Tuesday, May 26, 2009

SUPPORT THE 10TH AMENDMENT AND STATES RIGHTS!

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.-- U.S. Constitution, Tenth Amendment

Fed up with Washington's involvement in everything from land use to gun control to education spending, states across the country are fighting back against what they say is the federal government's growing intrusion on their rights.

At least 35 states have introduced legislation this year asserting their power under the Tenth Amendment to regulate all matters not specifically delegated to the federal government by the Constitution.

"This has been boiling for years, and it's finally come to a head," said Utah State Rep. Carl Wimmer. "With TARP and No Child Left Behind, these things that continue to give the federal government more authority, our rights as states and individuals are being turned on their head."
The power struggle between the states and Washington has cropped up periodically ever since the country was founded.

But now some states are sending a simple, forceful message:

The government has gone too far!

ENOUGH IS ENOUGH!!!

Montana Gov. Brian Schweitzer recently signed into law a bill authorizing the state's gun manufacturers to produce "Made in Montana" firearms, without seeking licensing from the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. Similar laws are being considered in Utah, Alaska, Texas and Tennessee.

The Montana law is expected to end up in the courts, where states' rights activists hope judges will uphold their constitutional right to regulate firearms. That would reverse a longstanding trend, said Martin Flaherty, a professor of constitutional law at Fordham Law School.

"From 1937 to 1995 there is not one instance of the Supreme Court knocking back Congress," he said. "In the Constitution the interstate commerce clause gives Congress the right to regulate commerce between the states. That gives them a lot of power. There were questions of how far they can reach, but then comes the New Deal, and Roosevelt gets all these picks on the [Supreme] Court, and they come upon a theory whereupon congressional power is almost infinite."

That 1930s understanding of the Constitution is now the norm, with advocates for the federal government arguing that issues of a certain size and scope can be addressed only by an institution with the resources of the federal government. As an example, federal authority is necessary in the economic crisis, said U.S. Rep. Dan Boren, whose home state of Oklahoma recently passed a sovereignty resolution. "The economic situation in our nation over the past year has not been contained in any one community or state. The industries and institutions affected by the recent economic crisis touch multiple layers of our economy and are not confined to any one state or region," he said in a statement. "I feel there was Constitutional justification for Congress's recent efforts to stabilize our economy."

But for many state leaders, the degree to which Congress regulates issues within their boundaries, using the interstate commerce clause to regulate just about everything and anything, has become untenable.

Texas Gov. Rick Perry made headlines recently when he made a passing reference to the possibility of the Lone Star State seceding from the U.S., saying, "if Washington continues to thumb their nose at the American people, you know, who knows what might come out of that?"

States rights advocates offer countless examples of what they believe is Washington's overreach.

 

In Utah, 67 percent of the state's land is controlled by the federal government through wilderness preserves, limiting state leaders in their bid to fill government coffers through oil and natural gas drilling after Interior Secretary Ken Salazar cancelled 103,000 acres of leases this year.

In Idaho, ranchers are furious that federal endangered species law prevents them from shooting the wolves that prey on their cattle.

"The balance of power between the states and the federal government is way out of whack," said Georgia state Senator Chip Pearson." The effect here is incalculable. Everything you do from the moment you wake up until you get to bed, there is some federal law or restriction."

Up until recently, the state sovereignty movement has remained almost entirely Republican, drawing supporters from the ranks that voted against President Obama and attended tea parties last month to protest federal tax hikes. But the movement's rank and file are just as likely now to criticize Obama's predecessor, George W. Bush, as they are the new president, pointing to what they believe were Bush's overreaching policies on education and homeland security.

Many are becoming frequent visitors to a Web site, http://www.tenthamendmentcenter.com/, which was founded in early 2007 and has become a community bulletin board for states rights activists and politicians. Up to 20,000 viewers log on to the site every day. The site's founder, Michael Boldin, a 36-year-old Web marketer in Los Angeles who says he has no political affiliation, says he decided to launch the site after watching the Maine State Legislature fight the Department of Homeland Security on the Real ID act, a controversial Bush-era law that will require states to issue federally regulated identification cards, complete with biometric data and stringent address checks. "Maine resisted, and the government backed off, and soon all these other states were doing the same thing," Boldin said.

"The bottom line is, if there's widespread support, people can resist the federal government at the state level." The deadline for states to comply with Real ID has now been pushed back until 2011.

The Tenth Amendment movement is not without controversy. In Georgia, a columnist for The Atlanta Journal Constitution called a sovereignty resolution in the state Senate a threat "to secede from and even disband the United States."

The resolution, which was passed as part of a group of bills that were banded together, affirmed the state's powers under the Tenth Amendment, taking its inspiration and language from Thomas Jefferson's 1798 resolution opposing the Alien and Sedition Acts -- laws enacted by the federal government during wartime to quiet protest against the government.
The resolution asserts that any instance of the federal government taking action beyond its enumerated powers "shall constitute a nullification of the Constitution for the United States of America by the government of the United States of America."

"It's been taken out of context by some editors," said Pearson, who sponsored the bill. "It certainly never meant secession. The intent was to communicate that the actions of the federal government are an infringement on states' rights."

Robert Natelson, a law professor at the University of Montana who was involved in drawing up that state's sovereignty resolution over a decade ago, argues that states up until now have been unwilling to take action of any real consequence in checking federal power. He said, "Back then they passed the resolution, but they didn't turn down any federal dollars."

He also said. "If the states are serious about returning the federal government to its historical origins, they're going to have to do more than pass resolutions. They're going to have to turn down money and litigate."

SUPPORT YOUR STATE IN

REGAINING

YOUR RIGHTS!!!

.

