A Tale of Two State-Sponsored Killings

by William L. Anderson

(Editor’s Note: Executions…yet another thing that government regularly screws up and should never be trusted with.)

The other night, the State of Georgia killed Troy Davis for the alleged murder of an off-duty police officer. The execution was controversial because a number of witnesses who testified at Davis’ trial later recanted their statements. What was most interesting to me about that was that prosecutors had no problem accepting their testimony when it implicated Davis, but when those same witnesses later claimed to have been coerced and said that they lied because that was what police and prosecutors wanted, suddenly those same conveyors of truth had become “unreliable.” Likewise, those wearing the black robes of judges came to the same conclusion.

The case itself became a symbol of the state ramrodding through executions even though there could be doubt about the guilt of the convicted, and I join in the disgust and anger that others who have opposed this execution have expressed. However, Davis’ state-sponsored homicide was not the only execution in the USA that night; the New York Times had an Associated Press article about an execution in Texas:

White supremacist gang member Lawrence Russell Brewer was executed Wednesday evening for the infamous dragging death slaying of James Byrd Jr., a black man from East Texas.

There were no vigils and no protests of this government killing, and the headline in the NYT said it all: “White Supremacist Executed for Texas Dragging.” The placing of the two accounts together supposedly highlighted the contrast between the natures of the stories. In one, the state was killing a black man convicted of killing a white cop and there was doubt about the verdict, thus bringing together all of the political issues at once. In the other, we see a vicious, racist killer getting his just desserts in an open-and-shut case.

With Davis, we have a story about issues of racism, the killing of a state agent, and wrongful convictions, all wrapped in the ugly shroud of executions. One cannot put together a case with more political implications, and the response to it was what one would expect. The wounds of past injustices are great and only opened more when the State of Georgia injected poison into the body of Davis, and also injected more venom into our Body Politic. Racism. Cop killing. Wrongful convictions. Executions. There is nothing to add.

Brewer’s state-sponsored homicide brings different emotions. I remember seeing an African-American juror who had voted death to Brewer being interviewed on television afterward, and he said that while he opposed the death penalty, the nature of this case made such punishment justified. To put it another way, the horrific circumstances of the murder of Byrd and its racial and political implications permitted people to do away with their own principles and to support that which they normally would oppose. (To their credit, the family of Byrd asked for clemency for Brewer, while the family of Mark McPhail, the dead officer, supported Davis’ execution.)

He had participated in the murder of a black man, and was identified with groups that openly are racist. His views of others of a different race made it easier for those who say they oppose executions to support his being put to death by state authorities. Like Davis, who allegedly killed a member of a politically-favored group, police officers, Brewer not only had violated the life of someone else, but he had engaged in politically-incorrect behavior. Thus, the government apparatus that seeks to execute went into high gear in order to make sure that these alleged miscreants were to face the full fury of the law.

Before Brewer was to be killed, he declined to make a statement; Davis, about to die, calmly expressed one last time that he did not do what he was about to be killed for allegedly doing. They were different men, different events, yet they are tied together and not just because they were executed on the same date in the same country.

Would Troy Davis have supported the execution of Lawrence Russell Brewer? Would Lawrence Russell Brewer have supported the execution of Troy Davis? I don’t know. What I do know is that when it comes to state-sponsored killings, all principles are discarded. People become what they have hated, and supposedly-principled people become the worst of hypocrites.

People who say they are “pro-life” try to justify executions in that same light. John Ashcroft, who lost his U.S. Senate election in 2000 to a dead man, had enraged black voters in his state of Missouri because he single-handedly denied the appointment of a black judge to the federal bench because Ashcroft claimed that the judge “was soft on the death penalty.” Yet, Ashcroft was one of the most staunchly anti-abortion members of Congress and always was feted by “pro-life” groups for his legislative actions.

Likewise, many others who oppose state-sponsored killings of people convicted in the courts believe that taxpayers should be forced to fund the killing of children who are ready to be born, the “partial-birth” abortion in which a medical professional brings out the head of a child from the womb, stabs the back of the head with scissors, bringing death. Like those in the execution chamber, the child is not deemed worthy of staying alive by people in legislative office and by men and women wearing black robes, not to mention the editors of the “Newspaper of Record.”

What I am describing is a Culture of Death, and a state-sponsored Culture of Death at that. In fact, a society cannot degenerate into that awful culture without the prodding and the sponsorship of the State. In the end, the State itself becomes Death.

Government

I don’t know if Troy Davis did what police and prosecutors claimed and what jurors and judges believed, although given what I know about how the courts in the USA work, I have my doubts. On the other hand, no one disputes the perfidy of what Lawrence Russell Brewer did, and it is understandable why jurors were willing to discard their own principles so that they could order his execution.

As I see it, once we give the State the privilege of killing whom it may choose, things are set into motion that are expressly unjust and cannot be reversed. The fact that Brewer took part in a terrible murder no more justifies his execution than the chance – and only the chance – that Davis shot a cop to death justified the State of Georgia killing him. (The officer was off-duty, but the fact that he was employed as a police officer was enough to label Davis a “cop-killer.”)

By giving the State the power to kill others “legally,” we also must realize that the State will kill those whom are politically deemed unfit to live. Plenty of people commit terrible murders for which no one is officially put to death. Only when a killing is deemed politically-incorrect is someone executed, and if politics ultimately is to become the standard of who is to live and who is to die, then we have become people who have passed the Point of No Return.

Following Davis’ execution, the economist Robert Higgs wrote:

“Those who compose the state have estranged themselves from their fellows and arrogated to themselves the power of life and death. Heedless of natural law, they are cruelly selective and opportunistic in their obedience even to the “laws” they have made. They have traded their consciences for power and political place, and their souls are as cold as ice. They are, morally, the walking dead.”

I would add that other people who support such things also join those who are spiritually dead. That is where state-sponsored killings always lead.

William L. Anderson, Ph.D. teaches economics at Frostburg State University in Maryland, and is an adjunct scholar of the Ludwig von Mises Institute. He also is a consultant with American Economic Services.

Copyright © 2011 by LewRockwell.com. Permission to reprint in whole or in part is gladly granted, provided full credit is given.

