“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.” — Amendment 1, United States Constitution
Raleigh, NC — The state of North Carolina is one of the least affected states in the country with regard to the current COVID-19 outbreak. With just over 5,000 confirmed cases and only 108 deaths related to the virus, many citizens are growing wary of the state’s lockdown order and are demanding things go back to normal.
On Tuesday, more than 100 protesters took the the city streets of Raleigh, North Carolina to voice their desire to reopen the the state’s economy. They were quickly met with police action but the well-organized protesters stood their ground through multiple threats.
According to the News and Observer, the protest was organized by ReopenNC, a private Facebook group organized last week that wants people to make their own stay-at-home decisions to avoid exposure to COVID-19 as the worldwide pandemic continues. The group surpassed 28,000 members on Tuesday afternoon.
When the protest began, the Raleigh police department put out a tweet that is sure to go down in history books as they declared the Constitutional right to peaceably assemble, otherwise known as the First Amendment — “non-essential.”
During the protest, the police department filmed their officers ordering the crowd to disperse as their commands fell on deaf ears.
“You are in violation of the executive order,” said a police captain. “You are posing a risk to public health. If you do not disperse, you will be taken and processed at Wake County jail.”
Every 15 minutes during the protest, roughly 50 cars honked their horns in unison.
“You should be ashamed of yourself,” said one protester.
“Are you goons of Cooper or servants of the people?” said another, in reference to governor Roy Cooper’s executive order.
“We are in violation of Comrade Cooper’s order,” said Leonard Harrison of Mebane. “If I get locked up today, I’m OK with that. As North Carolinians, we need to get back to work.”
After multiple threats of arrest and police force, most of the protesters finally began to disperse — only under duress.
One person did get locked up, however, and that was Monica Faith Ussery, 51, of Holly Springs. She was charged with violating the executive order to stay at home.
“I have a right to peacefully assemble,” she said as officers led her away, her hands bound with a zip tie. “God bless America.”
After the protest on Tuesday, the Raleigh police posted video of it online.
They were met with massive backlash. Nevertheless, Raleigh police and the governor’s office doubled down on their decision.
“Some people want to completely obliterate these restrictions,” Governor Cooper said . “It would be a catastrophe. The numbers are very clear that the interventions that we’ve entered into — social gatherings, limitations on bars and restaurants, the stay at home order — those kinds of things are working.”
As the Observer reports, in a statement Tuesday night, the Raleigh Police Department stood by its tweet as well as officers’ obligation to enforce the stay-at-home order during “these unprecedented times and unusual circumstances.” They said there’s no exemption spelled out in state and Wake County stay-at-home orders for protesting like there is for other “essential” activities.”
“But more important is the health and wellness of all who live in our community, including the officers who must engage in circumstances such as these,” the statement said. “We simply want everyone to be safe during this very serious public health crisis.”
The protest was not in vain. According to reports, it sparked a conversation among officials on how to proceed with possible future protests as well as reopening the economy.
In an email to The News & Observer, Raleigh police said they are “having ongoing conversations with Wake County officials and the Wake County District Attorney’s Office on the scope and enforcement” of both the local stay-at-home order and the statewide order.
The Raleigh Police Department added in its statement:
The Wake County District Attorney is the individual who decides charging language for failure to adhere to the Governor’s Orders and the Wake County Proclamation, when charging is appropriate, and what charges individuals may face for violating either one of these orders.
As more people grow tired of watching their life savings diminish and their local economies turn to dust, rest assured that more protests like this one are inevitable. Instead of brute force and fear, it may be time to rethink the solution to COVID-19.
No one here is discounting the severity of the coronavirus. However, multiple experts have stated that social distancing and lockdowns may be a temporary fix and may only be serving to suppress the virus.
“I think they did an amazing job of knocking the virus down,” said Michael T. Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota, in regard to China’s lockdown. “But I don’t know if it’s sustainable. What have the Chinese really accomplished? Have they really contained the virus? Or have they just suppressed it?”
