Today's the day, folks. Put the fireworks away. Close up the picnic basket. Sit the kiddies down around you. Then, reach for that text we call the "Declaration of Independence." At a mere 1,300+ words, it will not take very long to read. And, if you don't have a copy handy, go over to the Constitution.org page and rip off one. http://www.constitution.org/usdeclar.htm

Because, it's about time we had a little discussion about freedom -- from the point of view of the Founding Fathers. And the Declaration of Independence is a very good starting point. Besides, many of the complaints the Founders had with the King are again very pertinent.

Thomas Jefferson set the tone for us again today:

Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed.

That's where we are now: suffering the loss of our personal freedom under that ever reaching hand of the central government. Everything in our lives from womb to tomb is controlled by the federal government. Like indentured serfs or share croppers, government takes half of everything we make throughout our life and, at death, takes half of what we have managed to accumulate after taxes.

Worse yet, federal agents constantly violate the Fourth Amendment by spying on the American people a la Big Brother. For instance, federal laws requiring banks to report any "suspicious transactions" to a massive IRS computer require that banks report deposits or withdrawals of more than $10,000.

Or, federal officers just "take" personal possessions with no real reason other than they have the guns. Last year, the Justice Department confiscated 42,454 cars, boats, houses, and other belongings -- valued at over $604 million -- from Americans who were never convicted of any crime.

To start the discussion, here are a few similarities between the Colonists and the King and today's American citizen and the overbearing central government.

He has refused his assent to laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

He has forbidden his governors to pass laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

 

And so it is today, because the federal government has set one size fits all laws, rules and regulations. State and local governments are relegated to little more than setting speed limits and taxing. They need federal permission for anything important.

The U.S. General Accounting Office reported that between April 1, 1996 and March 31, 1999, the federal government issued more than 12,925 new regulatory rules. Of these, 188 were listed as 'major rules.' A major rule is defined as a new regulation estimated to cost Americans more than $100 million each year. That's what they call "reinventing government" today.

Few of us know anything about any of these "rules," but we can end up in prison for not obeying them. Worse, in 1995 there were already over 200 thick books of rules and regulations we are all expected to obey."

"He has erected a multitude of new offices, and sent hither swarms of officers to harass our people, and eat out their substance." And so it is today. The federal government is the largest employer in the United States, and many of these bureaucrats have nearly unlimited power over the people. Worse, many in the bureaucracy actually believe their positions are necessary.

"He has kept among us, in times of peace, standing armies without the consent of our legislature."

The Constitution does not give the federal government plenary authority within the States. Law enforcement is a State matter. Yet, there is a standing army of over 70,000 well armed federal agents wandering the country who are accountable to no one. They kill people -- Ruby Ridge and Waco are well known examples -- with impunity. All should be disarmed. Because, there is no reason they cannot call the sheriff or local police for protection like everyone else.

One function for the gunslingers of the federal government would be to protect our borders. Yet, the government is a complete failure at that task. We are inundated with illegal aliens -- and tons of illegal drugs.

The Declaration of Independence is said to be the promise. The Constitution is the implementation. Both are instructions from the people to government. Both must be enforced by the people.

We are the people. But, we have not been supervising our public servants. And, if we do not put our collective foot down really quick, the tables will turn and we will soon become their servants.

Some bureaucrats already act like the American people are their servants. That is why the Declaration of Independence is again starting to become very applicable.

Back in April, the environmental whackos blew a few tons of hot air and CO2 at another of their air pollution meetings. And, of course, they identified a new source of atmospheric pollution.

As Reuters reported: The meteorologists attending a world summit on climate change in the Costa Rican capital San Jose called on the industrial powers to recognize that airplanes along with industry were contributing to global warming.

"Airplanes emit gasses that change the atmosphere and exacerbate the greenhouse effect, such as carbon dioxide, methane, water vapor, sulfates and soot," said Ram Sundararam, secretary of the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Sundararam then urged airplane manufacturers to start taking into account the damage to the environment caused by aircraft.

Well folks, if you believe in the global warming myth, they've got a good point there. And here in the United States, it is a very interesting point, too.

