The federal govt would still be able to keep the states in check. It would just delegate more responsibilities and liberties to the states. I'm not talking about disbanding the supreme court or anything.

yeah, it's hard to tell what people mean when they say "smaller government". In today's climate, that's come to mean the extreme "make it so small you can drown it in the tub" version of small.

I cannot express how fantastically hilarious I found that expression, I am absolutely going to be using that as shorthand for the position from here on out!

I often have the same worry when it comes to people asserting that state governments should be more able to function like smaller countries- I worry in particular that to some traditional enemies it would our individual parts "small enough to drown it in the tub."

"I don't want to abolish government. I simply want to reduce it to the size where I can drag it into the bathroom and drown it in the bathtub."

https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Grover_Norquist