Doom is a mathematical certainty of this prolonged economic scenario in which we currently find ourselves. There is fight and there is flight when it comes to all situations, especially COVID-19. Running from it in flight mode is sending us back to food lines and doing possible irreversible damage to America’s economy. I don’t know what the fight mode looks like yet, but it’s high time we start discussing it.
Matt Agorist is an honorably discharged veteran of the USMC and former intelligence operator directly tasked by the NSA. This prior experience gives him unique insight into the world of government corruption and the American police state. Agorist has been an independent journalist for over a decade and has been featured on mainstream networks around the world. Agorist is also the Editor at Large at the Free Thought Project. Follow @MattAgorist on Twitter, Steemit, and now on Minds.
In this ongoing story surrounding cattle rancher Cliven Bundy, there are a series of questions mainstream media has ignored. For instance, in the 20 years Bundy hasn’t been paying his fees, why hasn’t he been taken to court? Why this year spend nearly $1,000,000 of taxpayer money to round up 400 cattle that ultimately have to be returned? Why didn’t the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) just place a lien on the cattle rather than attempting to take them by force and then auction them off?
The Bureau of Land Management has suffered a huge black eye this week because of their response to the Bundy situation. Perhaps though, there is a reason the BLM chose force over the courts.
In an exclusive interview with Benswann.com, Montana cattle rancher Todd Devlin says the BLM is now considering new ways of dealing with the Cliven Bundy situation. Devlin is not just a Montana cattle rancher but is also a County Commissioner in Prairie County, Montana and he has worked with the Department of Interior, having taught workshops for the agency in the past. On Monday, Devlin reached out to his contacts in the Department of the Interior to find out why the Bureau of Land Management has refused to work with Bundy rather than simply attempting to run over him.
Among the questions Devlin asked of the BLM: “Is it possible that this guy (Cliven Bundy) has prescriptive rights?”
The response from top officials at the BLM: “We are worried that he might and he might use that defense.”
So what exactly are prescriptive rights?
Prescriptive right to property is an easement that gives someone the right to use land owned by someone else for a particular purpose. An example is using a path through Party A’s land to get to your land; in this case a prescriptive easement is allowed which gives the user the right to get to his land through A’s property.
In most states, if a trespass or use of land occurs regularly for at least 5 years without the “owner” of the land taking legal action, prescriptive rights come into play. Because Bundy stopped paying his grazing fees to the BLM in 1993 but continued to use the land for over 20 years, it is possible he now has prescriptive rights to the land. That might explain why the BLM has not taken this issue to court and never bothered to file a lien against the cattle.
Granted, there have been court actions over the years. In 1998 a federal judge issued a permanent injunction against Bundy, ordering him to remove his cattle from the federal lands. He lost an appeal to the San Francisco 9th Circuit Court of Appeals. Yet, the “trespass cattle” remained on the BLM land. In fact, it took until August of 2013 for a court order to be issued saying Bundy had 45 days to remove his cattle from federal land. 15 years went by from the time of the last court case over the cattle, until the BLM attempted to remove the livestock.
Of course, Bundy has not made the claim that he will not pay the fees, he simply says he will not pay those fees to the BLM because he doesn’t recognize federal authority over the land. Bundy has said that in the past, that he would pay fees to Clarke County, Nevada, though Clarke County has refused to accept them. The BLM has insisted that Bundy owes $1.1 million dollars in grazing fees for his trespass cattle. “The actual number is probably around $200,000. The $1.1 million claimed by the BLM is probably mostly interest and penalties for trespass cattle.” says Devlin, who goes on to say that it is unlikely that Clarke County would be able to collect those penalties.
When Devlin reached out to the BLM, he suggested that the federal agency just allow Bundy to pay the fees to the county rather than continuing with these aggressive tactics to confiscate his cattle. “I got a call back from the liaison saying ‘Yes, pursue it’, says Devlin. Devlin reached out to contacts in Nevada to get that process moving forward. If that were to happen, Clarke County could collect the grazing fees and if it desired to do so could hand those fees over to the BLM.