Air transportation is one of the areas in which EPA fears to tread. Yet, many airports are among the top 10 industrial air pollution sources in their cities. Nationwide, aircraft contribute only about 1 percent of smog-forming gases. Still, while pollution from other sources is stabilizing or decreasing, the pollution from airports continues to grow. In fact, due to the growth in air travel and the lack of controls on airport pollution, airports are probably America's largest pollution growth segment.

For instance, just one 747 arriving and departing from the average airport produces as much smog as a car driven over 5,600 miles, and as much polluting nitrogen oxides as a car driven nearly 26,500 miles. Locally, the Kentucky airport hosts about 1,200 aircraft daily, and many of those are large cargo planes -- which are allowed to use the oldest, noisiest and dirtiest engines available.

Aircraft, of course, do not use catalytic converters. And, they certainly do not get tail-pipe tests. Yet, they are fuel driven vehicles. Politically speaking, though, aircraft are the "third rail" of environmentalism. That's because the Lords and Ladies of Capitol Hill are very frequent flyers and will not allow themselves to be inconvenienced. Then, there's also a seldom spoken fact about campaign contributions and lobbyist provided perks. . . .

So, figure what 1,000+ aircraft per day can do for local air quality. Then, ask your friendly EPA air control regulator why the hell they are messing with the working folks' little automobiles when the airport gets to pump out ten to one-hundred thousand pounds of pollution a day. One may gain a little insight into the problem by the string of gratuitous expletives used in the reply.

Anyway, the green-on-the-outside and red-on-the-inside environmental groups report that airplanes account for up to 4% of two global warming gases: carbon dioxide and nitrogen oxide. Their analysts predict that, within 50 years, airplanes will account for as much as 10% of all such pollution. Many of us continue to tell them that if half of us would plant just one tree once a year all that would go away. But, never mind.

According to the bureaucrats at EPA, airports create smog, contaminate waterways and contribute to global warming. They also generate significant amounts of noise pollution. However, there is not a damn thing EPA can do about it, so they place the burden on personal vehicles.

One thing Craig Brown did not mention last week in his piece about the groups fighting personal vehicle tail-pipe testing in Northern Kentucky was that their local airport was allowed to expand again.

A very expensive environmental impact study was completed in preparation for the airport expansion, and some very interesting details were gleaned. The area has not been out of what EPA calls "attainment" for over a decade. So, EPA allowed the airport to expand and add yet another few hundred flights daily.

But, just to be sure the people of Northern Kentucky shall not violate air quality, some EPA honcho sitting in Atlanta, GA unilaterally demanded that their personal vehicles be tested. As the bureaucratic story goes, some EPA air testing center about 60 miles (in Ohio) north of the closest point in Northern Kentucky was out of "attainment" a couple times years ago. And, the airport is expanding.

So, from EPA's point of view, someone must pay. Trucks, trains, buses and aircraft are protected. Transient traffic through the area cannot be regulated. That leaves only the people who live there to control.

We have shown time after time that this is an unconstitutional -- and hence, illegal -- act. But, that means nothing to members of government. Therefore, it is time to force them to touch that third rail and watch 'em squirm.

First Congress tries to get its regulatory foot in the door by censoring us "for the protection of the children" who don't belong in the Internet unsupervised, anyway. Then, goofy Al Gore has unelected bureaucrats at FCC tax us in a round-about way. Lately, a group of governors and mayors want to tax us, saying they are missing about $149-million in tax revenue -- which, in effect, amounts to peanuts when divided by 50 states and over 100 municipalities. Now comes the big-boy on the web saying it owns all intellectual data users place on web sites on their computers.

Such is the state of freedom here in the land of the free. Apparently, we are little more than serf-citizen profit centers for those with deep pockets. They are starting to act like they own us and everything we have or produce.

The latest assault on common sense comes from the legal-eagles at Yahoo, which just acquired the GeoCities system. On June 25, Yahoo presented web page publishers on GeoCities with some "new terms." Under those new terms of service, web page publishers must give Yahoo a "royalty-free, perpetual, irrevocable, non-exclusive and fully sublicensable right and license to use, reproduce, modify, adapt, publish, translate, create derivative works from, distribute, perform and display such content." Which means, they can sell any of your intellectual property to anyone at any time and there is nothing you can do about it.

Yahoo says they own the work of all web site publishers on their system. So, if and when they market it, they keep all profits.