Legal Obedience

by Walter Williams

(Editor’s Note: We are also not morally obligated to obey any government edict that attempts to stop any state from seceding from the Union. A state that submits an Ordinance of Secession to Washington has in effect revoked its contract with the Union and is no longer subject to any possible jurisdiction that DC might think it retains.)

What laws are we morally obligated to obey? Help with the answer can be found in “Economic Liberty and the Constitution,” a 66-page pamphlet by Jacob G. Hornberger, founder and president of The Future of Freedom Foundation.

Hornberger offers a hypothetical whereby Congress enacts a compulsory church attendance law that requires children to attend church service each Sunday. Parents are penalized if their children fail to comply. Would there be any moral or constitutional legitimacy to such a congressional mandate? The law would be a clear violation of one’s natural, or God-given, rights to life and liberty. As to whether it would be constitutional, we have to see whether mandating church attendance is one of those enumerated powers of Congress found in Article 1, Section 8 of our Constitution. We’d find no such authority. Our anti-federalist Founding Fathers didn’t trust Congress with religious liberty, so they sought to protect it with the First Amendment to explicitly deny Congress the power to mandate religious conduct. Suppose there’s widespread popular support for a church-going mandate and the U.S. Supreme Court rules it constitutional; do Americans have a moral obligation to obey the law?

You might say, “Williams, while there are gray areas in the Constitution, the U.S. Supreme Court would never brazenly rule against clear constitutional prohibitions!” That’s nonsense. The first clause of Article 1, Section 10 mandates that “No State shall … pass any … Law impairing the Obligation of Contracts.” During the Great Depression, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld a Minnesota law that restricted the ability of banks to foreclose on overdue mortgages, thereby impairing contracts made between lender and borrower. To prevent this kind of contract impairment — routinely done under the Articles of Confederation — was precisely why the Framers added the clause.

Another, perhaps more egregious example of the Supreme Court’s impairing contracts came during President Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal, when the government nationalized gold and made it a felony for any American to own gold. Not only was gold ownership made illegal but it nullified all “gold clauses” in private and government contracts. Writing contracts in gold was a way people protected themselves against government theft, namely inflation. The Supreme Court upheld federal nationalization of gold and nullification of gold contracts in the famous Gold Clause Cases. Today many Americans have turned to gold, driving its price to an all-time high, as a safeguard against what they see as pending inflation. Here’s my question to you: If Obama and Congress enacted a law demanding that you turn in your gold, would you be morally obligated to obey such a law?

Decent people should not obey immoral laws. What’s moral and immoral can be a contentious issue, but there are some broad guides for deciding what laws and government actions are immoral. Lysander S. Spooner, one of America’s great 19th-century thinkers, said no person or group of people can “authorize government to destroy or take away from men their natural rights; for natural rights are inalienable, and can no more be surrendered to government — which is but an association of individuals — than to a single individual.” French economist/philosopher Frederic Bastiat (1801-50) gave a test for immoral government acts: “See if the law benefits one citizen at the expense of another by doing what the citizen himself cannot do without committing a crime.” He added in his book “The Law,” “When law and morality contradict each other, the citizen has the cruel alternative of either losing his moral sense or losing his respect for the law.”

After reading Hornberger’s “Economic Liberty and the Constitution,” one cannot avoid the conclusion that the liberties envisioned by the nation’s founders have been under siege, trivialized and nullified. Philosopher Johann Wolfgang von Goethe explained that “no one is as hopelessly enslaved as the person who thinks he’s free.” That’s becoming an apt description for Americans who are oblivious to — or ignorant of — the liberties we’ve lost.

Dr. Williams serves on the faculty of George Mason University as the John M. Olin Distinguished Professor of Economics.

Copyright © Townhall.com. All Rights Reserved

Property Rights

by Armen A. Alchian
Library of Economics and Liberty

(Editor’s Note: Here’s a good basic lesson on property rights. One thing this author doesn’t talk about are the property rights inherent in a free-market hard money monetary system. That is, that a government is not stealing the value of your property…your money…through inflation by devaluing the money supply. That’s a deal-killer in secession. Either your money is your absolute property or it is not.)

One of the most fundamental requirements of a capitalist economic system—and one of the most misunderstood concepts—is a strong system of property rights. For decades social critics in the United States and throughout the Western world have complained that “property” rights too often take precedence over “human” rights, with the result that people are treated unequally and have unequal opportunities. Inequality exists in any society. But the purported conflict between property rights and human rights is a mirage. Property rights are human rights.

“The definition, allocation, and protection of property rights comprise one of the most complex and difficult sets of issues that any society has to resolve, but one that must be resolved in some fashion. For the most part, social critics of “property” rights do not want to abolish those rights. Rather, they want to transfer them from private ownership to government ownership. Some transfers to public ownership (or control, which is similar) make an economy more effective. Others make it less effective. The worst outcome by far occurs when property rights really are abolished.” (see tragedy of the commons).

A property right is the exclusive authority to determine how a resource is used, whether that resource is owned by government or by individuals. Society approves the uses selected by the holder of the property right with governmental administered force and with social ostracism. If the resource is owned by the government, the agent who determines its use has to operate under a set of rules determined, in the United States, by Congress or by executive agencies it has charged with that role.

Private property rights have two other attributes in addition to determining the use of a resource. One is the exclusive right to the services of the resource. Thus, for example, the owner of an apartment with complete property rights to the apartment has the right to determine whether to rent it out and, if so, which tenant to rent to; to live in it himself; or to use it in any other peaceful way. That is the right to determine the use. If the owner rents out the apartment, he also has the right to all the rental income from the property. That is the right to the services of the resources (the rent).

Finally, a private property right includes the right to delegate, rent, or sell any portion of the rights by exchange or gift at whatever price the owner determines (provided someone is willing to pay that price). If I am not allowed to buy some rights from you and you therefore are not allowed to sell rights to me, private property rights are reduced. Thus, the three basic elements of private property are (1) exclusivity of rights to choose the use of a resource, (2) exclusivity of rights to the services of a resource, and (3) rights to exchange the resource at mutually agreeable terms.