Finally, Devlin says instead of allowing the situation with Bundy’s cattle to grow completely out of control, the BLM could have simply placed a lien on the cattle in the first place. Of course, that lien might have been rejected in court if Bundy were able to demonstrate those prescriptive rights. Then again, the courts so far have sided with the government, therefore it is even more baffling why the lien wasn’t placed on the livestock.
Days after the BLM has claimed they will stand down, they are now reportedly considering a lien on the cattle. “I asked why they didn’t put a lien against the cattle… They hadn’t thought about that but they are considering it now”.
Who Actually “Owns” America’s Land?
Here we see a modern representation of Americans awakening to the insidious growth of our Federal Creature. Over the weekend, the fierce stand-off between Bundy Ranch militiamen and the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) came to a dramatic end – for now – with the protesters chasing government representatives off the disputed land.
But this situation raises the important question…. Does the Constitution make provision for the federal government to own and control “public land”? This is the only question we need to consider. Currently, the federal government “owns” approximately 30% of the United States territory. The majority of this federally owned land is in the West. For example, the feds control more than 80% of Nevada and more than 55% of Utah. The question has been long debated. At the debate’s soul is Article IV, Section 3, Clause 2 of the Constitution, which is know as the “Property Clause”. Proponents of federal expansion on both sides of the political aisle argue that this clause provides warrant for the federal government to control land throughout the United States.
The Congress shall have Power to dispose of and make all needful Rules and Regulations respecting the Territory or other Property belonging to the United States….
Those who say this clause delegates the feds control over whatever land they arbitrarily decide to lay claim to are grossly misinterpreting even the most basic structure of the Constitution.
It is said the Constitution is “written in plain English”. This is true. However, plain English does not allow one to remove context. Article IV does not grant Congress the power to exercise sovereignty over land. Article IV deals exclusively with state-to-state relations such as protection from invasion, slavery, full faith and credit, creation of new states and so on.
Historically, the Property Clause delegated federal control over territorial lands up until the point when that land would be formed as a state. This was necessary during the time of the ratification of the Constitution due to the lack of westward development. The clause was drafted to constitutionalize the Northwest Ordinance, which the Articles of Confederation did not have the power to support. This ordinance gave the newly formed Congress the power to create new states instead of allowing the states themselves to expand their own land claims.
The Property Clause and Northwest Ordinance are both limited in power and scope. Once a state is formed and accepted in the union, the federal government no longer has control over land within the state’s borders. From this moment, such land is considered property of the sovereign state. The continental United States is now formed of fifty independent, sovereign states. No “unclaimed” lands are technically in existence. Therefore, the Property Clause no longer applies within the realm of federal control over these states.
The powers of Congress are found only in Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution. With the exception of the less than two dozen powers delegated to Congress found within Article I, Section 8, Congress may make no laws, cannot form political agencies and cannot take any actions that seek to regulate outside of these enumerated powers.
Article I, Section 8 does lay forth the possibility of federal control over some land. What land? Clause 17 defines these few exceptions.
To exercise exclusive Legislation in all Cases whatsoever, over suchDistrict (not exceeding ten Miles square) as may, by Cession of Particular States, and the Acceptance of Congress, become the Seat of the Government of the United States, and to exercise like Authority over all Places purchased by the Consent of the Legislature of the State in which the Same shall be, for the Erection of Forts, Magazines, Arsenals, dock-Yards, and other needful Buildings– (Emphasis added).
Article I, Section 8, Clause 17 is known as the Enclave Clause. The clause gives federal control over the “Seat of Government” (Washington D.C.) and land that has been purchased by the federal government with consent of the state legislatures to build military posts and other needful buildings (post offices and other structures pursuant to Article I, Section 8). Nothing more.
