For you legal buffs out there this will interest you: David E. Bernstein of The Volokh Conspiracy has a paper entitled Lochner Era Revisionism, Revised: Lochner & the Origins of Fundamental Rights Constitutionalism.

Give it a read.

Clayton Cramer has made the first two chapters of his new book Armed America: Firearms Ownership, Hunting & Gun Culture in the Early United States available online. For some reason he's having trouble finding a publisher, so any help would be appreciated.

Harry Browne has a piece up called Pay No Attention To This Day

"This day isn’t important.
There are far more significant days in the year:
• Labor Day, when we pretend to care about other people’s jobs while frolicking at the beach.
• Election Day, when we pretend we’re making a difference by voting.
• Martin Luther King, Jr. Day and Susan B. Anthony Day, when we pretend to be politically correct.
• Memorial Day, when we pretend that we live in a free country because of all the people who were killed in the government’s senseless wars.
• Flag Day, when we pretend the government is America.
• Veterans Day (formerly Armistice Day, when we pretended that World War I made the world safe for democracy).
• National Teachers Day, when we pretend our children are getting an education.
• Earth Day, when we pretend that making the government more powerful will make the environment cleaner.
• United Nations Day, when we pretend to believe all those inane statements about world peace.
Today doesn’t seem to come anywhere near those days in importance.
You see, today is supposed to be Constitution Day. And no one really cares about the Constitution anymore."

Read it.

Now read this & please note the similarity between Mr. Browne's ideas of what will be taught concerning the Constitution.

For example, from Mr. Brownes piece:

"Those conservatives who still care about the Constitution say that it should be taught in the schools. As though government employees will emphasize the original purpose of the Constitution in restraining government. Instead, they’ll give snap quizes on such weighty questions as 'How many years in a Senator’s term?' or 'Who appoints the Supreme Court justices?"

Now compare that to this excerpt from the NARA's Constitution Day Activities section

"Following ratification, the next task was implementation. Analyze historic documents and determine the extent to which the Constitution provided for the reestablishment of the Navy."


If you'll look here I think you'll discover the problem:

"The half hour program will begin with President George W Bush leading all the 120,000 schools in the nation in the simultaneous recitation of the Preamble to the U.S. Constitution broadcast by Fox News."

See? If only they could get passed the Preamble & read the rest of the thing!

At any rate, Happy Constitution Day, or what's left of it at least.

Well, those bastards in Chicago have moved Roderick Pritchett's trial to a district where an all white anti gun jury would be easier to come by*, now they've postponed the trial until October 7th. Thanks to Concealed Carry Inc for keeping up with this.

Mr. Pritchett was arrested & is being tried because two Chocago police officers didn't like the idea of a citizen being armed. It didn't matter that he did all the steppin' & fetchin' required to get a gun permit in Illinois. Neither did it matter that he had his pistol cased & unloaded as required by Illinois law, nor that he informed police officers of his pistol & its location when he was detained for a traffic violation. What mattered is that any citizen that dares carry a weapon needs to be made an example of. He is being charged with Aggrevated Unlawful Use of a Weapon, which is a felony. He did not waive his pistol, nor threaten anyone with it. In fact he did not touch his pistol in the presence of the police officers. This charge apperently applies to merely having a weapon in your car.

Mr. Pritchett still needs your help, as the longer the trial drags on the more legal fees mount up.

If you feel like you can help write a check made payable to:

WALTER MAKSYM and ASSOCIATES

& send it to:

Concealed Carry, Inc.
PO BOX 4597
OAK BROOK IL 60522-4597

Also you can send Mr. Pritchett a kind word at talawah22@yahoo.com




* From The Illinois Leader's article on Mr. Pritchett:
"...the case was moved from a Chicago court, where there likely would have been a big pool of black jurors, to the Skokie court, where there is a more liberal anti-gun white jury pool."

Random Acts of Kindness has a post about home schooling. A Regional Superintendent of Schools want families who home school their children to provide proof to him that schooling is actually occuring.