The U.S. Supreme Court has vacillated about this third aspect of property rights. But no matter what words the justices use to rationalize such decisions, the fact is that such limitations as price controls and restrictions on the right to sell at mutually agreeable terms are reductions of private property rights. Many economists (myself included) believe that most such restrictions on property rights are detrimental to society. Here are some of the reasons why.

Under a private property system the market values of property reflect the preferences and demands of the rest of society. No matter who the owner is, the use of the resource is influenced by what the rest of the public thinks is the most valuable use. The reason is that an owner who chooses some other use must forsake that highest-valued use—and the price others would pay him for the resource or for the use of it. This creates an interesting paradox: although property is called “private,” private decisions are based on public, or social, evaluation.

The fundamental purpose of property rights, and their fundamental accomplishment, is that they eliminate destructive competition for control of economic resources. Well-defined and well-protected property rights replace competition by violence with competition by peaceful means.

The extent and degree of private property rights fundamentally affect the ways people compete for control of resources. With more complete private property rights, market exchange values become more influential. The personal status and personal attributes of people competing for a resource matter less because their influence can be offset by adjusting the price. In other words, more complete property rights make discrimination more costly. Consider the case of a black woman who wants to rent an apartment from a white landlord. She is better able to do so when the landlord has the right to set the rent at whatever level he wants. Even if the landlord would prefer a white tenant, the black woman can offset her disadvantage by offering a higher rent. A landlord who takes the white tenant at a lower rent anyway pays for discriminating.

But if the government imposes rent controls that keep the rent below the free-market level, the price the landlord pays to discriminate falls, possibly to zero. The rent control does not magically reduce the demand for apartments. Instead, it reduces every potential tenant’s ability to compete by offering more money. The landlord, now unable to receive the full money price, will discriminate in favor of tenants whose personal characteristics—such as age, sex, ethnicity, and religion—he favors. Now the black woman seeking an apartment cannot offset the disadvantage of her skin color by offering to pay a higher rent.

Competition for apartments is not eliminated by rent controls. What changes is the “coinage” of competition. The restriction on private property rights reduces competition based on monetary exchanges for goods and services and increases competition based on personal characteristics. More generally, weakening private property rights increases the role of personal characteristics in inducing sellers to discriminate among competing buyers and buyers to discriminate among sellers.

The two extremes in weakened private property rights are socialism and “commonly owned” resources. Under socialism, government agents—those whom the government assigns—exercise control over resources. The rights of these agents to make decisions about the property they control are highly restricted. People who think they can put the resources to more valuable uses cannot do so by purchasing the rights because the rights are not for sale at any price. Because socialist managers do not gain when the values of the resources they manage increase, and do not lose when the values fall, they have little incentive to heed changes in market-revealed values. The uses of resources are therefore more influenced by the personal characteristics and features of the officials who control them. Consider the socialist manager of a collective farm under the old Soviet communist system. By working every night for one week, he could have made, say, one million rubles of additional profit for the farm by arranging to transport the farm’s wheat to Moscow before it rotted. But because neither the manager nor those who worked on the farm were entitled to keep even a portion of this additional profit, the manager was more likely than the manager of a capitalist farm to go home early and let the crops rot.

Similarly, common ownership of resources—whether in the former Soviet Union or in the United States—gives no one a strong incentive to preserve the resource. A fishery that no one owns, for example, will be overfished. The reason is that a fisherman who throws back small fish to wait until they grow is unlikely to get any benefit from his waiting. Instead, some other fisherman will catch the fish. The same holds true for other common resources whether they be herds of buffalo, oil in the ground, or clean air. All will be overused.

Indeed, a main reason for the spectacular failure of the 1980s and early 1990s economic reforms in the former Soviet Union is that resources were shifted from ownership by government to de facto common ownership. How? By making the Soviet government’s revenues de facto into a common resource. Harvard economist Jeffrey Sachs, who advised the Soviet government, once pointed out that when Soviet managers of socialist enterprises were allowed to open their own businesses but still were left as managers of the government’s businesses, they siphoned out the profits of the government’s business into their private corporations. Thousands of managers doing this caused a large budget deficit for the Soviet government. In this case the resource that no manager had an incentive to conserve was the Soviet government’s revenues. Similarly, improperly set premiums for U.S. deposit insurance gave banks and S&Ls (see savings and loan crisis) an incentive to make excessively risky loans and to treat the deposit insurance fund as a “common” resource.

Private property rights to a resource need not be held by a single person. They can be shared, with each person sharing in a specified fraction of the market value while decisions about uses are made in whatever process the sharing group deems desirable. A major example of such shared property rights is the corporation. In a limited liability corporation, shares are specified and the rights to decide how to use the corporation’s resources are delegated to its management. Each shareholder has the unrestrained right to sell his or her share. Limited liability insulates each shareholder’s wealth from the liabilities of other shareholders, and thereby facilitates anonymous sale and purchase of shares.

In other types of enterprises, especially where each member’s wealth will become uniquely dependent on each other member’s behavior, property rights in the group endeavor are usually salable only if existing members approve of the buyer. This is typical for what are often called joint ventures, “mutuals,” and partnerships.

While more complete property rights are preferable to less complete rights, any system of property rights entails considerable complexity and many issues that are difficult to resolve. If I operate a factory that emits smoke, foul smells, or airborne acids over your land, am I using your land without your permission? This is difficult to answer.

The cost of establishing private property rights—so that I could pay you a mutually agreeable price to pollute your air—may be too high. Air, underground water, and electromagnetic radiation, for example, are expensive to monitor and control. Therefore, a person does not effectively have enforceable private property rights to the quality and condition of some parcel of air. The inability to cost-effectively monitor and police uses of your resources means “your” property rights over “your” land are not as extensive and strong as they are over some other resources such as furniture, shoes, or automobiles. When private property rights are unavailable or too costly to establish and enforce, substitute means of control are sought. Government authority, expressed by government agents, is one very common such means. Hence the creation of environmental laws.

Depending on circumstances, certain actions may be considered invasions of privacy, trespass, or torts. If I seek refuge and safety for my boat at your dock during a sudden severe storm on a lake, have I invaded “your” property rights, or do your rights not include the right to prevent that use? The complexities and varieties of circumstances render impossible a bright-line definition of a person’s set of property rights with respect to resources.