State permission being a requirement, state authority was explicitly emphasized while drafting this clause. The founders and respective states insisted (with loud cries) that the states must consent before the federal government could purchase land from the states. Nowhere in this clause will you find the power for Congress to exercise legislative authority through regulation over 80% of Nevada, 55% of Utah, 45% of California, 70% of Alaska, or any other state. Unless, of course, the state has given the federal government the formal authority to do so, which they have not.
If a state legislature decides sell land to the federal government then at that point the Enclave Clause becomes applicable and the federal government may seize legislative and regulatory control in pursuance to the powers delegated by Article 1, Section 8.
In America’s infancy, the Supreme Court of the United States upheld the Founding Fathers’ understanding of federal control over land. Justice Stephen J. Field wrote for the majority opinion in Fort Leavenworth Railroad Co. v. Lowe (1855) that federal authority over territorial land was “necessarily paramount.” However, once the territory was organized as a state and admitted to the union on equal ground, the state government assumes sovereignty over federal lands, and the federal government retains only the rights of an “individual proprietor”. This means that the federal government can only exercise general sovereignty over state property if the state legislatures formally grant the federal government the power to do so under the Enclave Clause with the exception of federal buildings (post offices) and military installations. This understanding was reaffirmed in Lessee of Pollard v. Hagan (1845), Permoli v. Municipality No. 1 of the city of New Orleans (1845) and Strader v. Graham (1850).
However, it did not take long for the Supreme Court to begin redefining the Constitution and legislating from the bench under the guise of interpretation. Case by case, the Court slowly redefined the Property Clause, which had always been understood to regard exclusively the transferring of federal to state sovereignty through statehood, to the conservation of unconstitutional federal supremacy.
Federal supremacists sitting on the Supreme Court understood that by insidiously redefining this clause then federal power would be expanded and conserved.
Through the centuries, by the hand of corrupt federal judges, we arrive and the Bundy Ranch in Nevada. The Founding Fathers never imagined the citizens of a state would be subject to such treatment at the hands of the federal government. Furthermore, they certainly never imagined the state legislatures themselves would allow such treatment to go unchecked. The latest updates appear to show that Bundy has won his battle against the feds– for now. However, it remains a damn shame that the state of Nevada would allow for such a situation to arise in the first place.
What does Nevada’s Constitution say about property? Section 1, titled “Inalienable Rights,” reads:
All men are by Nature free and equal and have certain inalienable rights among which are those of enjoying and defending life and liberty;Acquiring, Possessing and Protecting property and pursuing and obtaining safety and happiness. [Emphasis added]
In Section 22 of the Nevada Constitution, eminent domain is clarified. The state Constitution requires that the state prove public need, provide compensation and documentation before acquiring private property. In order to grant land to the federal government, the state must first control this land.
Bundy’s family has controlled the land for more than 140 years.
The Bureau of Land Management (BLM), which is an agency created by Congress, claimed that Bundy was “violating the law of the land”. Perhaps the agency has forgotten that the law of the land is the Constitution, and the only constitutional violation here is the very modern existence of the agency’s presence in Nevada.
LOS ANGELES POISED TO BE THE FIRST MAJOR U.S. CITY TO CALL FOR END TO CORPORATE PERSONHOOD by David Swanson
Grassroots Momentum Builds Toward Passage of a Constitutional Amendment
LOS ANGELES, CA – Next week the Los Angeles City Council will vote on a resolution that calls on Congress to amend the Constitution to clearly establish that only living persons — not corporations — are endowed with constitutional rights and that money is not the same as free speech. If this resolution is passed, Los Angeles will be the first major city in the U.S. to call for an end to all corporate constitutional rights.
From War is a Crime.org
Posted on 01 December 2011
http://warisacrime.org/content/los-angeles-poised-be-first-major-us-city-call-end-corporate-personhoodThe campaign in Los Angeles is the latest grassroots effort by Move to Amend, a national coalition working to abolish corporate personhood. “Local resolution campaigns are an opportunity for citizens to speak up and let it be known that we won’t accept the corporate takeover of our government lying down,” said Kaitlin Sopoci-Belknap, a national spokesperson for Move to Amend. “We urge communities across the country to join the Move to Amend campaign and raise your voices.”
