States oppose health care bill while implementing it
“We’re for it while we’re against it.” That sums up the apparent position of many states challenging the constitutionality of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. While pursuing an end to the health care act in the federal court system, Alabama, Arizona, Idaho, Iowa, Maine, Michigan and Nebraska have crossed the first threshold in [...]
State sovereignty: a final solution
Political activists Ron and Donnie Kennedy have proposed an amendment that would formalize the principles of state nullification and reaffirm the sovereignty of the 50 American states. These United States of America are a Republic of Republics deriving its authority from the consent of the governed residing within their Sovereign State. Each Sovereign State is [...]
For the Feds, Speech is Speech. Unless you’re advocating Jury Nullification
Retired chemistry professor Julian Heicklen is facing imprisonment for advocating jury nullification to passersby, following an indictment by federal prosecutors last year, according to the New York Times. He stood on a plaza outside the United States Courthouse in Manhattan and handed out brochures on the subject. According to prosecutors, Heicklen’s “advocacy of jury nullification, directed as it [...]
Tea Party: Cut Insane Deficits. Bring Back Crazy Deficits!
Herman Cain won a straw poll of Missouri Tea Party members last week. Ron Paul came in second, and Newt Gingrich third, with no other candidate even close. If you read this blog regularly, nothing here will come as a surprise to you. But I am still trying to understand what principles the Tea Party espouses. Constitutionalism? [...]
Phil Hart: Declaring a State of Emergency
Idaho State Representative Phil Hart became concerned about the federal government’s illegal introduction of Canadian gray wolves in Idaho because they pose a public danger. The federal government and Idaho agreed to allow a population of 100 wolves into the state, but the Canadian wolf population far exceeds that number now, and is estimated to [...]
Conceived in Liberty
There’s never been a better time to remember the revolutionary and even libertarian roots of the American founding, and there’s no better guide to what this means in the narrative of the Colonial period than Murray Rothbard. For anyone who thinks of Murray Rothbard as only an economic theorist or political thinker, this giant book [...]
Lies The Government Told You
by Andrew Napolitano EDITOR’S NOTE: The following is the introduction to Judge Andrew Napolitano’s book, Lies The Government Told You During the 1980 presidential campaign, a joke made the rounds in the Reagan camp. George Washington, Richard Nixon, and Jimmy Carter die and go to Heaven. In a chance meeting about how they got there, [...]
Did Judge Silberman ask the Supreme Court to rein in Congress?
Two notes on the court challenges to Obamacare: First: The Supreme Court has agreed to hear the challenge to the law’s expensive and humiliating Medicaid mandates on the states. The Court did so although no lower court has yet overturned those mandates. This is clearly the correct decision. Those mandates appear to violate even the modern Supreme Court’s [...]
Just Stand There and do One Thing Right!
cross-posted from the Oregon Tenth Amendment Center So, the time has come. The “super-committee”is about to fail and “draconian cuts” (read reductions in the rate of increase over the next 10 years) are on the way. As I said when the stupid idea was passed to defer decisions to an unconstitutional body’s decision making prowess, [...]
Powers must remain separated
We resist government power up until the moment we perceive that it will benefit our particular cause. Then we laud its brilliance. You can scarcely turn on the radio or open a story on the web without coming across a Republican complaining loudly about Pres. Obama and his tendency to use executive orders like a [...]
Happy Thanksgiving!
Add to iTunes As we gather together this Thanksgiving holiday, let’s take at least a few minutes to step back and breathe. Let’s push from our minds the imperial presidents, the attacks on our liberty, the obligations many of us feel to spend ourselves into oblivion, and so much more – and let’s focus on [...]
The Real First Thanksgiving
No, I’m not talking about the Pilgrims who, as stated in their own Mayflower Compact, sailed to the “Northerne parts of Virginia” in 1620. (There was no Massachusetts colony yet.) That well-known Pilgrim “thanksgiving” came years after one I’m talking about. I refer to a thanksgiving celebrated further south in Virginia on the north bank [...]