Similarly, the set of resources over which property rights may be held is not well defined and demarcated. Ideas, melodies, and procedures, for example, are almost costless to replicate explicitly (near-zero cost of production) and implicitly (no forsaken other uses of the inputs). As a result, they typically are not protected as private property except for a fixed term of years under a patent or copyright.

Private property rights are not absolute. The rule against the “dead hand,” or perpetuities, is an example. I cannot specify how resources that I own will be used in the indefinitely distant future. Under our legal system, I can specify the use only for a limited number of years after my death or the deaths of currently living people. I cannot insulate a resource’s use from the influence of market values of all future generations. Society recognizes market prices as measures of the relative desirability of resource uses. Only to the extent that rights are salable are those values most fully revealed.

Accompanying and conflicting with the desire to secure private property rights for oneself is the desire to acquire more wealth by “taking” from others. This is done by military conquest and by forcible reallocation of rights to resources (also known as stealing). But such coercion is antithetical to—rather than characteristic of—a system of private property rights. Forcible reallocation means that the existing rights have not been adequately protected.

Private property rights do not conflict with human rights. They are human rights. Private property rights are the rights of humans to use specified goods and to exchange them. Any restraint on private property rights shifts the balance of power from impersonal attributes toward personal attributes and toward behavior that political authorities approve. That is a fundamental reason for preference of a system of strong private property rights: private property rights protect individual liberty.

Copyright ©2008 Liberty Fund, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Politician Personality Disorder aka Sociopathy

By Russell D. Longcore

The premise of this article is that persons who seek and hold elective office have latent, and often overt sociopathic personalities.

The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, fourth edition, DSM IV-TR = 301.7, a widely used manual for diagnosing mental disorders, defines ”antisocial personality disorder” as:¹

A) There is a pervasive pattern of disregard for and violation of the rights of others occurring since age 15 years, as indicated by three or more of the following:
1. failure to conform to social norms with respect to lawful behaviors as indicated by repeatedly performing acts that are grounds for arrest;
2. deception, as indicated by repeatedly lying, or conning others for personal profit or pleasure;
3. impulsiveness or failure to plan ahead;
4. irritability and aggressiveness, as indicated by repeated physical fights or assaults;
5. reckless disregard for safety of self or others;
6. consistent irresponsibility, as indicated by repeated failure to sustain consistent work behavior or honor financial obligations;
7. lack of remorse, as indicated by being indifferent to or rationalizing having hurt, mistreated, or stolen from another;
B) The individual is at least age 18 years.
C) There is evidence of conduct disorder with onset before age 15 years.
D) The occurrence of antisocial behavior is not exclusively during the course of schizophrenia or a manic episode.

Now, I’m going to list those characteristics again, and give examples in bold print after each characteristic. Some of this will be tongue-in-cheek, but that doesn’t mean it’s not true:

A) There is a pervasive pattern of disregard for and violation of the rights of others occurring since age 15 years (runs for Student Council, runs for Class President, editor of the school newspaper, becomes an attorney, etc.), as indicated by three or more of the following:
1. failure to conform to social norms with respect to lawful behaviors as indicated by repeatedly performing acts that are grounds for arrest (voting to violate the US or state constitution is a criminal act);
2. deception, as indicated by repeatedly lying (campaign pledges), or conning others for personal profit or pleasure; (accepting money from lobbyists, or voting to “save” the Ponzi schemes Social Security and Medicare);
3. impulsiveness or failure to plan ahead (voting for any bill without reading it, voting to spend tax money on unconstitutional acts, or raising the Federal debt ceiling to allow Washington to borrow more money it cannot repay);
4. irritability and aggressiveness, as indicated by repeated physical fights or assaults (in election season, going negative to destroy political opponents);
5. reckless disregard for safety of self or others (allowing the Department of Homeland Security and the TSA to even exist, voting for anything that violates the 2nd Amendment, 4th Amendment, 5th Amendment…pretty much any of the Amendments in the Bill of Rights);
6. consistent irresponsibility, as indicated by repeated failure to sustain consistent work behavior or honor financial obligations (a history of employment in government, spending tax money profligately, failing to pass balanced budgets, hiding off-budget spending, using government accounting principles instead of GAAP²);
7. lack of remorse, as indicated by being indifferent to or rationalizing having hurt, mistreated, or stolen from another (running for re-election);
B) The individual is at least age 18 years.
C) There is evidence of conduct disorder with onset before age 15 years.
D) The occurrence of antisocial behavior is not exclusively during the course of schizophrenia or a manic episode.

You see? Most politicians or wannabe politicians are sociopaths. You’d be hard pressed to find one that isn’t.

At DumpDC.com, we beat the drum incessantly for secession. But I don’t want you to get the idea that we believe that secession is some panacea…some utopia…some Nirvana. A seceded state, which would be a newly formed sovereign nation, will have a government formed and designed by human beings. That new nation would have the opportunity to craft a government built around individual liberty and property rights, founded in the Zero Aggression Principle (ZAP).

Haven’t heard of the Zero Aggression Principle? Thusly: that no one has the right, under any circumstances, to initiate force or fraud against another human being for any reason whatever; nor will a person or persons advocate the initiation of force or fraud, or delegate it to anyone else.

In light of the ZAP, the new nation would have to be very creative as it forms its own constitution and methods of governance. In most situations, government and the ZAP are mutually exclusive ethical systems and principles.

Government is force. Government relies upon the inevitable threat of violent force and/or death for its power. Think I’m overstating the cruelty of government? Let me give you three benign examples. Leave me a note if you disagree.

1. You get a parking ticket for $20.
– You do not pay your parking ticket.
– Eventually, the issuing law enforcement agency swears out a bench warrant for your arrest.
– A Law Enforcement Officer (LEO) may seek you out and attempt to place you under arrest. Or, you may be stopped for some other traffic infraction and the LEO finds your bench warrant when he does your background check. Either way, the LEO attempts to place you under arrest.
– You resist arrest.
– The LEO escalates his use of violence.
– You escalate your resistance.
– The LEO will draw his service firearm and use deadly force.
– You’re dead over a $20 parking ticket.

