
Democracy aligns the interests of the unproductive, the law-breaking, and the non-hard-working segments of society with the interests of the rulers.
If you want a more eloquent and persuasive case than I’m capable of:
http://unqualified-reservations.blogspot.com/2008/01/how-i-stopped-believing-in-democracy.html
http://unqualified-reservations.blogspot.com/2007/07/democracy-as-adaptive-fiction.html
I suggest whiskey when reading Unqualified Reservations.
The President is basically a figurehead.
Actually, frak, that’s not entirely true. The President has quite a lot of power to issue Executive Orders, and while I have some issue with their constitutionality the courts apparently feel otherwise. And if anything, his power has been expanding lately, thanks to such laws as the USA Patriot Act and its ilk. So a President Ron Paul really could make a difference, although not as much as most of us would like and probably not of long duration.
Otherwise, I agree with much of your post.
Indeed. In fact, to me it sounds very much like an argument for anarcho-capitalism. You may still call it ‘monarchy’ though, if it makes you feel better:-)
Indirectly they do actually.
Scottish Conservatism is as oxymoronic as Muslim Feminism or Swiss Imperialism….
Scottish Conservatism is as oxymoronic as Muslim Feminism or Swiss Imperialism….
Frac the Welfare States – even Bismark’s in Germany were NOT created in response to demands from below.
As you admit yourself they were created by politicians (Bismark, Lloyd George, and so on) and elite academics – in Germany they called them “the Socialists of the Chair” – neither group cared what the people wanted.
Over time people get used to things they have – but that is true under any political system (including monarchy). Also Ryan’s plans have never been put to the people – what they have been told (by the media and so on) is that he aims to end social security and Medicare overnight and push old ladies off cliffs.
If I thought that then I would oppose the Ryan plan.
“We have tried structural limits in the United States” with respect you have NOT.
There are no STRUCTURAL limits in the Constitution (such as, with Texas, saying that the legislature can only sit for a certain number of days a year – but one could think of many other and better structual limits) what there is a series of powers.
Article One Section Eight – saying what Congress can do.,
And Article One Section Nine – saying what Congress can not do.
Well what the freak does that mean?
Does it mean that Congress can only do what is in Section Eight or can do anything not included in Section Nine?
And what are the words “general welfare” doing in Section Eight?
Does this mean the Congress can spend money on anything it thinks is for the “general welfare”.
“No Paul, it means that the following specific powers are for PURPOSE of the general welfare”.
I know that – but the Constutiition does not include those specific words does it?
“You are claiming to be wiser than the Founders”.
NO I am claiming to have had the benefit of two centuries of experience they did not live to see.
The Constitution has bits of bad drafting – words that should no tbe there such as “general welfare” (as bad as “public interest” or “reasons of state”).
Words that are badly chosen – such as “regulate interstate commerce” rather than “ensure free trade between the States” (I know it means the same thing – but it does not SOUND as if it means the same thing).
And so on.
As for STRUCTUAL features (as opposed to just lists) there are hardly any at all.
For example, the Founders quite rigtly (Frac please note) feared the power of a Monarchy – the ability of a King to de facto legislate by “orders in council”.
Yet they created a “President” who (of course) developed exactly those powers.
This is not recent – not just Obama ruling (in defiance of the expressed will of Congress) with such things as EPA and NLRB edicts.
MOST “law” is in fact Executive degrees (or executive branch regulations – under vague “enabling acts” of Congress) and has been for about a century.
The President was not supposed to represent “the people” he was supposed to be a “presiding officer” (not a King), but as soon as States were given votes in line with their populations (not equal votes for each State) the President was bound to start claiming that he “represented the people”.
That might not have been fatal if the Constitution had been clear and contained no weak or loose language – but THAT IS JUST NOT TRUE.
The Constitution (in a few key places) DOES include weak and loose langauge – langauge that can be (and has been) exploited.
It is pointless to lie about it – or claim that no Constitution could have stood (regarless of how it was written).
“In any political system there must be a person, or group of persons, with total unlimited power”.
That is from Thomas Hobbes and it is bullshit.
If a person (or group of persons) has absolute, unlimited power then you will have tyranny (despotism) – not matter whose “interests” they claim to rule in.
Every despot claims to rule in the interests of the people – and most despots actually believe they do (they would certainly pass a lie detector test).
To say (which the Hobbes line says) that to limit power is impossible – so let us give up trying, is a death sentence for civil society.
It means that freedom has no chance what-so-ever, none.
Actually the logical place for a libertarian to go (if he or she really does not believe that government power can be limited – by either written or unwritten constitutions) is not “monarchy” it is “anarchy”.
For better no government – than total (totalitarian) government.
“Come down from the clouds Paul – be specific”.
O.K. I will.
Does a Governor of Texas have the same power over the government of the State of Texas that the President of the United States has over the government of the United States?
If you look into the matter you will find that they do NOT.
And the reason is that the Constitution of the State of Texas (1876 and amendments) is more carefully worded (concerning what the executive can and can not do) than the Constitution of the United States (1787 and amendments) is.
Actually so are many of the State Constitutions – in many respects (although not all).
That is because in the past (at least up to the 20th century) people did not say “limiting the power of government is impossible – let us fall on our knees and suck the God-King’s …….”
The principle, at least some of them, acted on was the Constitution of the United States of America is vague and loose in certain key areas (we know what the intentions of the Founders were – but the wording allows misinterpretation, accidental or deliberate) – let us avoid these errors as we write our State Constitutions.
And they were right to act on this principle.