Power Transferred From Society To The State

I have never said in any of my writings that government is unnecessary.  Government is a necessity.  Who does government rule?  It rules people.  It rules groups of people.  In a broader sense,  it rules a group, the largest group........society.  Yes, government rules society.  Society is larger than government.  How can government be larger than society?  Is government more powerful than society?  I know these are philosophical questions.  However, they are relevant questions in light of the current roles of government in the United States.  Sometimes the working person thinks: "I would like to pay less taxes.  I would like to keep a larger portion of my paycheck."  However, the government helps the needy.  Is this wrong?  No.  But there was a time in this country when the government did not help the needy, charities did.  Did that work well?  Maybe, maybe not.  It works today to some extent.  Does tax and spend work well?  Not that well.  There is room for improvement. How? By not spending unnecessarily.   "Needs of society's members" and "redistribution " are two key words in this discussion.  Some years ago, two scholars discussed the situation that is of concern today.  Here are two short, thought-provoking quotes regarding this issue.

"The great non sequitur committed by defenders of the State,including classical Aristotelian and Thomist philosophers, is to leap from the necessity of society to the necessity of the State."
  
Murray N. Rothbard     (1926-1995)    Dean of the Austrian School of Economics

"The more one considers the matter, the clearer it becomes that redistributionis in effect far less a redistribution of free income from the richer to the poorer, as we imagined, than a redistribution of power from the individual to the State."

Bertrand de Jouvenel   (1903-1987)Source: The Ethics of Redistribution [1952] (Indianapolis: Liberty Press, 1990)