From this PJStar.com article:

"Home-school families is Bureau, Stark and Henry counties should not expect a truant officer to come knocking this fall.
But Regional Superintendent of Schools Bruce Dennison said he still expects those families to provide him with proof that schooling is taking place.
Such proof, Dennison said, must include information about "who is being schooled, who is doing the schooling" and verification that the curriculum is comparable to the subjects taught in public schools."

Well, if parents wanted curriculum comparable to what's being taught in public schools, they'd be sending their kids there wouldn't they?

Most parents want to home school their children for two reasons: Quality of education & accuracy of education. They figure they can teach their children as, if not more efficiently than public school teachers & they won't have to spend time unteaching their kids they lies, fabrications & myths taught at public school.

I highly recommend that anyone with school age children pick up a copy of Lies My Teacher Told Me by James W. Loewen. You will notice a left leaning perspective when reading the book, but that shouldn't distract you too much from the factual errors that are pointed out.

But I wonder what Regional Superintendent Dennison would say if a parent reported that they are instructing their children for 6 hours a day about how the Constitution limits the size of government & that most social programs, including federal funding of schools, are outside the bounds of constitutional limitations?

Do ya think there'd be any adverse reaction if a prent told Superintendent Dennison that at least once a week part of their child's education involved punching holes in a paper target 100 yards away with an object that was constitutionally protected by an amendemnt in the Bill of Rights?

Read what Random Acts of Kindness has to say. There are some interesting links at the bottom about home schooling.

Via The Serfdom Times I found this:

"On Friday, September 12th, the Treasury Department issued a 'Media Advisory,' calling on all of the nation’s media to have reporters and cameramen at the headquarters building of the U.S. Treasury Department next Tuesday at 10 AM where they will announce a 'New Partnership' between the IRS and nine States 'to fight abusive tax avoidance.'
Obviously, the government’s intent is to have the media shower the Nation with a blanket of propaganda by flooding Tuesday evening TV and Wednesday morning newspapers with its biased, one-sided story..."

< sarcasm > The government? Our government? biased towards its own interests? Say it ain't so... Next you'll be telling me that they can pass gun control laws despite the Second Amendment! < / sarcasm >

"To this we say, 'No Answers, NO Taxes.'
At 10 AM Tuesday morning, former IRS Agents Joe Banister, John Turner, Sherry Jackson, along with We The People’s Chairman Bob Schulz and We The People Congress National Director Devvy Kidd will be standing outside the Treasury Department’s main entrance at 1500 Pennsylvania Ave. They will hand the arriving reporters a packet of materials documenting aspects of the income tax fraud.
They will also hold a sidewalk press conference immediately following the conclusion of the 11 AM Treasury press conference. Banister is a CPA and former IRS Criminal Investigation Division (CID) Special Agent. Turner was a former IRS Revenue Officer for a decade and Jackson is a CPA/CFE (Certified Fraud Examiner) and former Revenue Agent that was assigned to an elite IRS fraud detection unit.
On Monday, We The People will distribute a press release announcing its intentions to provide the press with the other side of the story including the government’s continued refusal to answer crucial questions regarding the legal jurisdiction for the income tax and the patently unconstitutional means utilized to force it upon the People.
We realize the media traditionally quotes, without serious interrogation, the voice of “officialdom” and typically pays little heed to the sovereignty of the People and their rule- book – the Constitution of the United States of America. We also realize that the silence of the People is acquiescence.
With that in mind, we call upon all concerned Americans to demonstrate the courage of Joe, John and Sherry by joining them on Tuesday morning in DC. Let’s catch the eye and ear of press and expose the improper collusion of the federal government with the state taxing authorities as they attempt to delay the ongoing collapse of the income tax fraud.
Remember: the Constitution can’t defend itself. The People must defend it. Please join us.
One final note, as is our custom, we must remind everyone that images are important, so please dress appropriately and be respectful."

Of course I expect the mainstream media to either ignore Mr. Schultz & the We The People's demonstrations or to downplay them as a lunatic fringe group that's lost touch with reality. Still, if anyone sees any coverage of this please let me know.

Could you put a price on the life of a family member? Some people can & it comes to around $17 million.