2. You fail to file your income tax return.
– The IRS contacts you to recommend that you file your return.
– You ignore them.
– The IRS attempts to confiscate your assets, attach your real property, clean out your bank account, or garnish your wages to collect tax, fines and penalties.
– You resist their attempts.
– Eventually, you will receive a visit from armed IRS agents. They may attempt to place you under arrest.
– You resist arrest.
– The agent escalates his use of violence.
– You escalate your resistance.
– The agent will draw his service firearm and use deadly force.
– You’re dead over a tax return.

3. You fail to pay your property tax.
– The taxing agency forecloses on your property.
– The county Sheriff comes to your property to evict you.
– You refuse to leave.
– The Sheriff attempts to place you under arrest.
– You resist.
– The Sheriff escalates his use of violence.
– You escalate your resistance.
– The Sheriff will draw his service firearm and use deadly force.
– You’re dead over unpaid property tax.

We here at DumpDC acknowledge that all government is evil. We also acknowledge that a seceding state will likely get most everything wrong when it tries to form a new national government. To the degree that the Founders adhere to the ZAP will tell the world how much the new nation’s politicians wish to use deadly force in their new laws. We believe that there is an inverse proportion to the number of laws and the degree of individual liberty. More laws, less liberty. More laws, more deadly force to enforce the laws.

The accretion of political power is the reason for living for the government worker or elected official, but is antithetical to being a true “public servant.”

May God help us as we pass from the United States of America to seceded new sovereign nations. May He help us find non-sociopathic leaders who truly have the heart of a servant.

Secession is the Hope For Mankind. Who will be first?

DumpDC. Six Letters That Can Change History.

[1] Antisocial personality disorder – Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders Fourth edition Text Revision (DSM-IV-TR) American Psychiatric Association (2000) – pages 645–650
[2]Generally Accepted Accounting Principles

© Copyright 2011, Russell D. Longcore. Permission to reprint in whole or in part is gladly granted, provided full credit is given.

Homosexual Marriage And Individual Liberty

by Russell D. Longcore

We can only hope that in a seceded state, the new lawmakers would have sense enough to stay away from this issue and allow people to live as they choose.

Homosexual marriage, or civil union, has always been kind of a mystery to me.

When I moved to Atlanta from a small town in Michigan in 1992, I had never even met a homosexual. Once I got here in Atlanta, I auditioned and was accepted into the Tenor section of the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra Chorus. Out of about 30 tenors, there were only two or three of us that were not gay men.

Quite a culture shock for me…the conservative Christian who was always told that homosexuals would burn in hell. But I met and became friends with individuals, not a group. They were kind, and warm, and caring, and genuinely wonderful people. My attitude toward homosexuals was forever changed. I don’t ascribe to their lifestyle, but neither do I stand in condemnation. That’s someone else’s job.

I’ve heard comedians say, “The homosexuals should have the right to be as miserable as the rest of us married people.”

Why should homosexuals want the blessing and licensure of the State on their relationships? What’s the big draw… the big benefit?

It doesn’t appear to be that the homosexuals want to be taken too seriously. The folks that march in Gay Pride parades don’t appear to be concerned with the straight world’s acceptance of their chosen lifestyle.

Could it be that they are looking for a legal status that will provide them monetary benefits that they cannot get today? Like Social Security, Medicare, pension and health care benefits?

The LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender) communities already have the right to have any kind of legal relationship they choose.

The Evangelicals who spend so much time denouncing homosexuals say that licensing homosexual marriage will undermine the “sanctity of marriage.”

Please.

First, if you have a faith or religious tradition you follow that prohibits homosexuality, fine. Practice your own individual behavior within the confines of your own conscience. But the states and the Federal Government of the USA are secular in nature, not Christian. Don’t presume to force your beliefs onto others.

Second, marriage got its start as a religious ceremony. And marriage should remain under the auspices of a religion. The State has no vested interest in marriages per se.

Third, if marriage was as sacred as our society tells us it is, the state legislatures would not have passed laws that made divorce so easy. Besides, why should any state have any licensure of a marriage? Is it only for the easy fees it generates? Is there any real difference between a marriage license and a dog license or business license?

Seems to me that the essence of this issue is the sanctity of contracts, not the sanctity of marriage.

There is nothing I know of that prevents any two or more people from entering into contract with each other. Two people can go to an attorney and have a legal document drafted that deals with: legal duties to each other, community property and the disposition of assets, legal duties to children of the “union,” procedure for dissolution of the agreement (kind of a civil divorce), and any other contractual terms the parties desired.

When the contract was acceptable to all parties, it could be signed and notarized. No preacher or judge would have to officiate…that’s just the romantic myth that accompanies the process. And, there is no license fee for executing a contract.

This should be the normal procedure for two people, regardless of sexual preference, who wish to be married. EVERYONE should draw up contracts for their non-religious civil unions. The prenuptial agreement is just such a contract. Isn’t it amazing that the “pre-nup” seems to be only used by those with considerable assets to protect? This speaks to the ridiculous romanticism surrounding religious marriage. I’m all for romance, but marriage is supposed to be a religious ceremony. What happens in a divorce is the legal part of civil union, and should be planned before the union occurs. Anything else is a denial of reality.

If the partners of a civil union want to have a little ceremony and a celebration following, great! Nothing prevents it but their budget.

You never see two guys, going into business as a remodeling contractor, draw up a partnership agreement, and then go get a pastor or priest to bless their partnership. Homosexuals don’t need it either.

If homosexuals would stop thinking about being slaves of the State, they could actually become leaders to the rest of the population. They could enter into their own legal relationship agreements, and completely forsake the blessing of the State. Tell the bureaucrats to stay out of their relationships, as well as their bedrooms.

Homosexuals, stop trying to curry the politicians’ favors, and show the rest of us a little taste of individual liberty.

Forsake state-approved “marriages” forever! Utilize contract law for civil unions, and enjoy your lives together in whatever form you choose!

DumpDC. Six Letters That Can Change History.

© Copyright 2011, Russell D. Longcore. Permission to reprint in whole or in part is gladly granted, provided full credit is given.

