I’m an old country boy, a patriot, and jack-of-all-trades who just wanted to be left alone to worship and live my life the way I saw fit.
So how did I become a citizen lobbyist?
Having realized early in my life the genius and the history-inspired roots of our Constitution and Bill of Rights, I have always been a member of the Founders' fan club. The necessity of learning history so we don’t repeat the mistakes of the past just made sense to me.
The wisdom of having a government with the power residing with the people and strict limits on the jurisdiction of the elected leaders to govern was clear.
When I realized how all governments strive for more power and how corruption follows the power and riches of a big government and observed how far ours had strayed from its original intent, I began paying more attention.
When I saw how much more rapidly it was “progressing,” I became alarmed. Maybe it was time to get off the sidelines and onto the field!
Convention of States
I became aware of the Article V Convention of States years ago via talk radio and reading articles online. The fact that our federal government was running year after year without a budget was alarming. The fact that we had so many career politicians was clearly not the way it was supposed to work.
Observing the power and decisions meant to be left to state and local control increasingly being taken by the federal government was scary to me.
Thomas Jefferson argued, ”What has destroyed liberty and the rights of man in every government which has ever existed under the sun? The generalising and concentrating all cares and powers into one body…”
Many of the pearls of wisdom from our framers were meant to emphasize the importance of the few and defined powers for the federal government and most remaining with the state and local control.
The rate at which I was seeing this going in the opposite direction the last handful of years with minimal concern by the average citizen, inspired me to start talking about this with everyone I could. Not just in passing but passionately, and with purpose.
My mission was to wake people up people and abolish woke-ism. This was often not a ‘popular’ conversation to start and have in mixed company.
Then I took notice of Article V again and went to ConventionOfStates.com and signed the petition. I soaked in more information on the grassroots movement and the people who are leading the way. I decided that if I was to be a responsible citizen participant in this republic, I had to find time to get involved and volunteer to help grow this movement.
Fellow citizens, the time has come to wake up and help to wake up others to this rapid erosion of our liberty and self-government.
Gary Lotterman is a State Content Writer and Volunteer Activist for Convention of States in western Michigan.
