Only the most deluded amongst us would deny that federal deficit spending is not a major problem.  As the federal deficit approaches an astronomical $40 trillion, one would be justified in labeling it an existential threat to the States.  Lowering the federal debt is one of the reasons Elon Musk got himself tangled up in DC politics, and yet even his efforts are being negated by the federal Congress’s old spending habits, as illustrated by the Big Beautiful Bill.

In light of FedGov’s inability to cut spending and reduce the debt in any meaningful way, the States themselves, as the creators of the federal government, must now act to limit the destructive behavior of the bureaucratic behemoth that they brought into existence in Philadelphia in 1787.

The necessary plan of action was drawn up years ago.  During Obama’s first term, the Red States were balking at his regime’s much-increased federal spending and proposed federal tax escrow accounts as a way to make sure only constitutional actions were funded.  From 2010:

‘One idea, which will take a great deal of courage on the part of the People and their state governments, is to establish what’s being called a “Federal Tax Escrow Account” or a “State Authority and Federal Tax Funds Act.”

‘Already introduced in Georgia (HB877), Oklahoma (HB2810), and Washington (HB2712), such laws would require that all federal taxes come first to the state’s Department of Revenue. A panel of legislators would assay the Constitutional appropriateness of the Federal Budget, and then forward to the federal government a percentage of the federal tax dollars that are delineated as legal and Constitutionally justified. The remainder of those dollars would be assigned to budgetary items that are currently funded through federal allocations and grants or returned to the people’ (Michael Boldin, ‘ResistDC: The Federal Tax Funds Act,’ tenthamendmentcenter.com).

Now that a Republican is back in the White House, Blue States like California are proposing the same method to restrict the flow of tax revenue to the federal government.

Former HUD secretary Catherine Austin Fitts adds this in her tremendously detailed and helpful report, ‘What the States Can Do:  Building the Legal and Financial Infrastructure for Financial Freedom:’

‘Common Law Right of Offset

‘As a means of effecting change at the federal level, activist state AGs can create escrows into which state residents may opt to deposit their federal taxes so that the state attorney general can assert common law right of offset on behalf of the opting residents for U.S. depository bank or federal government debts’ (solari.com).

Lew Rockwell also joined this discussion in recent days:

‘What can we do if Congress passes a bad law? For example, Congress mandates that billions of dollars be spent on aid programs to the Ukraine, the Middle East, and other troubled areas. Of course, we can protest or refuse to pay part of our taxes. But if you try that, the IRS will come after you. In this week’s column, I’m going to talk about a remedy for such bad laws. States have the power to nullify unconstitutional laws, so they do not apply within that state. If the Alabama legislature, for example, nullified foreign aid, the people of Alabama couldn’t be taxed for this purpose’ (‘Why We Need Nullification,’ lewrockwell.com).

Vis-à-vis the federal debt, the way forward for the States isn’t an inexplicable, unsolvable mystery.  The plan of action is readily available to them.  The only thing lacking is the resolve to implement it and begin the actual withholding of federal revenues until they have ironclad assurances and ways of verification that the federal budget is no longer running a deficit and that the debt is being substantially reduced.

Those who are rather attached to the Hamiltonian plan of Forever Federal Deficits will say that this is a dangerous, radical innovation, but of course it is not, as anyone with an ounce of historical knowledge could point out.  In the original federal constitution adopted by the States after they seceded from the British Empire, the Articles of Confederation, the federal government was funded by a similar method called requisitioning, by which it asked each State to donate funds for its operating budget.  The States were free to give or not give the funds.

So it once was.  So it ought to be again.

Federal officials will not control their spending; the States must do it for them.