I have no problem with them seeking monetary damages from the murderers.

But seeking damages from a person who helped steal the guns used in the murder, as well as the gun store from which they were stolen & two burglar alarm companies??? That's not seeking restitution, that's seeking a jack pot.

"But the families of Georgio Gallara and Jeremy Giordano said it's unlikely they will ever collect money from the killers, who are both serving life prison sentences.
'I think it's more symbolic than anything,' Giordano's father, Joseph Giordano of Hardyston, said after the settlements were announced Friday."

So that means they have to go after those capable of paying, even if they were not directly responsible for the murders of their family members?

"The now-defunct gun store and two burglar alarm companies, T&R Alarm System Inc. and Monital, agreed to pay undisclosed amounts."

I feel for the loss both families have suffered, but that in no way excuses their actions. Seeking restitution from the gun store from which the guns used in the crime were stolen from makes as much sense as suing Ford because someone stole a car & then hit a pedestrian with it.

There is one legitimate avenue they could have pursued other than suing the murderers: suing the victims' employers. Why wouldn't that be just as wrong as suing the gun store? Most delivery places prevent their employees from carrying weapons. In fact they usually make it a terminable offense to not only carry weapons, but to offer anything other than compliance to the robbers.

In my youth I worked for a few major pizza delivery companies. Pizza Hutt being one & Papa Johns being the other. With both places the company policy was to comply with whatever a robber wanted & to be completely disarmed at all times. They even go so far as to tell an employee that they cannot have weapons in their own vehicles while working.
& if you are robbed but have more cash on you than you should (usually $20 to make change & whatever the total was from your delivery) they usually terminate you because they feel you endangered other drivers by reinforcing the idea that drivers have more than $20 on them! They don't seem to realize that by forcing the drivers to be compliant victims that it re-inforces the idea that delivery drivers are easy targets with little risk. Not to mention the fact that some people will rob & kill you for far less than $20.

So if the pizza place in question prevented their drivers from being able to be armed & told them not to defend themselves & comply with whatever was asked of them, then they should be held liabel. To a lesser degree than the murderers of course, but held liabel for their complacency in it.

& the same would apply to any retail industry where the employees face a risk of robbery while being denied the means to protect themselves by company policy.

But to sue a gun store because guns were stolen & then used in a crime? That's not grief, it's greed.

Update: Want to know how effective the disarmed compliance policy is? Very, if you're a robber.

"A man robbed Papa John's Pizza in the 1800 block of East Amarillo Boulevard minutes after midnight Friday."

Luckily no one was injured. But that is just that: luck. The disarmed compliance policy depends solely on the benevolence of the robber to be effective. & let's be honest, would you bet your life that someone who threatens you with force would never make good on that threat?

Things might get real interesting in Bay Township, Michigan.

Let me pre-face this by giving you an idea of how libertarian I am: I find no solid convincing reason in any argument I've ever heard on the subject that could justify making a person pay for the local governments' permission for building a structure on their own property. Therefore the threat of force to enforce these types of laws is, to me at least, nothing more than common thuggery.
Merely because a person is elected & sends his agents to commit an act of thuggery in no way justifies that thuggery, nor is it reasonable to insist that the victim of said thuggery makes appeals & supplications to the thugs in question for mercy. If a person feels he/she should stand up to thugs then I will not condemn them, no matter how disasterous the consequences of their actions may be for them. To me it is no different than defending yourself & your property from a robbery attempted by a common criminal.

What the hell am I talking about? This:

"Lyle Barkley received authorization to place two 12x60 manufactured homes (mobile homes) on 4 acres in Bay Township. Permits were granted by the County. Once on the property, Barley began a building project to join the two homes via an enclosed walkway. It was then that former township supervisor, "Bud" Chipman filed a complaint to stop further construction and have the homes removed. (Chipman was recalled from his position. Reason unknown).
County Court Judge May found in favor of Chipman's complaint and issued an order to Barkley to remove the homes by September 18th."

& what does this very questionable act by the county & judge in question have to do with my previous rant?

