Our institutions were designed explicitly to counter the forces so well documented by Nock. The principles of federalism, the separation of powers, the constraints on national power spelled out in our Bill of Rights, all these are means available to resist the parasitic expansion of State power. It is an unfortunate fact that a vanishingly small number in public life actually support the principles of our Declaration of Independence and Constitution. It is a fortunate fact, however, that no politician dares to publicly oppose those great documents. Those who wish to expand State power in brazen contradiction to our Constitution are compelled to make ever more absurd claims that the meaning of our Bill or Rights is the exact opposite of what it clearly states.
None dare denounce it directly.
And therein may lie our salvation. If those who oppose the direction in which our country is headed, as it follows the course that Nock foresaw, fight the battle on the merits of competing policies at the federal level, then all is lost. Nock s prediction will, in that case, be fulfilled. If, instead, the battle is fought on the basis that the consolidation of power at the federal level is a criminal enterprise under our Constitution, we may yet prevail. The forces of totalitarian socialism in this country are powerful and devious, but they cannot publicly oppose the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, or its Bill of Rights.