Do earnings and poverty levels have anything to do with citizenship? How has welfare affected the role of citizens? Does the power of small town government get lost in the bureaucracy of big government? These questions were addressed by guest speakers at the 2003 annual Maine Town Meeting. Attorney Merton Henry welcomed the group and Facilitator Kathy Hunt from the University of Maine introduced speakers, Dr. Michael Katz, Dr. Ann Acheson, and Christopher Spruce.

Dr. Katz is the Walter H. Annenberg Professor of History at the University of Pennsylvania. Having published many books about the social history of the United States, Dr. Katz notes that the American welfare state is an invention arising after the 1950s. By definition, it is a collection of programs designed to assure economic security (providing adequate food and shelter) to all citizens. Its transformation from the charity and relief practices used in the 1930s and 40s is a result of the Cold War. The structure of the welfare state consists of two tracks — public and private. The public track includes public assistance programs such as AFDC (Aid for Families with Dependent Children) and TANF (Temporary Assistance for Needy Families); social insurance such as Social Security; and tax breaks such as the Earned Income Tax Credit. The private track includes charities and social services, such as Catholic and Jewish charities, and employee benefits such as health insurance and pensions. Only through work, says Katz, do strangers become members of the national family, citizens who merit our sympathy and help. And yet, as the definition of citizenship increasingly includes work, more Americans will find themselves strangers in their own country, outside the circle to which they thought they belonged. Katz asks, does citizenship have to be earned? Or is it a status—a right of birth? In his opinion, the welfare state is a precondition of democracy. The marketization of democracy and citizenship is the root issue at stake in the redefinition of the welfare state.