We’ve Had Enough Government ‘Stimulation’
After three years and $4 trillion in combined deficit spending, unemployment remains stubbornly high and the economy sluggish. That people are still asking what the government can do to stimulate the economy is mind-boggling. That the Keynesian-inspired deficit spending binge did create jobs isn’t in question. The real question is whether it created any net jobs after [...]
Is (Iowa Conservative) Bob Vander Plaats for World Government?
The social conservative leader has ruled out Ron Paul for his organization’s endorsement because Paul believes in “states’ rights” across the board — rather an odd view for a Christian group to take. Christians, from Calvinists to Catholics, are supposed to believe in subsidiarity, an ancient principle of Christian social thought, whereby power is to be as [...]
Tenthers to the Left and Tenthers to the Right
Respecting the Tenth Amendment does not necessarily predispose allegiance to an economic theory. Thus both libertarians and socialists can enthusiastically agree that our national government is bound by strictly enumerated powers and save their blows for whether the sovereign states should adopt single payer health care schemes or operate liquor store monopolies. Likewise political party [...]
Congress, Butt Out! The Constitution Reserves Malpractice Reform for the States
In their zeal to adopt a federal malpractice reform bill to dictate procedures to state courts, many Republicans in Congress are doing precisely what they rightly accuse Democrats of doing: blithely disregarding the Constitution’s clear limits on federal power. Their proposals, once encapsulated in H.R. 5 and then slipped into the Senate Republican “jobs bill,” not only [...]
The Remedy to Save Our Nation
According a Supreme Court Ruling the Federal Government does not have the Constitutional Authority to dictate to the County Sheriff. He has sworn an Oath to preserve, protect and defend the Constititution and is the Chief Law Enforcement Officer in the County and takes his marching orders from the People he serves and the Constitution. [...]
SCOTUS Must be Reigned In!
I tremble with fear every time a serious constitutional question is put to the “Supreme Court”. Obvious to all but the willfully ignorant or ideologically blind, over the years SCOTUS has evolved into an essentially unbridled power unto itself. Guided by the principle of “judicial supremacy” vs “constitutional supremacy”, and tainted by politics, ideology and [...]
Sound Money Program in Utah
SALT LAKE CITY, Utah (ABC 4 News) – Buying gold may be something many of us know is a good idea; but how do you actually buy gold, and how do you spend it when you need it? The state of Utah has a new program that’s designed to make both of those things easier. [...]
Thoughts on the ‘Minibus’ Spending Bill
The House is scheduled to vote this evening on a fiscal 2012 “minibus” packaging of three appropriations bills (Agriculture, Commerce-Justice-Science and Transportation-HUD) agreed to in conference on Monday. It includes a continuing resolution to keep the government funded through December 16th, thus avoiding a government “shutdown.” In sum, I think the bill is largely business [...]
Maine’s Food Turf War
cross posted from the Maine Tenth amendment Center As reported yesterday by the Maine Tenth Amendment Center, the State has made good on its April 6th promise to prosecute farmers in towns that have passed a Food Sovereignty Ordinance. Walter Whitcomb, Commissioner of the Maine Department of Agriculture, has not backed down. “It was not done as a statement. [...]
Feds in on ‘Occupy’ evictions?
Recently, cities including New York, Portland, Denver, Salt Lake City and Oakland cleared out their Occupy Wall Street protests from their encampments. Beforehand, many cities participated in several conference calls with representatives from the Federal Government about ways to break up these protests The Feds’ role during these discussions hasn’t been fully ascertained. From their [...]
Obama’s View of the Constitution is a Crock
Some people – including the former law instructor who now serves as President of the United States – believe that it is impossible to reconstruct the Constitution’s original meaning. As this book demonstrates, that view is substantially incorrect. The Original Constitution fills a void that has existed for a long time—the need for a clear, [...]
