I’m Phil Andrews, and I am running for the New Hampshire State House of Representatives in the new Hillsborough District 32. The updated district now includes Wilton, Temple, and New Ipswich.
I grew up in the woods of Maine and moved to NH shortly after finishing my college degree in upstate NY. I came here with my wife to enjoy the freedoms and way of life in the Live Free or Die state. After spending one year renting in Milford, NH, we have spent the last 12 years living in the beautiful town of New Ipswich.
During that time, my wife gave birth to our four daughters, who have been home-schooled and taught to enjoy and explore nature. Our girls have grown up working in our family businesses, and we have owned several local laundromats where they have learned to earn and manage money from a young age.
We want to thank Phil Andrews for this Op-Ed. Please direct yours to Editor@GraniteGrok.com.
Why Me?
Most politicians or aspiring politicians will talk about the laws they want to create, tell you about the projects they want to fund, how they wish to restrict the rights of some or give someone special treatment. I will tell you about the laws I would like to get rid of and the government agencies I want to restrain to protect its citizens.
So What Then?
I would like to guarantee the rights of parents to raise their children. That means restraining public education to actually educating. That means allowing parents the final say on medical decisions for their children and keeping parents informed of their children’s health discussions. At no point should a government agency know more about a child than their parents.
Currently, in NH, the creation of rules around legislation is delegated to the department responsible for enforcing that law. These rules are created by the agency on how a specific law will be enforced, then reviewed by a subset of the house and senate.
There are thousands and thousands of legal enforcement rules that are voted on by a mere five representatives and five senators. Out of our 400+ person legislature, these ten preside over how each agency chooses to enforce its laws. The appointment of this committee by the party leaders allows the deck to be stacked for the party in power.
I would like to see this process be brought under much closer supervision with over 100+ agencies with delegated authority this is a muddy area that has been abused time and again for political gain. These rules have the force of law and should require the full legislature to approve them before they go into effect.
We need to stop electing leaders who go to the state house with the ideals of stripping rights away from some target group. Whether those rights be social, fiscal, or natural, our elected officials should not be leading the charge to penalize but rather leading the charge to protect.
We have seen government agencies over the years grow larger, more powerful, and more resilient to challenges in court. This needs to be our goal, to ensure our people are protected from our government, whether local, state, or federal.
