How Hyper‑Planning Defines Liberty in New Hampshire
I have come to realize that New Hampshire, far from being a bastion of freedom, is quietly becoming a textbook case of Charles Merriam’s vision of administrative progressivism. The technocratic restructuring of government that Merriam called for in the early twentieth century—replacing representative institutions with expert-driven administrative bodies—is no longer theoretical. In New Hampshire, it is happening right before our eyes.
Our elected officials see themselves as Committees of the Competent “legislating” us into freedom, bragging that “they are making life better” for the people of New Hampshire. That sure sounds like Progressive drivel to me, not something you would expect from the liberty-minded. It is a tragedy to watch the so-called “right” adopt the language of Democrats, but here we are. Do-gooders are in every camp. Free Staters, Republicans, Libertarians, Progressives, and Democrats share a common mental illness. That government is here to fix people’s lives.
I recently spoke on ”The Great Reset” in New Hampshire, and what I uncovered should alarm anyone who believes in limited government, local sovereignty, and the Declaration of Independence, which is America’s common creed and statement of values. What is true is that not a corner of the state is untouched by the influence of hyper‑planning. From regional councils to sustainability frameworks, New Hampshire has embraced a managerial model that is anything but constitutional.
The globalist web is woven deeply into our towns. ICLEI – Local Governments for Sustainability – is alive and well here. You will not hear it on the campaign trail, but its sustainability metrics, climate agendas, and equity frameworks are embedded in the documents produced by New Hampshire’s nine regional planning commissions and Local Development Districts, most of which are administered by the Northern Border Regional Commission (NBRC)
These Local Development Districts are not benign service providers, as many republicans believe. I was shouted down by one representative, being told that the Local Development Districts “have no power,” they are just advisors. Power is actual or implied, and their advisory role serves as a philosophical means of change. They serve as intermediaries for funneling federal dollars into local projects under the guise of economic development, bypassing any meaningful legislative debate or popular consent. Staffed by unelected “experts” and guided by a collectivist, central‑planning ideology, they mirror Merriam’s vision to a tee. They were created to replace the county government. One stage in the transformation of America from a nation-state government to a city state government. So you will have the State of Boston or the State of Chicago. This transformation is key to Agenda 2030 and the Great Reset model: a world managed by technocratic, transnational cities, where states and even nations become obsolete.
New Hampshire is highly reliant on federal grants. In that way, no matter the initial before your name, belief in this dependency makes you a Socialist. Dressing a bill up with stars and stripes means nothing. If it walks like a duck, talks like a duck, it is a duck. Without Federal Grants, NH would be broken. “Without Federal Grants, NH would be broke. Cities like Nashua and Concord would likely collapse like a house of cards.” Entire town budgets, infrastructure projects, education programs, and climate initiatives depend on this money. Our fiscal lifeblood flows not from Granite Staters but from Washington—and by extension, international organizations and public‑private partnerships aligned with global governance goals.
What worries me even more is the silence around this fact. Town officials sign Memoranda of Understanding, enter regional compacts, and apply for HUD or DOT grants as if they were performing acts of good civic duty. But these agreements transform local self‑government into a subcontractor for a global administrative apparatus. But let’s listen to the politicians chant how much they are doing for us in making things “better for us.”
Consider the Nashua Regional Planning Commission (NRPC). Although officially advisory, it drafts comprehensive master plans for land use, transportation—including explicit ties to Boston’s Metro Area Planning Commission (MAPC)—housing, and municipal coordination. These plans are enforced in accordance with RSA 36 : 47 It is odd reading a statute that starts out with words like advisory and spreads the word “must’ like confetti.
Importantly, the NRPC actively assists member towns in securing federal and private grant funding, reinforcing dependence on external money for local initiatives . The NRPC’s regional plans dovetail directly with MAPC’s federally funded climate agendas under EPA sponsorship
And then there’s the NBRC’s growing influence. This federal‑state partnership—modeled on the Appalachian Regional Commission—has funneled tens of millions into rural New Hampshire via programs like Catalyst, Timber for Transit, water and broadband infrastructure, childcare, health care, and recreation
In the spring of 2025 alone, NBRC awarded one of its largest rounds ever: roughly fifty‑four million dollars in grants . Much of this money bypassed legislators and local budgets completely, embedding federal priorities without debate.
The puzzling part is that this hyper‑dependency is happening in a state with a robust Free State Project (FSP) presence—thousands of liberty-minded individuals who speak the language of freedom. Many serve on town budget committees or school boards. They champion tax cuts, constitutional carry, and school choice. Yet where is their pushback when regional bodies harness federal mandates to shape land use or force Agenda 2030‑style sustainability plans on New Hampshire towns?
The disconnect speaks to the central illusion I have uncovered: freedom is not measured by slogans or single-issue victories. If the roads, schools, broadband, and water systems are all shaped by federal or regional mandates, what true liberty remains?
Take Educational Freedom Accounts. Proponents promote them as a tool for parental choice, but these accounts are still routed and regulated through state and federal systems. That choice is a managed illusion, not a decentralization. It continues a reliance on a state-run financial pipeline that enshrines the government—not the individual—as gatekeeper of education. We can thank Americans for Prosperity and Valerie McDonnell and her Republican entourage for handing education back to the Feds.
We must ask ourselves: What is freedom in a system that cannot function without federal money? Is it freedom if local governance is mere execution of a federal agenda? If liberty-minded individuals only rearrange policy outcomes without addressing the structures underpinning them, what are we actually preserving?
Charles Merriam, Woodrow Wilson, and other architects of the administrative state made this clear: government structure is ideology in action. Change the structure and the values follow. New Hampshire towns, full of people who call themselves conservative or libertarian, now function more like arms of federal agencies. Until liberty advocates confront the Structure—not just the policies—liberty remains cosmetic. We risk becoming another willing participant in a globalist order we never truly resisted.
Perhaps that explains why Jeanne Dietsch and other progressives are so alarmed—they sense the vulnerability of a system that is little more than a house of straw. But unless liberty-minded people do the hard work—educating towns, severing the flow of federal money, restoring real local sovereignty—this edifice will fall on its own, and all the inhabitants of New Hampshire will think and act like socialists. Frederic Bastiat said that all that is needed is a structural change to make a philosophical shift in the people. People are being bribed into collectivist thinking all throughout the state. That has always been the communist strategy: bribe people with their own money, and let them argue about which chains are the best suited for their imprisonment. Let’s hope the Free State Project will not go down as just another footnote in the long march of progressivism, having aided and abetted its final goals.
Granite Staters: true freedom requires structural rebellion. Anything less is compliance dressed up in liberty rhetoric.
Matthew Rhodes is a Field Coordinator for The John Birch Society
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