The Tragedy of Immigration Enforcement

by Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr.

(Editor’s Note: Lew proves that government is a thousand-armed monster, and at the end of each arm is a stinger. There is no way to interact with the monster without getting stung. Rather than deal with the millions of immigrants who are actually breaking the law, DC goes after the businesses who hire them. DC doesn’t have to chase the business owner…he is in a fixed location. Plus, even if the business goes through the process of trying to verify legal status, forged papers are easily created. So a business could do everything right and still be destroyed by Washington. That’s the country you live in folks. Don’t you think secession could remedy this disaster?)

Here’s the problem. If you give government a job to do, even one that seems justified in the abstract, it will use its power to make a terrible mess in practice. This is true in a host of areas from welfare to warfare, but it is even true in the complicated area of immigration.

Just imagine this. The owners of Chuy’s Mesquite Broiler in Phoenix and 13 other locations around western states have been kidnapped from their popular restaurants and dragged to jail. This will be followed by trial, and certain personal bankruptcy. They could face 80 years in prison. In the raid, “Homeland Security” stole their computers, their accounting and employment records, and walked out the door – just like a gang of thieves. The only difference is that these thugs operate under the cover of the law.

And what evil did these restaurateurs do? Were they poisoning people, stealing customers’ wallets, secretly running an assassination conspiracy, sending in the predator drones against people they hate, or what? To lock anyone away for life is a shocking sentence, so surely the punishment must fit the crime. Pyscho sniper-murderers have gotten less.

What they are alleged to have done is hired people who don’t have the proper bureaucratic forms filled out for them. That’s all. Nothing more. It is being done in the name of immigration enforcement and cracking down on illegals. The workers themselves are untouched by any of this. Their benefactors – and the benefactors of society – are the ones being targeted with police-state tactics.

The government is busting up a whole series of voluntary labor relationships that are designed to provide people with good food. Let us be clear: to the extent that many people object to illegal immigration, it has nothing to do with those who go to work and make an honest living doing things like working in restaurants. The problem with illegal immigration is related to other issues that drive people crazy, like going on welfare, engaging in actual (not pretend) crime, and demanding tax-funded support services.

People finding jobs to do and other wonderful commercial things is a praiseworthy aspect of immigration, legal or illegal. In fact, there are millions of jobs in this country that would simply not be done at the current price without such immigration, and this is true in a vast range of industries from housing to horticulture. American natives think too highly of themselves to accept these jobs at the market price.

And it is this very thing that government, given the power to enforce immigration statutes, wants to crack down on, not by rounding up workers, which would be bad enough, but by criminally prosecuting the business owners themselves, the people who are not only providing jobs but also providing good food for the public. The whole thing boggles the mind.

But the utilitarian will object. Yes, these tactics are rough, with results that are regrettable for property owners and those who like to dine out, but at least it helps address our nation’s problems with illegal immigration.

But will it? If mainstream employers are afraid of lifetime jail terms, they will not hire. And that leaves only marginal employers to pick up the slack. These include drug operations, fly-by-night underground businesses, gray markets, prostitution rings, and other things from the seedier side of life.

Or the result could be no employment at all, which means turning to crime itself. In other words, these efforts attempt to stop the best part of immigration and enhance the worst. For this we can thank the government.

Try to think of this issue in terms of the risk to attempting illegal immigration. No one on the other side of the border, faced with a porous fence, is thinking: I’ll take this risk only on the condition that I can go to work for Chuy’s Mesquite Broiler.

No, they will come anyway. In order to eliminate every possible job opportunity for immigrants, the Obama administration will have to jail and terrorize vast numbers, destroying the commercial life of major swaths of the country. This is a catastrophic plan that amounts to a fundamental attack on liberty, and the nationalization of the service industry. (I should add that I prefer illegal immigration to legal, since we have far too many citizens able to vote themselves other people’s property, and too few people who want to work hard for a living.)

Just as George Bush used national security as the great excuse to shred the Bill of Rights, the Obama administration is using illegal immigration as the excuse to achieve the socialist dream of bringing employer-employee relations entirely under government purview. It is a form of micro-nationalization.

And why? Socialist ideology plays a role here, and another authoritarian anti-market ideology, protectionism. But if you look closely enough at this enforcement, you will find the hand of Obama affiliated big labor unions at work behind the scenes. It’s not that they are against immigrants. The unions hate any employee who works for the going market wage. As their power and influence continues to fall, if not in DC, they are resorting to ever more desperate tactics to shore up their slipping cartel.

You can see, then, that this crack down has nothing to do with nationalism or racialism or securing the borders or anything else. It is all about bolstering the power of the state and its unions over the American economy, and making the rest of us poorer.

Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr., former editorial assistant to Ludwig von Mises and congressional chief of staff to Ron Paul, is founder and chairman of the Mises Institute, executor for the estate of Murray N. Rothbard, and editor of LewRockwell.com.

Copyright © 2011 by LewRockwell.com.

Prosecute John Murphy

by Daniel Miller, President
Texas Nationalist Movement

This week John Murphy of the Department of Justice issued a threat to the Texas Senate that amounted to a blockade of our airports. For those of you who are unaware of this situation, the basics of it are as follows:

Texas Representative David Simpson introduced a bill in the Texas House during this session that specifically addressed the criminal nature of airport pat-downs by the TSA. Although their violation of the privacy of Texans by the touching and groping of genitals during these pat-downs is already a crime under Texas law, Representative Simpson felt that the TSA procedures needed to be singled out for their particular heinous nature.

The bill soared through the House committee and passed with almost no opposition from either party on the floor. The bill was then transmitted to the Texas Senate for consideration and a vote.

In the meantime, the social networking wizards in the US Department of Justice “blogged” about the bill and whined that it was wrong for a state to pass a law regulating the Federal Government and its agents.

However, despite the whining of the DOJ, the bill had support in the Texas Senate and looked as though it was on its way to passage before the session ended. After all, who wants to be seen as legitimizing sexual assault even if it is by the Federal Government?

Then it happened. What would be described as an “act of war” had it been done to the United States was laid squarely at the feet of a Vichy Texas Senator and a Lieutenant Governor with Federal aspirations.

