Center for Tenth Amendment Studies


The federal government is the creation of the several states and exists as their common agent and arbiter. The powers delegated by the states to that government are, as James Madison said, “few and defined.” All other powers are reserved either to the states (where legitimately delegated to them), or to the people themselves.

Accordingly, the Tenth Amendment was passed. In it, the states clearly proclaimed that “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.” Utah legislators should use all available and appropriate methods to resist and deny the federal government’s usurpations. History has proven that the federal government will not fix the problems it created; the state of Utah must interpose itself between its citizens and a national government run amok.

Areas of focus for the Center for Tenth Amendment Studies:

  • Encourage bold resistance of all unconstitutional usurpations of authority by the national government through any and all available means.
  • Raise awareness of the Constitution’s “original intent” and the context surrounding the various conventions and debates as the document was being drafted and advocated.
  • Foster a recognition by Utahns that, as Thomas Jefferson said, “Whensoever the general government assumes undelegated powers, its acts are unauthoritative, void, and of no force.”
  • Highlight policies, projects, and other causes which are worthy of support in working towards limiting the power of the national government.
  • Call out legislation, executive orders, bureaucratic regulations and other activities at the federal level which violate the Constitution.
  • Fight for the reservation of power not only by the state of Utah, but more importantly the people themselves.
  • Propose methods of fighting back against the federal government in areas where it has illegitimately assumed authority.