Worse yet, according to reports by Declan McCullagh at Wired News and others, Yahoo froze out all web page publishers on the GeoCities system until they agree to the new terms. Which means, web page publishers cannot even remove their pages from the offending system.

"Yahoo, which launched its Yahoo-GeoCities site [last] Monday, says it owns all Web pages, articles, and images on member sites and has 'irrevocable' rights to them for all time," McCullagh reports. "This presents a problem for those GeoCities members who have painstakingly assembled large sites with dozens, even hundreds, of pages of valuable material."

Yeah, no doubt! It's what is called a damn, dirty trick, too. At the very least, Yahoo could have given people a warning so they could remove whatever information and data they did not wish to give to Yahoo.

Apparently, Yahoo is not the only corporation pulling that type of stuff, either. Tripod also has the same deal for web page publishers using its system. Tripod claims to have "a royalty-free, perpetual, irrevocable, nonexclusive, worldwide, unrestricted license to use, copy, modify, transmit, distribute, and publicly perform or display the submitted Member Web Page."

As Sandeep Junnarkar reported June 30 at CNET News.com: "Previous GeoCities users are flocking to the 'Boycottyahoo' site, hoping the pressure will persuade Yahoo to withdraw or change the terms of service that users must agree to before they can edit or update their Yahoo-GeoCities Web pages." The boycott site can be found at: http://www.sitepowerup.com/boycottyahoo/boycottyahoo.htm

The "Boycottyahoo" site urges users to stop using Yahoo to show the company that there is "a large, diverse Internet outside" the Yahoo network, which includes Broadcast.com. "Don't buy products from merchants at 'shopping.Yahoo.com,' and let them know why," one of the message on the site reads.

It appears that the boycott may be working, too. As of this writing, Yahoo began backing down from that ridiculous stunt. Tripod is making noises about softening its position, too. And, other servers are now advertising that they do not do that.

"This is huge folks," writes Jim Townsend (aka: "Vor the Admin"). "By simply rocking Yahoo's boat a little we've helped start a chain of events which will, eventually, change the nature of the ToS of every significant free web space provider on the net." He then goes on to propose the adoption of a "Homesteader's Bill of Rights" to be presented to providers.

There will be no freedom on the Internet unless we all work to enforce it. Therefore, we must be relentless and fight any government or group attempting to rein us in. And, if that includes a few providers . . . well, so be it. After all, we made them and we can destroy them.

Meanwhile, perhaps web page publishers will remember to add that little copyright mark and say that ALL rights are reserved -- before a server "changes the rules."

The text and the structure of the Constitution protect various rights and principles. Many of these, such as the right to trial by jury and the prohibition on unreasonable searches and seizures, derive from the common law. The common-law lineage of these rights does not mean they are defeasible by statute or remain mere common-law rights, however. They are, rather, constitutional rights, and form the fundamental law of the land.¹

By the same token, the contours of sovereign immunity [of the States] are determined by the founders' understanding, not by the principles or limitations derived from natural law.¹

The Constitution, after all, treats the powers of the States differently from the powers of the Federal Government. As we explained in Hall: "In view of the Tenth Amendment's reminder that powers not delegated to the Federal Government nor prohibited to the States are reserved to the States or to the people, the existence of express limitations on state sovereignty may equally imply that caution should be exercised before concluding that unstated limitations on state power were intended by the Framers."¹

The Federal Government, by contrast, "can claim no powers which are not granted to it by the constitution, and the powers actually granted must be such as are expressly given, or given by necessary implication." Martin v. Hunter's Lessee, (1816); see also City of Boerne v. Flores, (1997); United States v. Lopez, (1995).¹

We believe, however, that the founders' silence is best explained by the simple fact that no one, not even the Constitution's most ardent opponents, suggested the document might strip the States of the immunity.¹

Our historical analysis is supported by early congressional practice, which provides "contemporaneous and weighty evidence of the Constitution's meaning." Printz.¹

By "splitting the atom of sovereignty," the founders established "two orders of government, each with its own direct relationship, its own privity, its own set of mutual rights and obligations to the people who sustain it and are governed by it." Saenz v. Roe, (1999), quoting U.S. Term Limits, Inc. v. Thornton, (1995) (concurring opinion). "The Constitution thus contemplates that a State's government will represent and remain accountable to its own citizens." Printz. When the Federal Government asserts authority over a State's most fundamental political processes, it strikes at the heart of the political accountability so essential to our liberty and republican form of government.¹

