Radical Federalism in Action: How States and Cities Can Secure Their Autonomy Now
A Practical Guide for Building a Decentralized, Resilient Future
How to Force Your State to Lead: A Tactical Guide
Call your governor. Call your attorney general. Call your state legislators.
This is the defining moment. The states must lead. The national Democratic Party, outside of a few rare exceptions, has failed to act with the necessary speed, boldness, and clarity. The federal government will not save us. Congress will not save us. The courts will not save us.
Only the states can lead the resistance. And only relentless public pressure will force those with lingering uncertainties to embrace courage, embrace the moment, and act.
Follow the lead of Maine Governor Janet Mills and Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker. They have drawn a line. Now, your state must do the same.
Step 1: Identify the Pressure Points
There are three key targets:
Your Governor : Can issue executive orders blocking federal enforcement and instructing state agencies to refuse compliance.
Your Attorney General : Can file lawsuits, refuse state cooperation, and issue legal opinions shielding against federal mandates.
Your State Legislators : Can pass laws enshrining state sovereignty and funding legal defenses against federal retaliation.
Find their direct office numbers, emails, and social media accounts by searching for your State Legislative Directory.
Step 2: Demand Real Action, Not Words
This is not a time for vague opposition. Force them to take a stand.
Governor: "Will you issue an executive order blocking state cooperation with [federal policy]?"
Attorney General: "Will you immediately file suit against [federal overreach]?"
Legislators: "Will you introduce and support a bill declaring [state sovereignty action]?"
If they hesitate, ask: "Do you have the courage to lead?"
If they refuse, make it public: "This official refuses to stand up for our state."
Step 3: Make Defiance the Only Option
Flood social media. Tag them. Demand action. Call out hesitation. Use hashtags like #StateSovereignty and #RadicalFederalism to coordinate visibility.
Show up in person. Attend town halls, legislative hearings, and public events. Demand answers. Film their responses. Post the clips online.
Force media coverage. Call reporters. Write letters to the editor. Frame the issue as urgent: "State leaders must act before it’s too late."
Step 4: Organize Locally and Build Power
Find allies. Labor unions, business associations, city councils, and grassroots organizations can amplify pressure.
Pass local resolutions. City and county governments calling for state action build momentum from the ground up.
Threaten primaries. Make it clear: "If you will not lead, we will replace you."
Step 5: Keep the Pressure Relentless
This is not a one-time demand. The moment will pass unless we seize it.
Call every week.
Show up at every event.
Make it clear: This is the fight that will define their political careers.
Your state must act. It must lead. It must resist.
█ The defining battle is now. Force them to choose a side.
Now, onto what states and cities must be called upon to do:
The plan for states to ensure their independence and lead in resistance
Yesterday kicked off what will be remembered as the showdown between the current “administration” and the first of the states with the courage to refuse to submit. Now in the realest sense yet, Radical Federalism is not just an idea—it is a strategy for survival.
National governance is unraveling. Institutions once assumed to be permanent have become tools of repression, not democracy. The federal government is no longer a stabilizing force; it is a mechanism of centralization, now intent on gnashing through American limbs.
There is only one viable path forward: decentralize power, build parallel systems, and create a resilient framework that cannot be captured by any one force.
Here’s how states and cities can secure their independence today—not in theory, but in practice.
I. The Core Strategy: Building Political, Economic, and Mutual Protection Networks
Radical Federalism requires action on three critical fronts:
Political & Legal Autonomy : States and cities must govern themselves free from external interference.
Economic Independence : No state that relies on federal funding is truly sovereign. Financial self-sufficiency is not optional.
Mutual Protection Alliances : A single state can be isolated and crushed. A network of Radical Federalist states can hold the line.
These steps will create a distributed system of resilient governance, ensuring that democracy, justice, and autonomy cannot be erased by the whims of Washington.
II. Political & Legal Autonomy: Fortifying Local Control
The belief that courts will protect states and cities has been shattered. The Supreme Court is no longer a neutral arbiter—it is a weapon for consolidating federal power. States cannot rely solely on legal challenges to resist overreach; they must build parallel systems of governance that function independently of Washington.
1. Codify Local Rights in State Constitutions
States must enshrine protections for reproductive rights, labor rights, voting rights, and anti-discrimination laws in their constitutions. These amendments must be deliberately difficult to override through future legislation or judicial reinterpretation.
Vermont and California have already begun embedding abortion rights in state law, insulating them from federal shifts. Other states must follow.
2. Expand Home Rule for Cities & Counties
Cities must secure and expand their rights to self-governance. State preemption laws that override city authority must be overturned or circumvented. If necessary, major cities must push for autonomous governance agreements, granting them control over taxation, policing, and public policy.
3. Strengthen State Supreme Courts & Local Judicial Systems
Judicial independence is critical. The federal courts cannot be trusted to safeguard democracy. States must expand the power of their own courts to interpret and enforce constitutional rights at the state level. Defensive litigation strategies should be coordinated among states and cities to challenge federal overreach.
III. Economic Independence: Freeing States & Cities from Washington’s Grip
Political autonomy is impossible without financial autonomy. A state that relies on federal funding is a state that may be dealt life-threatening wounds overnight. That vulnerability must end now.
