Why can't we do this to Brussels?

This week Governor Freudenthal of Wyoming signed a House Joint Resolution claiming 'sovereignty on behalf of the State of Wyoming and for its citizens under the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States over all powers not otherwise enumerated and granted to the federal government or reserved to the people by the Constitution of the United States.'

That's the 'subsidiarity' that our outstanding diplomats failed to enshrine in the EU Constitution - that is if they ever really tried. The basic principle of the EU is government of the bureaucrats, by the bureaucrats and for the bureaucrats, and I can't see our Mandarins objecting to that.

The act continues (my italics): 'That this resolution serve as notice and demand to the federal government, as our agent, to cease and desist, effective immediately, from enacting mandates that are beyond the scope of these constitutionally delegated powers. The state of Wyoming will not enforce such mandates.'

Freudenthal underlined his signature with the following words: 'For decades we have shared increased frustration dealing with the federal government and its agencies. What started out as a leak in the erosion of state prerogative and independence has today turned into a flood [of] endless regulation and unfunded mandates – the federal government has become far too powerful and intrusive.'

Wyoming joins ten other states that have passed similar resolutions since last year. Alaska, Idaho, North Dakota, South Dakota, Oklahoma, Louisiana, and Tennessee passed theirs in 2009, and Utah, Alabama, and South Carolina passed resolutions this year.

Works for me: let those who devise rules and regulations without democratic legitimacy enforce them. Oh, they don't have the means? Then why the hell should we obey them?

Hat-tip to Samizdata.net