Fearing passage of this bill, John Murphy of the United States Attorney’s Office for the Western District fired off a warning letter to Lt. Governor David Dewhurst and Speaker of the House Joe Straus. The warning – kill the bill or we’ll shut down ALL air travel in Texas.

This threat would have emboldened previous generations of Texas who would have hoisted the “Come And Take It” flag over the capitol and stationed DPS and Texas Rangers at the airports “just in case”. However, the current occupants of the top leadership in the Texas Legislature began to sweat like a chihuahua trying to excrete a peach pit.

In a fit of “what do we do now?” Dewhurst found a willing accomplice in State Senator Kirk Watson. Always quick to prove that is the most loyal lapdog of the “powers that be” he locked arms with Dewhurst as they tip-toed through the tulips of the Texas Senate communicating the threat and finding twelve others that would skip along with them.

With this threat and the reaction of the tip-toe twelve, the bill was dead.

Attempts to resurrect it in the eleventh hour were fruitless.

Of course this is only one reason among many that we need to secede from the Union. However, there is something that Texas should do immediately.

You see, I am an avid reader of the Texas statutes. As such, something about this rang a bell for me. I knew that I had read at one time that threatening a public servant was a crime.

It is.

In the Texas Penal Code are two statutes that apply. The first:

Sec. 36.06. OBSTRUCTION OR RETALIATION. (a) A person commits an offense if he intentionally or knowingly harms or threatens to harm another by an unlawful act:

(1) in retaliation for or on account of the service or status of another as a:

(A) public servant, witness, prospective witness, or informant; or

(c) An offense under this section is a felony of the third degree unless the victim of the offense was harmed or threatened because of the victim’s service or status as a juror, in which event the offense is a felony of the second degree.

The second:

Sec. 36.03. COERCION OF PUBLIC SERVANT OR VOTER. (a) A person commits an offense if by means of coercion he:

(1) influences or attempts to influence a public servant in a specific exercise of his official power or a specific performance of his official duty or influences or attempts to influence a public servant to violate the public servant’s known legal duty; or

(b) An offense under this section is a Class A misdemeanor unless the coercion is a threat to commit a felony, in which event it is a felony of the third degree.

The questions that have to be answered:

Did John Murphy threaten to harm anyone?

Of course he threatened harm. His threat was to close down air travel in Texas. The harms are obviously economic but even more than that. He threatened to deny us the right to freely travel using the method that we feel is most expedient. Yep. He threatened to harm us.

Was it the threat of an unlawful act?

It was definitely unlawful. First, the Department of Justice does not regulate air travel. However, he might have been speaking on behalf of someone else. Regardless, this threat was unlawful under Federal law. Title 42 of the United States code makes it unlawful for a Federal agent or employee to deny a person their civil rights. That includes the right to travel and the right to vote and have a republican form of government. His actions directly impacted my right and the right of all Texans to have a republican form of government. Was the threat unlawful? Check.

Was the threat for the purpose of coercing behavior from the Texas Senate?

You bet. Unfortunately for Texas, it worked. He told them specifically what needed to be done through the ultimatum.

Where do we go from here?

It’s simple for me. I’m going to continue organizing the people that want Texas independence and we are going to take Texas back from thugs like John Murphy and from collaborators like Kirk Watson and David Dewhurst. And I’m going to do it in a way that they can’t stop. Poltically. Economically. Culturally. We will build our numbers and we will secure Texas independence. This is the path that must be taken. It’s one that I walk every day so nothing will change in this regard.

However, I do intend to add two additional items to my task list. As soon as I finish typing this, I’m going to file a criminal complaint with the Attorney General’s Office against John Murphy. Next, I’m calling my attorney to file a Title 42 Federal lawsuit against John Murphy for violating my right to enjoy a republican form of government.

You do what you wish, however I suggest that you join the Texas Nationalist Movement now. Otherwise, this is only going to get worse.

Daniel Miller is President of the Texas Nationalist Movement. Join today.

The Common Law Grand Jury: Secession’s Nuclear Weapon

By Russell D. Longcore

Just this week, writer Marilyn M. Barnewall introduced me to the Constitutional concept of the Common Law Grand Jury. I was aware that the Fifth Amendment provided for a grand jury, but until now I was not aware of either its history, its power nor its availability to The People. I’m a pretty wide reader of things political. And I do not remember seeing anything anywhere about the Common Law Grand Jury.

We are all taught in school…that is, if we get any information about the Constitution at all…that the Constitution established three branches of government, Executive, Legislative and Judicial. Curiously missing from our education is the separate fourth “branch” of government, the Common Law Grand Jury. It operates entirely independently from the Federal government, and its power has not changed since 1789 when the Constitution was ratified. Actually, the Grand Jury finds its roots in the Magna Carta (originally issued in 1215), and was always meant to be a way for The People to control the government.

Here is why this is such an important concept to groups such as the Texas Nationalist Movement, the Hawaiian Independence Movement and the Second Vermont Republic…organized groups of people dedicated to bringing about secession and the status of sovereign nation for their respective states. As we have seen in the Texas Legislature this session, not one elected official had the courage to even introduce a bill to have Texans vote on whether they even wanted the State of Texas to secede from the Union. No politician can be seen as a friend of secession and independence. So with legislative defeats freshly handed to the TNM, where can it go for a redress of grievances? What can the TNM…or any other secessionist movement…do to make an end run around their state houses and push forward toward secession?

They can use the power of the Common Law Grand Jury.

Perhaps you are well aware of the Common Law Grand Jury. For those to whom this is a new concept, I invite you to read on, and then click on the link below to read a paper written by Roger Roots and published in the Creighton State University School of Law Review.

Exerpted from the preface: “The loss of the grand jury in its traditional, authentic, or runaway form, leaves the modern federal government with few natural enemies capable of delivering any sort of damaging blows against it. The importance of this loss of a once powerful check on the “runaway” federal government is a focus that has remained largely untouched in the legal literature.

