Tenth Amendment Remembered

...from Tenth Amendment Center Via Josh Blackman at  Volokh Conspiracy , recently the Supreme Court denied cert  in  Lipschultz v. Charter Advanced Services , which presented the question whether the Federal Communications Commission’s “policy of nonregulation” of Voice over Internet services preempted state regulation.  Justice Thomas, joined by Justice Gorsuch, objected that the policy was not a law, and thus couldn’t be preemptive in any event (some citations omitted): I agree with the Court’s determination that this case does not satisfy our criteria for certiorari. I write to explain why, in an appropriate case, we should consider whether a federal agency’s policy can pre-empt state law.  The Supremacy Clause of the Constitution provides: “This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the...

...from Tenth Amendment Center BOSTON , Mass. (Oct. 31, 2019) – Last week, a Massachusetts legislative committee held a hearing on a bill that would require state courts to fully inform jurors of their right to use discretion in rendering verdicts. Sen. Joseph Boncore (D) introduced Senate Bill 828 ( S828 ) in January. The legislation would require the judge in any criminal proceeding to fully inform the jury of its right to judge both the facts and the application of the law in relation to the facts in controversy. This would include telling jurors that they have the power to acquit even if the defendant is technically guilty if the guilty verdict would yield an “unjust result.” Under the proposed law, at the request of the defense attorney, the judge would be required to read detailed instructions to the jury including the following: “Even if you find that the state has proved all of the elements of the offense charged beyond a reasonable doubt, you may still find that based u...

...from Tenth Amendment Center Conscientious citizens know that impeachment of a president – any president – is a sad occasion. It is not a time for the unseemly enthusiasm now displayed by many in politics and the media. Some cynics claim impeachment procedures are a free-for-all, determined by nothing but politics. That is not true. The Constitution and governing precedent impose rules. Those rules govern both impeachment (accusation) by the House of Representatives and trial in the Senate. Because most Americans understand the seriousness of impeachment-and-trial, they will insist that the rules be followed, even if the courts do not enforce them. The Constitution’s framers modeled its impeachment-and-trial provisions on 18 th  century English practice. That practice rested largely on cases dating back to the 1300s. Since the Constitution was adopted, Congress has created more precedents. The Constitution and the precedents define the law of impeachment. Under impeachment ...

...from Tenth Amendment Center Americans hated it when the Federal Reserve handed trillions of dollars to crooked Wall Street banks following the 2008 Financial Crisis. Politicians were confronted about the merits of central banking and bailouts. For the first time in history, college students were chanting “End the Fed” at campaign rallies as Ron Paul took the central bank to task during his presidential campaigns. Now all has gone quiet. What happened? Virtually everyone in America vehemently opposed the central bank handing piles of cash to the same bankers whose greed and fraud had caused the Financial Crisis . Little has changed, but the public’s revulsion taught the central bankers an important lesson. If they give handouts to greedy and fraudulent bankers, they had better do it in secret. Avoiding a public outcry is probably why there is scant information about what is actually happening in the repo markets right now. The Fed continues to ramp up its overnight lending oper...

...from Tenth Amendment Center Recently, there has been an increase in efforts to create a type of 2A sanctuary city. But, while it’s in the early stages, almost all of them are getting the strategy wrong. Path to Liberty: October 30, 2019 PODCAST VERSION Subscribe: iTunes | Google Play | Stitcher | Spotify | RSS SHOW LINKS: JOIN TAC Show Archives Subscribe and Review on iTunes James Madison: Four Steps to Stop Federal Programs Anti-Commandeering, The Legal Basis for Refusing to Cooperate Anti-Commandeering: An overview of five major Supreme Court cases Most Recent Gun Rights “Sanctuary Counties” are Anything But Gun Rights Sanctuary Counties: Voters in Oregon Set Foundation for Eight ALTERNATE VIDEO SOURCES Watch on Brighteon Watch on Bitchute Watch on Twitch.tv Watch on Periscope Watch on DLive Watch on Bittubers FOLLOW and SUPPORT TAC: Become a Member: http://tenthamendmentcenter.com/members/ Email Newsletter: http://tenthamendmentcenter.com/register R...

...from Tenth Amendment Center Popular commentary is suddenly awash with articles claiming that impeachment (and conviction and removal from office) do not require proof of a crime. Examples include Ezra Klein at Vox ( “High Crimes and Misdemeanors,” explained ), Elizabeth Drew in USA Today ( You don’t have to break a law to be impeached. Trump’s defenders need a better argument ) and Frank Bowman in The Atlantic ( The Common Misconception About ‘High Crimes and Misdemeanors’ ).  What’s notable from an originalist perspective is how originalist these articles are. Drew, for example, writes that “the Founders left enough guidance to make it clear that an impeachable or convictable offense need not be a crime.”  Professor Bowman (Missouri), after nine paragraphs on pre-drafting English history (going back to 1376) and the drafting and ratifying debates, concludes that “one point on which the founding generation would have been clear was that ‘high Crimes and Misdemeanors’ w...

