Along the way, our government has been somewhat hijacked.
The 10th amendment of the Bill of Rights says to the effect: ~"The Feds can only do what the Constitution says they can, states have rights to create their own rules, and all other liberties are given to citizens."
If you're imagining the power dynamic between the federal, state, and citizen level, the Constitution was written to give citizens a framework of higher government, while the Bill of Rights was written to explicitly restrict that government's power. (i.e. "government shall make no law" vs. "citizen has rights xyz")
Somewhere along the way people started seeing the federal government as the top of the pyramid rather than a caged beast. Somewhere the beast escaped the cage.
The 10th amendment of the Bill of Rights says to the effect: ~"The Feds can only do what the Constitution says they can, states have rights to create their own rules, and all other liberties are given to citizens."
If you're imagining the power dynamic between the federal, state, and citizen level, the Constitution was written to give citizens a framework of higher government, while the Bill of Rights was written to explicitly restrict that government's power. (i.e. "government shall make no law" vs. "citizen has rights xyz")
Somewhere along the way people started seeing the federal government as the top of the pyramid rather than a caged beast. Somewhere the beast escaped the cage.