States are not mere political subdivisions of the United States. State governments are neither regional offices nor administrative agencies of the Federal Government. The positions occupied by state officials appear nowhere on the Federal Government's most detailed organizational chart. The Constitution instead 'leaves to the several States a residuary and inviolable sovereignty,' (The Federalist No. 39), reserved explicitly to the States by the Tenth Amendment.²

Whatever the outer limits of that sovereignty may be, one thing is clear: The Federal Government may not compel the States to enact or administer a Federal regulatory program.²

Congress has vast power but not all power. When Congress legislates in matters affecting the States, it may not treat these sovereign entities as mere prefectures or corporations. Congress must accord States the esteem due to them as joint participants in a federal system, one beginning with the premise of sovereignty in both the central Government and the separate States. Congress has ample means to ensure compliance with valid federal laws, but it must respect the sovereignty of the States ¹

Although the Constitution begins with the principle that sovereignty rests with the people, it does not follow that the National Government becomes the ultimate, preferred mechanism for expressing the people's will. The States exist as a refutation of that concept. In choosing to ordain and establish the Constitution, the people insisted upon a federal structure for the very purpose of rejecting the idea that the will of the people in all instances is expressed by the central power, the one most remote from their control.¹

We have always understood that even where Congress has the authority under the Constitution to pass laws requiring or prohibiting certain acts, it lacks the power directly to compel the States to require or prohibit those acts. ... The allocation of power contained in the Commerce Clause, for example, authorizes Congress to regulate interstate commerce directly; it does not authorize Congress to regulate state governments' regulation of interstate commerce.²

But whether or not a particularly strong federal interest enables federal regulation, no Member of the Court has ever suggested that such a federal interest would enable Congress to command a state government to enact state regulations. No matter how powerful the federal interest involved, the Constitution simply does not give Congress the authority to require the States to regulate.²

Where Congress exceeds its authority relative to the States, therefore, the departure from the constitutional plan cannot be ratified by the "consent" of state officials. An analogy to the separation of powers among the Branches of the Federal Government clarifies this point. The Constitution's division of power among the three Branches is violated where one Branch invades the territory of another, whether or not the encroached-upon Branch approves the encroachment. … The constitutional authority of Congress cannot be expanded by the "consent" of the governmental unit whose domain is thereby narrowed, whether that unit is the Executive Branch or the States.²

Much of the Constitution is concerned with setting forth the form of our government, and the courts have traditionally invalidated measures deviating from that form. The result may appear "formalistic" in a given case to partisans of the measure at issue, because such measures are typically the product of the era's perceived necessity. But the Constitution protects us from our own best intentions: It divides power among sovereigns and among branches of government precisely so that we may resist the temptation to concentrate power in one location as an expedient solution to the crisis of the day.³

We held in New York that Congress cannot compel the States to enact or enforce a federal regulatory program. Today we hold that Congress cannot circumvent that prohibition by conscripting the State's officers directly. The Federal Government may neither issue directives requiring the States to address particular problems, nor command the State's officers or those of their political subdivisions, to administer or enforce a federal regulatory program. It matters not whether policy making is involved, and no case-by-case weighing of the burdens or benefits is necessary; such commands are fundamentally incompatible with our constitutional system of dual sovereignty.³

The Federal Government may not compel the States to implement, by legislation or executive action, federal regulatory programs. … We warned that this Court never has sanctioned explicitly a federal command to the States to promulgate and enforce laws and regulations, "The Federal Government," we held, "may not compel the States to enact or administer a federal regulatory program."³

1. Alden et al. v. Maine No. 98-436. June 23, 1999

http://supct.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/98-436.ZS.html

2. New York vs. U.S. et al 488 U.S. 1041 (1992)

http://supct.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/91-543.ZS.html

3. Printz, v. U.S. (95-1478, 1997)

http://laws.findlaw.com/US/000/95-1478.html

(This is Jeff in central Michigan) 

  ** uhuh **

The President said he is reducing taxes.

uhuh.

Congress says they are balancing the budget.

uhuh. Sez who?

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