The "Headless Fourth Branch" is described as the regulatory commissions by Time Magazine in a 1964 article. The writer of the article could hardly foresee the future of government and the dangers of combining powers into single agencies. Dangers of being able to make laws, change laws, enforce laws, and break laws were a concern of the makers of the Constitution, and yet many agencies have the ability to administer all of the above mentioned powers.
Many refer to the media, the public, lobbyists, and any other bureaucracy having the ability to influence the three branches as "The Fourth Branch". Consideration in the creation of the bureaucracies having "Totalitarian" powers should be reconsidered. The original structure of the three branch system ensured that conflicts of interest and corruption be eliminated by the separation of power.
More than 46 years later, our country continues to dispute the powers of government and the administration of laws. After reading this article, concerns about the powers of government still exist.
The major issue is not the intent of agencies, but rather the total power provided to the agencies.
The premise that a three branch government will guarantee that power is equally divided and that a checks and balances system will prevent corruption is abandoned by the practice of bureaucracies that have the power of all three branches. How can corruption in a system be removed by a corrupt system? The three branch system is still intact but not fully functional. Much of the oversight that was once an active part of the three branch system has been removed by bureaucratic powers.
A simple flow chart of the checks and balances system demonstrates that the equal balance of power between three branches diminishes through the fourth branch of bureaucracy. Consideration of any action on the part of the totalitarian agency by an outside party is made only when a challenge exists against the policy execution. The original systems design required review prior to implementation of policy. The decisions of the bureaucracy go unchallenged today before the policy execution. Arguments are made in favor of the cost and time savings for such easily applied rules, regulations, and enforcement.
Protections against Totalitarianism are in place in the three branch system of government, but not in administrations that have all three branches of power to execute. Those protections are now purchased at a high price after an action is taken by the fourth branch.
The fourth unchecked branch was named by Time Magazine's article as the "Headless Branch."
That explains everything.
When you see the headless body who drives fear into Ichabod Crane's everywhere, let them know that W. Irving said: "The dominant spirit, however, that haunts this enchanted region, and seems to be commander-in-chief of all the powers of the air, is the apparition of a figure on horseback, without a head." and I add...and he is seemingly expensive to the public mind. We aren't ALL horse thieves Governor; but the ones that are, they are ALL headless riding on the backs of stolen property!
Tags: Government Unchecked Goes Headless