This article examines the historic decrease in the powers of the American grand jury during the twentieth century. It introduces the subject of the grand jury in the context of the constitutional language which invoked it, and then compares the modern application of the institution at the federal level with its common law model. Tracing the historic evolution of the grand jury as an anti-government institution in the English common law until its “capture” by the government in the mid-twentieth century, this article will demonstrate how the role of the grand jury has changed considerably over time. Finally, this article will argue that the modern loss of “runaway” or independent grand juries is unconstitutional and recommend a restoration of the grand jury’s historic powers.”

To read all about the Common Law Grand Jury, go to: The Common Law Grand Jury

DumpDC. Six Letters That Can Change History.

© Copyright 2011, Russell D. Longcore. Permission to reprint in whole or in part is gladly granted, provided full credit is given.

The Bankruptcy of American Colony/States

by Russell Longcore

We all know that Washington’s government is broke. But nearly every colony/state of the Union is also in desperate financial trouble. They have nearly all spent profligately. But their underfunded pension obligations are going to sink them aside from too much spending. And Federal law doesn’t permit colony/states to declare bankruptcy.

I just want to point out that if a colony/state seceded from the Union to become a nation once again, it would likely shed enough Federal debt and Federally-mandated spending that it could balance its budget once again. And now the new nation would not be subject to Federal bankruptcy laws. That doesn’t mean it should stiff its creditors, but it could facilitate restructuring and payment of its obligations.

Also remember the old saying…”The thinking that got us here will not get us where we want to go.” There will need to be an entirely new group of leaders who move away from the republic to secession and new nationhood.

The Daily Beast has an article about colony/state bankruptcy that you should read.

CLICK HERE to see how badly your state is doing.

Secession is the Hope For Mankind. Who will be first?

DumpDC. Six Letters That Can Change History.

© Copyright 2011, Russell D. Longcore. Permission to reprint in whole or in part is gladly granted, provided full credit is given.

The Question Is

by Eric Peters

The question isn’t whether you’re a liberal or conservative.

Who can say what either of those labels means anymore? Like “Christian,” a liberal (or a conservative) can be anything he wants to be and still claim the label.

The question, I think, is whether you’re an authoritarian.

It is a question that neatly cleaves one group of people from another. There’s no hedging, no getting around the central thing – which is: Do you – or don’t you – support using force to compel other people to do what you want them to do? If you do, then you are an authoritarian. It does not matter whether your desire to control others is based on “liberal” goals or “conservative” ones.

To your victims, the defining thing is force.

Modern “conservative” authoritarianism most typically expresses itself in literal blood lust. They are eager to go to war, as the first resort. (Our turgid ex-Decider’s fight fer freedom in Iraq being the obvious recent example.) They are remarkably untroubled by the indiscriminate death and destruction that result, taking the attitude that one must break eggs to make an omelette.

“Liberal” authoritarians on the other hand, like to believe they are helping people – by forcing them to do X or Y (or making X pay so that Y may have). The typical liberal authoritarian is (unlike the “conservative authoritarian) personally mild-mannered and gentle-seeming. He, personally, would never resort to violence. But he is enthusiastic to see the government use force to achieve aims he deems worthy. (A recent example is heff cayuh reform. The liberal authoritarian delights in seeing the government force people to buy a product he thinks they should have – even though they may disagree with him- and hugs the very strange idea that heff cayuh – that is, medical supplies and the time/talent of doctors, etc. – is a right to which everyone is entitled.)

The common denominator is – force. We demand that you do This or That and if you do not comply, we shall literally assault you.

It is never put quite that plainly, but it is the bottom line.

Refuse to be drafted to kill and maim strangers in another country who have done you no harm (or fund the system that does it in your name) and the “conservative” authoritarian will insist that you be imprisoned. Fail to “purchase” the heff cayuh insurance that the “liberal” authoritarian demands you “purchase” and he will be pleased to first fine you and, should you decline to pay the fine, eventually, seize your assets or (failing that) seize you.

The “conservative” authoritarian assuages any misgivings his stunted humanity might still cling to by telling himself that security, or The National Interest (or even worse, “protecting our freedoms”) justifies the open-ended, never-to-be-questioned sacrificial offerings to the arms merchants and war profiteers.

The “liberal” authoritarian tells himself that he is working for equality – or toward a just society.

Neither takes the time to ask himself: Would I put my next-door neighbor in prison (or threaten him with violence) if he declined to do as I wish and asked that I leave him in peace?

Because probably 90 percent of the population has never even thought to ask themselves this crucible of a question, we find ourselves living in what amounts to a (somewhat) controlled orgy of reciprocal looting and assault lacquered over with euphemisms about “democracy.” It pulls one way or the other, but in the end, the result is always the same.

“Liberal” authoritarians win a legislative victory one year – and millions are forced to buy the product of a private, for-profit business (heff cayuh insurance). “Conservative” authoritarians seize control and, suddenly, we are literally assaulted by government agents before being allowed to get on a commercial airplane.

From the Macro at the federal level to the Micro at the local/county level, this is the nature of the process – and the system.

The question that is never asked is: Do I have any right to impose my will on my neighbor, who is doing me no harm? For to ask that simple but penetrating question – and to come to grips with the moral implications of the answer – would cause the “conservative” and “liberal” authoritarian alike to suddenly see the blood each have on their hands.

So, the question is never asked.

It is not unlike the attitude of the ordinary German villagers in the towns near the Camps. Look away; don’t ask what’s going on.

No – it’s worse than that.

The German villagers were caught up in events beyond their control. Self-preservation strongly encouraged silence – even complicity. To raise one’s voice meant risking finding oneself on the other side of the barbed wire. But to their credit as human beings, they were not egging on the guards and urging them to round up more victims.

And this is precisely what both the “liberal” and “conservative” American Authoritarian do. And they do it lustily, basking in the Rightness of their cause.

You can sometimes literally see the delicious malice in their eyes. (Watch The Chimp’s press conferences and interviews – or those of his likely successor, The Alaskan Autocrat – to remind yourself).

Lenin – one of the Philosopher Kings of authoritarianism – defined politics as “who does what to whom.”

It is a definition that both “liberals” and “conservatives” agree on.

Eric Peters is an automotive columnist and author of Automotive Atrocities and Road Hogs (2011). Visit his website.

Copyright © 2010 Eric Peters