Earlier this year voters in Madison and Dane County, Wisconsin overwhelmingly approved ballot measures calling for an end to corporate personhood and the legal status of money as speech by 84% and 78% respectively. In November voters in Boulder, Colorado and Missoula, Montana both passed similar initiatives with 75% support.
“We are experiencing overwhelming support for what may be a historic turning point in restoring a voice to the voters and setting an example for the rest of the country,” stated Mary Beth Fielder, Coordinator of Move To Amend LA. “This action would provide the basis for overturning the recent Supreme Court decision in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission.”
Move to Amend volunteers in dozens of communities across the country are working to place similar measures on local ballots next year, including West Allis, WI, a conservative suburb of Milwaukee where last week local residents successfully qualified a measure for their spring ballot.
Move to Amend’s strategy is to pass community resolutions across the nation through city councils and through direct vote by ballot initiative. “Our plan is build a movement that will drive this issue into Congress from the grassroots. The American people are behind us on this and these campaigns help our federal representatives see that we mean business. Our very democracy is at stake,” stated Sopoci-Belknap.
The campaign in Los Angeles is endorsed by a growing list of organizations including Common Cause, Occupy LA, LA County Federation of Labor, Physicians for Social Responsibility, The Environmental Caucus of the CA Democratic Party, Southern California Americans for Democratic Action, MoveOn LA, Progressive Democrats of the Santa Monica Mountains, Democracy for America, Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom, Strategic Actions for a Just Economy, AFSCME 36, LA Green Machine and California Clean Money Campaign.
Bestselling Author, The End of America: Letter of Warning to a Young Patriot
The First Amendment and the Obligation to Peacefully Disrupt in a Free Society
Posted: 10/22/11 04:03 PM ET
Mayor Bloomberg is planning Draconian new measures to crack down on what he calls the “disruption” caused by the protesters at Zuccotti Park, and he is citing neighbors’ complaints about noise and mess. This set of talking points, and this strategy, is being geared up as well by administrations of municipalities around the nation in response to the endurance and growing influence of the Occupation protest sites. But the idea that any administration has the unmediated option of “striking a balance,” in Bloomberg’s words, that it likes, and closing down peaceful and lawful disruption of business as usual as it sees fit is a grave misunderstanding — or, more likely, deliberate misrepresentation — of our legal social contract as American citizens.
Some kinds of disruption in a free republic are not “optional extras” if the First Amendment governs the land, as it does ours, and are certainly not subject to the whims of mayors or local police, or even DHS. Just as protesters don’t have a blanket right to do everything they want, there is absolutely no blanket right of mayors or even of other citizens to be free from the effect of certain kinds of disruption resulting from their fellow citizens exercising First Amendment rights. That notion, presented right now by Bloomberg and other vested interests, of a “disruption-free” social contract is pure invention — just like the flat-out fabrication of the nonexistent permit cited in my own detention outside the Huffington Post Game Changers event this last Tuesday, when police told me, without the event organizers’ knowledge and contrary to their intentions, that a private entity had “control of the sidewalks” for several hours. (In fact, the permit in question — a red carpet event permit! — actually guarantees citizens’ rights to walk and even engage in political assembly on the streets if they do not block pedestrian traffic, as the OWS protesters were not.)
I want to address the issue of “disruption,” as Bloomberg is sending this issue out as a talking point brought up on Keith Olbermann’s Coundown last night: the neighbors around Zuccotti Square, says Bloomberg, are feeling “disrupted” by the noise and visitors to the OWS protest, so he is going to crack down to “strike a balance” to address their complaints. Other OWS organizers have let me know that the Parks Department and various municipalities are trying to find a way to eject other protesters from public space on a similar basis of argument.
Please, citizens of America — please, OWS — do not buy into this rhetorical framework: an absolute “right to be free of disruption” from First Amendment activity does not exist in a free republic. But the right to engage in peaceable disruption does exist.