1. Create State & Municipal Public Banks
Public banks keep local revenue circulating in-state, funding projects without reliance on federal dollars. California, North Dakota1, and New York have already explored this—it must become a national strategy.
A state that controls its own banking system cannot be financially blackmailed.
2. Shift Away from Federal Grant Dependence
Many states and cities are financially dependent on Washington—this must change. Independent revenue streams must be developed, including regional trade agreements, state-led infrastructure and energy projects, and municipal bond systems that provide long-term financial security.
3. Develop Parallel Infrastructure for Energy & Trade
States with strong energy sectors must resist federal environmental and energy mandates that prioritize federal interests over local needs. Texas already operates an independent power grid, proving that large-scale infrastructure can be locally managed (no, really2). Other states must follow suit.3
IV. The Firewall Against External Takeover
Winning sovereignty is only half the battle. A state that cannot defend itself from economic infiltration will be taken over piecemeal—one industry, one financial institution, one political faction at a time.
1. Blocking Billionaire Buyouts & Corporate Land Seizure
No state can remain sovereign if its land, industries, and infrastructure can be quietly bought out from under it.
States must ban corporate land accumulation, ensuring that hedge funds, multinational corporations, and billionaire investors cannot monopolize farmland, utilities, or housing markets.
Land trusts must be established to permanently remove key assets from speculation. Housing must be tied to real, local individuals, with sane limits on absentee ownership to prevent outside investors from buying up entire communities.
2. Preventing Economic Blackmail
The federal government does not need to invade a state to control it. It can simply cut funding, shut down banking access, or sabotage supply chains.
To resist:
Build state-controlled credit and lending institutions to bypass Wall Street’s financial chokeholds.
Powerful regional trade pacts must be established with aligned states to ensure economic insulation.
State-run resource and energy grids must be developed to prevent corporate leverage over utilities.
A free state that cannot feed, power, and finance itself is not a free state.
V. Mutual Protection: Building an Interstate & Local Alliance Against Federal Overreach
A single state cannot stand alone. But a network of Radical Federalist states can stand together.
A multi-state legal defense network must be established, ensuring that any lawsuit against federal overreach is met with a coordinated legal assault.
Regional trade agreements must be established to insulate states from economic coercion.
Cities and municipalities within hostile states must build internal resistance networks, ensuring that home rule is protected regardless of who sits in the governor’s mansion.
█ A single state is vulnerable. A network of Radical Federalist states is not. Regional interdependency ensures that no one state can be blackmailed into submission.
VI. The Path Forward: Build the New Order Now
Radical Federalism is the only rational response to a collapsing, centralized system.
No state can afford to wait. This is not a distant possibility. The fight has already begun. If we do not build our legal, financial, and security defenses now, we will lose. The only question left is whether we will stand against tyranny’s latest manifestation, or whether we will kneel.
█ The old system is dying. We must build a new one. The time for waiting is over. The time to act is now.
Further Reading :
A future post will provide a deep dive into the Bank of North Dakota, the only state run bank in the US and also arguably the most successful banking system in the US [see 1.5 below for the footnote to this foonote] : how it has insulated the state from recessions, has provided value meeting local needs with local knowledge and local committment, and how it provides a model for all other states.
1.5 BND remarkable for the following reasons :
Most stable bank in the U.S. : Never failed. Never needed a bailout. Always profitable.
Massive public benefit : Hundreds of millions returned to North Dakota’s budget.
Local-first finance : Partners with community banks, doesn’t compete. Strengthens, not extracts.
Recession-proofing : Keeps credit flowing in downturns. Shields the state from financial crises.
Best-in-class student loans : Lower rates, less debt, better outcomes.
Ag & small business powerhouse : Funds farmers and entrepreneurs when private banks won’t.
No Wall Street strings : State-controlled. No outside shareholders. No profit-driven risk.
Proof that public banking works : Efficient, resilient, and wildly successful on its own terms.
Texas’s state-run electric grid, ERCOT, takes heat in the press (and deservedly so, which we’ll address in a moment), but beneath the bad headlines lies one of the most successful energy systems in the country. Unlike federally entangled grids, Texas controls its own power—no forced cost-sharing, no bureaucratic slowdowns, no subsidizing failing utilities across state lines. The result? Lower electricity prices, faster innovation, and a competitive market that has made Texas the U.S. leader in wind power and a rising force in solar. The grid itself held during the 2021 winter storm—what failed was one specific market flaw brought about by a failure to appreciate the need to mitigate risk: the exposure of some consumers to uncapped variable-rate pricing. Some households got hit with catastrophic bills, not because the system lacked power, but because it lacked basic consumer protections against extreme price swings. That’s an easily fixed policy oversight, not an indictment of state control. Contrary to establishment-oriented expectations, a grid run for Texas, by Texas, remains the best model for cheap, abundant, and independent energy—one that works best when paired with smarter guardrails.
As a complete aside, local electric grids are an excellent example of the value of the fault tolerance, redundancy, and availability perspective taken in Distributed Governance - electric grid security seems a perenial concern, and although lessons have been learned from single points of failure taking down electricity for entire regions, we continue to fail to learn the lesson of the dangers of centralization and consolidation, of monopolies and monocultures.