Posted by Landry at 12:07 PM 1 comments Links to this post

Monday, May 25, 2009

 It  is now closer to reality than you think. You're sound asleep when

  you hear a thump outside your bedroom door. Half-awake, and nearly   

  paralyzed with fear, you hear muffled whispers. At least two  people have 

  broken into your house and are moving your way. With  your heart pumping, 

  you reach down beside your bed and pick up  your shotgun. You rack a 

  shell into the chamber, then inch toward  the door and open it. In the darkness,

 you make out two shadows.   One  holds something that looks like a crowbar.

  When the intruder brandishes it as if to strike, you raise the shotgun and fire. The blast 

  knocks both thugs to the floor. One writhes and screams  while the second man crawls

  to the front door and lurches outside.  As you pick up the telephone to call police, 

  you know you're in  trouble.  In  your country, most guns were outlawed years before, 

  and the few that are privately owned are so stringently regulated as to make them    

  useless. Yours was never registered. Police arrive and inform  you that   

  the second burglar has died. They arrest you for First  Degree Murder

  and Illegal Possession of a Firearm. When you talk  to your attorney, he 

  tells you not to worry: authorities will  probably plea the case down to  manslaughter.                                                                                             

  "What  kind of sentence will I get?" you ask.                      

  "Only  ten-to-twelve years," he replies, as if that's nothing.

  "Behave yourself, and you'll be out in seven."                     

  The  next day, the shooting is the lead story in the local newspaper.

  Somehow, you're portrayed as an eccentric vigilante while the two men    

  you shot are represented as choirboys. Their friends and  relatives can't 

  find an unkind word to say about them. Buried deep  down in the article,  

  authorities acknowledge that both "victims"  have been arrested numerous  

  times. But the next day's headline  says it all: "Lovable Rogue Son 

  Didn't Deserve to Die." The  thieves have been transformed from career    

  criminals into Robin  Hood-type pranksters. As the days wear on, the 

  story takes wings.  The national media picks it up, then the  international media. 

  The  surviving burglar has become a folk HERO!

  Your  attorney says the thief is preparing to sue you, and he'll     

  probably win. The media publishes reports that your home has been    

  burglarized several times in the past and that you've been  critical

  of local police for their lack of effort in apprehending  the suspects. 

  After the last break-in, you told your neighbor that  you would be   

  prepared next time. The District Attorney uses this  to allege that you   

  were lying in wait for the burglars.                                                                            

  A  few months later, you go to trial. The charges haven't been 

  reduced, as your lawyer had so confidently predicted. When you  take the

  stand, your anger at the injustice of it all works  against you. Prosecutors

  paint a picture of you as a mean,  vengeful man. It doesn't take long for 

  the jury to convict you of  all charges.                                                                                    

  The  judge sentences you to life in prison.                                                                         

  This  case really happened.                                                       

  On  August 22, 1999, Tony Martin of Emneth, Norfolk,  England, killed one 

  burglar and wounded a second. In April, 2000, he was convicted and is    

  now serving a life term.                                      

  How  did it become a crime to defend one's own life in the once Great  British Empire?                                                  

  It  started with the Pistols Act of 1903. This seemingly reasonable law  

  forbade selling pistols to minors or felons and established  that  handgun 

  sales were to be made only to those who had a  license. The Firearms

  Act of 1920 expanded licensing to include  not only handguns but all

  firearms except shotguns.  Later  laws passed in 1953 and 1967 outlawed the carrying of any

  weapon  by private citizens and mandated the registration of all shotguns.

  Momentum  for total handgun confiscation began in earnest after the  

  Hungerford mass shooting in 1987. Michael Ryan, a mentally  disturbed Man 

  with a Kalashnikov rifle, walked down the streets  shooting everyone he   

  saw. When the smoke cleared, 17 people were  dead.            

  The  British public, already de-sensitized by eighty years of "gun   

  control", demanded even tougher restrictions. (The seizure of all privately 

  owned handguns was the objective even though Ryan used a rifle.)                                                      

  Nine  years later, at Dunblane, Scotland, Thomas  Hamilton used a   

  semi-automatic weapon to murder 16 children and a  teacher at a public school.                                                         

  For  many years, the media had portrayed all gun owners as mentally  

  unstable or worse, criminals. Now the press had a real kook with which   

  to beat up law-abiding gun owners. Day after day, week after  week, the   

  media gave up all pretense of objectivity and demanded a  total ban on    

  all handguns. The Dunblane Inquiry, a few months  later, Sealed the fate  

  of the few sidearm still owned by private  citizens.           

  During  the years in which the British government incrementally took away 

  most gun rights, the notion that a citizen had the right to armed    

  self-defense came to be seen as vigilantism. Authorities refused  to grant gun 

  licenses to people who were threatened, claiming that self-defense was no longer considered

  a reason to own a gun.   Citizens who shot burglars or robbers or rapists were charged  while

  the real criminals were released.    Indeed,  after the Martin shooting, a police spokesman was 

  quoted as saying,  "We cannot have people take the law into their own hands."

  All  of Martin's neighbors had been robbed numerous times, and several    

  elderly people were severely injured in beatings by young thugs  who

  had no fear of the consequences. Martin himself, a collector  of

  antiques, had seen most of his collection trashed or stolen by  burglars.   

  When  the Dunblane Inquiry ended, citizens who owned handguns were given  

  three months to turn them over to local authorities. Being good British  

  subjects, most people obeyed the law. The few who didn't  were visited by 

  police and threatened with ten-year prison  sentences if they didn't  comply. 

  Police later bragged that they'd  taken nearly 200,000 handguns from private citizens.                                               

  How  did the authorities know who had handguns? The guns had been registered and licensed. 

  Kinda like cars.                               

  THIS IS WHY  OUR FOUNDING FATHERS PUT THE SECOND AMENDMENT IN OUR CONSTITUTION