第八十章
[原文]
小国寡民①。使②有什伯之器③而不用；使民重死④而不远徙⑤；虽有舟舆⑥，无所乘之；虽有甲兵⑦，无所陈之⑧。使人复结绳⑨而用之。至治之极。甘美食，美其服，安其居，乐其俗⑩，邻国相望，鸡犬之声相闻，民至老死不相往来。
[译文]
使国家变小，使人民稀少。即使有各种各样的器具，却并不使用；使人民重视死亡，而不向远方迁徙；虽然有船只车辆，却不必每次坐它；虽然有武器装备，却没有地方去布阵打仗；使人民再回复到远古结绳记事的自然状态之中。国家治理得好极了，使人民吃得香甜，穿得漂亮、住得安适，过得快乐。国与国之间互相望得见，鸡犬的叫声都可以听得见，但人民从生到死，也不互相往来。
现代联邦国家比较常见，以美国联邦为模型。 老子的理想国原型是古代中国周联邦，或者更早的尧舜禹汤。 可惜失乐园一般不可逆转。现代这样的桃花源乌托邦国家也就有冰岛和新西兰，北欧诸国。
Scaling is our friend, Scaling is our enemy.
AMENDMENT XVIII
Section 1
Section 2
Section 3
Quoted from above。
The Eighteenth Amendment, enacted in 1919, was one of four "Progressive" Amendments passed and ratified in quick succession. Although the American involvement with alcohol and with temperance movements had been present from the beginning of the country's history, Prohibition rode to easy victory in an alliance with other elements of the Progressive Movement in the early twentieth century. The Sixteenth Amendment, permitting the income tax, freed the government from dependence on the tax on liquor. The direct election of Senators, through the Seventeenth Amendment, made the Senate more amenable to electoral pressure for temperance. Although the Nineteenth Amendment, guaranteeing women the right to vote, was ratified in 1920, it reflected a general acceptance of woman suffrage (and temperance support) already present in the states, many of which allowed women to vote even before the Nineteenth Amendment came into effect.
Businesses supported the amendment to ensure a more reliable workforce, while prejudice against German-Americans and their breweries during World War I helped make Prohibition a patriotic cause. The amendment passed through both Congress and the states with amazing speed. There were no committee hearings in Congress, and debate took less than six hours, most of it centering on the time limit for ratification. The states ratified the amendment within a month.
...
The only problematic element of the amendment was Section 2, granting Congress and the states concurrent enforcement powers. Under its Section 2 powers, Congress enacted the Volstead Act in 1919 over President Woodrow Wilson's veto. The act defined "intoxicating liquors" as any drink with an alcohol content higher than .05 percent, a strict definition that prohibited even the intake of beer. It permitted exemptions for industrial, medicinal, and sacramental uses, and the act also contained a possession exemption for personal use within one's own private dwelling.
In the 1920 National Prohibition Cases, the Supreme Court ruled that, under the Supremacy Clause, states could not enact legislation that conflicted with congressional enactments regarding Prohibition. Because the states had been the engines of much Progressive legislation, the Progressive Movement assumed that the states would actively enforce the amendment, federal law, and their own state laws. The unexpected and widespread reluctance among the states to enforce Prohibition, along with the concomitant development of organized crime and the loss of tax revenues after the start of the Depression, led to a national scandal that undid Prohibition in little more than a decade. Prohibition was repealed in 1933 by the Twenty-first Amendment.
Quick in, Quick out. Unintended consequence strikes again, 欲速而不达。