"I've had enough. I'm going to fight!' Charlevoix County Businessman, Lyle Barkley, has been ordered to remove two manufactured homes from a 4-acre parcel in Bay Township by September 18. Barkley says he will not comply with the illegal and unconstitutional order of the court but will defend his property with arms if necessary. Barkley, 55, owns B&B Excavating in Boyne City. He is presently bulldozing fortifications around his property in preparation for the standoff he promises will come if officials attempt to remove the homes from his land."

So one man against a local government. Not much of a contest, right?

"His cause has drawn the attention of Rick Stanley, leader of an organization called Mutual Defense Pact 2d American Revolution Militia who offers to send more than 600 armed defenders to Barkley's aid once the standoff has begun.
Barkley contacted Norm Olson, a well-know Michigan Militia figure for help up until Stanley's organization arrives."

So that's at least 600 people willing to put their own necks on the line to help out someone who is about to be victimized by thugs.

Yes, legally he is on very shakey ground. The courts have usually condemned the use of any sort of force in stopping agents of the government from doing what they want to do. The proper response, according to judges, lawyers & most government employees, is to not resist or cause any kind of physical confrontation & try to settle the matter in a court of law. Many of you who read this will agree: the best thing for Mr. Barkleyto do would be to hire a good attorney & try to use the courts to correct the situation, even if that meant moving his homes until the courts could rule in his favor.

I feel differently. It's not the correct thing to do in every situation, but when someone threatens to violate your Rights going to court cannot take back the violation that occurred. It is similar to rape in that once it happens it happens. You can do what you can to punish the perpetrator & try to make sure it never happens again, but the scars will remain with you no matter how favorably a court rules.
Stopping someone from raping you is the preferred option. Similarly stopping somone, even an agent of government such as a police officer, from violating your Rights is the prefered method.

If you read this article you may feel that Mr. Barkley has some rather eccentric ideas about the law & how it works. & you'd probably be correct. However if you take away the 'patent land' arguments Mr. Barkley seems to be using & reduce it to simply an argument of who actually owns the property, then it's not hard to be sympathetic.

What do I mean by "...who owns the property..."?
Well if Mr. barkley in fact owns the property then no law should restrict him in doing as he sees fit with his property so long as his actions do not cause harm or the immediete threat of harm to others.
However if an entity can step in & dictate to Mr. Barkley what he may or may not do with the property then they are attemtping to exercise control of either the property in question or perhaps Mr. Barkely himself.

Mr. Barkley is doing what he feels is right. & I do believe he is correct to an extent. He does seem to have some of those 'conspiracy theory' arguments that are usually the subject of much ridicule from those who do not believe in them. But most of those 'conspiracy theories' that I've heard have had some basis in fact. They usually err in using overly elaborate explanations to justify things. & considering the complexity of our legal system & the departure from apperent logic it seems to take far too often I can't really fault them for thinking its more complex than it is.

So yes, Mr. Barkley should have hired an attorney to begin with. & yes, his arguments should have been less far-fetched (although I am unfamiliar with the 'patent land' issues he raised, so it's possible that he might have had some solid ground to stand on. I just do not know enough about the subject) & more simple. But the fact remains that his property is being threatened by his local government. & the use of force is something that any government is not shy about. Hell, some people have defined government as force.

In fact I offer you this:

"Government is not reason, it is not eloquence, it is force; like fire, a troublesome servant and a fearful master. Never for a moment should it be left to irresponsible action." -- George Washington

& this as well:

"Liberty has never come from the government. Liberty has always come from the subjects of government. The history of liberty is the history of resistance. The history of liberty is a history of the limitation of governmental power, not the increase of it." -- Woodrow Wilson

& finally this:

"Next to the right of liberty, the right of property is the most important individual right guaranteed by the Constitution and the one which, united with that of personal liberty, has contributed more to the growth of civilization than any other institution established by the human race." -- William Howard Taft

Mr. Barkley is attempting to defend his property. Even if you disagree with his methods I hope you understand the principle involved: a persons' property should not be subject to thuggery, even government thuggery.

I'll try to keep you updated on this.