Citizens who live or work near protest sites or marches have every right to be free of violence from protesters and they should never be subjected to destruction of property. This is why I am always saying to OWS and to anyone who wants to assemble: be PEACEFUL PEACEFUL PEACEFUL. Be respectful to police, do not yell at them; sing, don’t chant; be civil to pedestrians and shop owners; don’t escalate tensions; try to sit when there is tension rather than confront physically; be dignified and be nonviolent.
But the First Amendment means that it actually is not up to the mayor or the police of any municipality, or to the Parks Department, or to any local municipality to prohibit public assembly if the assembly is peaceful but disruptive in many ways.
Peaceful, lawful protest — if it is effective — IS innately disruptive of “business as usual.” That is WHY it is effective.
The Soviet Union was brought down by peaceful mass protest that blocked the streets and filled public squares. Many white residents of Birmingham Alabama in the 1960s would have said it was very disruptive to have all these African Americans marching through Birmingham or protesting the murder of children in churches. The addresses by Dr. King on the Mall were disruptive of the daily life of D.C. King himself marched without permits when permits were unlawfully applied. It is disruptive to sit at a whites-only counter and refuse to move and be covered with soda and pelted with debris and dragged off by police. It disrupted the Birmingham bus system for African Americans in the Civil Rights movement to organize a bus boycott. It is disruptive when people refuse to sit at the back of the bus.
When Bonus Marches — thousands of unemployed and desperate former veterans who had been promised and denied their bonus checks in the Depression, which they needed to feed their families — camped out for months on the Mall in D.C. and sat daily (when this was possible) on the steps of Congress, they won, eventually, because of the disruption. Some of the power of real protest, which is peaceful and patient and civil but disruptive, comes from the emotional power of the human face-to-face: all those Congresspeople had to look those hungry men in the eyes on their way to legislate the decision about the bonus.
Most of us need to remember, or learn for the first time (since this information is usually concealed from us) that the First Amendment, and the Constitution in general, supersedes all the laws of municipalities in violation of the constitution, as stated in the 1925 Gitlow v. New York ruling. So the First Amendment supersedes the restrictive permit laws now being invoked against protesters. The First Amendment was designed to allow for disruption of business as usual. It is not a quiet and subdued amendment or right.
Indeed, our nation’s founding was a series of rowdy and intense protests, disrupting business as usual for tax collectors and mercenaries up and down the eastern seaboard. Even after the establishment of the new nation massive, highly disruptive protests of various laws, Congressional actions, and even of foreign policy were absolutely standard expressions of political speech, and whether they liked the opinions expressed or not, these protests were spoken of by Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, Washington and others — some of whom themselves were the subjects of these protests — as part of the system they had set in place working, and the obligation of American citizens.
Dr. King, when asked about disruption, said that the disruption caused by peaceful protest is good and healthy in a society, because it is the result of festering problems that need to be addressed and that are buried being brought into light to be dealt with constructively.
But I would want to remind OWS, and any protesting group, that peaceful and dignified disruption of business as usual is very different from violence, anarchy or rioting, which must always be avoided. This is why I keep telling OWS and others: be peaceful. Don’t march in a militaristic way. Don’t cover your faces or let anyone with you cover their faces. Bring old people. Bring kids. Bring instruments, form bands of musicians and singers. Don’t fight. Don’t destroy property.
If neighbors complain about mess, bring brooms (as the Egyptians did) and clean up, not just the park but the whole neighborhood. Bake cookies FOR the neighbors. Be the good examples of civil society that you want to spread. Bring whole families (good job with that family sleepover in Zuccotti Park last night). I would go further: emulate the Civil Rights movement and wear your Sunday best at key times when you protest. Wear suits and dresses when it is practical, or wear red, white and blue when conditions are rougher. Bring American flags. Bring the Constitution. Don’t give the narrators any excuse to marginalize you because of the visuals or because of any individuals’ erratic or anarchic behavior.
By Matt Agorist
