It’s common knowledge that conservatives want government to play a smaller role in people’s lives.

And it’s true: If you are wealthy, work in the financial sector, own an oil company or sell guns, Republicans want to keep the government as far from you as possible.

But Republicans seem to have little respect for the will of average American voters.

Newly elected Republicans in several states have passed some pretty extreme, possibly unconstitutional measures. Most of them failed to mention these policies to voters during the campaign.

In Wisconsin, Gov. Scott Walker decided to repeal the hard-won rights of workers to collectively bargain. But it is the governor of another state whose actions more clearly represent the conservative concept of the role of government.

After taking office in January, Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder signed a law “that allows the governor to appoint Emergency Managers with virtually unlimited authority over local governments,” according to the Michigan Messenger.

Under the law, the state can declare a town is in a financial emergency, sack its elected government and appoint a manger to run the town as he sees fit.

Most of Michigan was already in a financial emergency before the recession even hit, but Snyder chose the small, impoverished town of Benton Harbor to debut his new authority.

Benton Harbor sits on the shore of Lake Michigan, parallel with Chicago’s wealthy northern suburbs. It was once the home of Whirlpool products but, though the headquarters remain, this year the last factory moved away and took the jobs with it. The town is 85.5 percent black, with a per capita income of $10,235. It is exactly the crumbling vision of industrial collapse you imagine it to be, except for the large beachfront park donated to the people of Benton Harbor by a former mayor in 1917. Since it is owned by the town, only local officials can decide the fate of the park, which is at risk of being replaced with a private golf course.

One of the sponsors of the new law is an heir to the Whirlpool throne and represents a district that includes Benton Harbor. He was also on the board of directors of the group that wants to turn the park into lakefront links.

Snyder’s newly appointed “emergency manager” immediately stripped the city commission of its ability to take any action. One man now controls the fate of the people of Benton Harbor; he will decide whether the shore remains a free park owned by the town, or a country club with a $5,000 membership fee.

Dissolving the only body with the authority to stop the development was probably incentive enough for Snyder to choose Benton Harbor as the test case for his new law. But Snyder is likely also banking on Benton Harbor’s demographics. This is a massive overreach of governmental authority; however, the town is small enough, poor enough and black enough that the media might not even notice.

And he was right. The governor of Michigan has taken away the right to self-government from the people of Benton Harbor, and the news media have hardly noticed. Compare this to the massive coverage given to the imagined governmental overreach of Sarah Palin’s “Death Panels.”

Conservatives probably owe 90 percent of their success to their ability to brand themselves as the party of small government and fiscal conservatism. The other 10 percent they owe to their rich coffers who don’t want government checking up on them.

But it’s a bunch of bulljive. Ask the people of Benton Harbor-at least they’ll have a say in something.

Dave Balson is a junior journalism major. He can be reached at 581-2812

or DENopinions@gmail.com