...from Tenth Amendment Center This episode of Thoughts from Maharrey Head is a hard dose of reality. The Constitution has become nothing more than a political prop. Both Republicans and Democrats claim to revere the Constitution. But do they? Really? I don’t think they do. In fact, I think the vast majority of politicians, including the current president, view the Constitution as nothing but a prop in their political theater. LISTEN Thoughts from Maharrey Head  focuses on constitutional issues and political decentralization. When you’re finished listening, you’ll be 10 minutes closer to freedom! You can subscribe to  Thoughts from Maharrey Head  for free on iTunes. Just click  HERE . SHOW NOTES AND LINKS Constitutional Interpretation: Living and Breathing is Dead Free E-Book: The Power of No!: The Historical and Constitutional Basis for State Nullification Mike Maharrey October 29, 2019 at 12:36PM

...from Tenth Amendment Center BOSTON , Mass. (Oct 29, 2019) – Last Tuesday, a joint Massachusetts legislative committee held a hearing on two bills that would place a moratorium on the use of facial recognition technology by law enforcement in the state and impose strict guidelines on any legislation authorizing the use of such technology in the future. The proposed laws would not only help protect privacy in Massachusetts, but it would also hinder one aspect of the federal surveillance state. Sen. Cynthia Stone Creem (D) introduced Senate Bill 1385 ( S1385 ) in January. Rep. David Rogers (D-Middlesex) introduced House Bill 1538 ( H1538 ) around the same time. Both bills would ban government agencies in Massachusetts, including law enforcement agencies, from acquiring, possessing, accessing, or using a facial recognition system without express statutory authorization passed by the state legislature. It would also prohibit government agencies from accessing information gathered by ...

...from Tenth Amendment Center The Trump administration has outdone itself. After running up the biggest deficit in six years in fiscal 2018 , the U.S. government managed to increase that massive budget shortfall by 26 percent in 2019. The Treasury Department released the  fiscal year 2019 budget numbers on Oct 25. The budget shortfall came in at $984 billion right on the CBO estimate . So, when is a $984 billion budget deficit good news? When you thought you might get a $1 trillion budget deficit. A CNBC report said this would likely, “come as a relief to the Trump administration, which had previously forecast that the deficit would hit $1 trillion during the 2019 fiscal year.” Never fear, the CBO estimates we could see trillion-dollar deficits again as early as 2020. Acting Office of Management and Budget Director Russ Vought tried to put a positive spin on the numbers. “Americans from all walks of life are flourishing again thanks to pro-growth policies enacted by this...

...from Tenth Amendment Center President Trump is reversing his foreign policy decisions so quickly these days that it almost seems like he overturns himself before making the decision in the first place. Last week he was very clear that the US was pulling its troops out of Syria. “Bringing soldiers home,” he said. “Let someone else fight over this long-bloodstained sand.” But then he overturned himself later in the same speech. He said: “We’ve secured the oil and therefore a small number of US troops will remain in the area where they have the oil. And we’re going to be protecting it and we’ll be deciding what we’re going to do with it in the future.” Where does President Trump think he gets the legal or moral authority to send US troops to illegally occupy foreign territory and determine what that foreign country can or cannot do with its resources? After eight years of Obama’s disastrous “Assad must go” policy, during which the US provided weapons and training to radicals and t...

...from Tenth Amendment Center A  recent post  linked to an article by Burlette Carter on the issue of federal prosecutions of sitting Presidents.  For me this, is a non-issue because (as an original matter) I accept the idea of a unitary executive.    Anyone with federal prosecutorial power must, in this view, serve at the pleasure and direction of the President.  The President is not going to prosecute himself.  So there’s no need for the Constitution to speak further to the matter.  (Further thoughts on federal prosecution of Presidents from me and others are  here ). A more difficult originalist question is whether a sitting President can be prosecuted under state law.  And that issue was argued yesterday to the Second Circuit.  From NBC News (via  How Appealing ):   Trump’s lawyers argue he can’t be charged while in office — even if he shoots someone .  The background: A panel of three federal appeals ...

...from Tenth Amendment Center When Congress passed the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (Obamacare), the law featured a  mandate  that individuals buy health insurance. People who did not comply would be fined. Obamacare advocates defended the constitutionality of this mandate by arguing that it was an exercise of Congress’s power to “regulate Commerce . . . among the several States.” (The Supreme Court had  earlier held —in defiance of the original understanding and a century and a half of precedent—that insurance was a form of “commerce.”) Obamacare opponents responded that ordering people to engage in commerce was not part of regulating it. Obamacare advocates claimed that there was no realistic line between regulating commerce and ordering it. The Supreme Court ultimately agreed with the opponents. It held that the mandate was not justified by Congress’s power to regulate commerce, although the court did uphold the fine as a form of tax. What almost ...

...from Tenth Amendment Center Recently, Louisiana prosecutors were forced to drop felony charges against a man after nearly 2 dozen potential jurors balked at criminal charges for illegal possession and none were left in the pool for the day. Whether this is a revolt or a kind of preemptive jury nullification, the end result is the same. Path to Liberty, Fast Friday Edition: October 25, 2019 PODCAST VERSION Subscribe: iTunes | Google Play | Stitcher | Spotify | RSS SHOW LINKS: JOIN TAC Show Archives Subscribe and Review on iTunes Louisiana Jurors Refuse to Consider Criminal Marijuana Charges, Effectively Nullify Law A New Orleans man faced a felony marijuana charge; too many potential jurors wouldn’t consider it Jurors revolt, refuse to consider felony charges for cannabis Trial by Jury: Defense Against Tyranny ALTERNATE VIDEO SOURCES Watch on Brighteon Watch on Bitchute Watch on Twitch.tv Watch on Periscope Watch on DLive Watch on Bittubers Watch on LinkedI...