Tenth Amendment Remembered

...from Tenth Amendment Center Sometimes I think there is some central office somewhere writing scripts for police departments to read when they need to oppose (support) something. No matter what city or state, or what issue we’re talking about, police arguments are almost exactly the same. “If this happens (or doesn’t happen) criminals will have free rein and officers will die in the streets.” Seriously, that’s barely even hyperbole. I heard a variation on this theme at my court hearing last week. Yes. I went to court. If you haven’t heard, the City of Lexington, Kentucky, sued me. Why? Because I asked the wrong questions. Last summer, I filed an open records request in an attempt to find out what kind of surveillance technology the Lexington Police Department uses and how it operates its surveillance programs. That’s apparently on a need to know basis and the good citizens of Lexington do not need to know. I did find out the LPD has 29 super-secret “mobile” surveillance came...

...from Tenth Amendment Center Most people’s political convictions resemble those of Captain Renault from the classic film Casablanca; it blows with the wind, and the prevailing wind happens to be not entirely hostile to states’ rights. But that will likely change. That’s why it’s important that the myths used to smear and tarnish a noble ideology by equating it with pro-slavery thought be refuted thoroughly. In a 2014 article for the City Journal titled “ The Truth About States’ Rights ,” Adam Freedman makes the compelling case that the initial wave of Southern secession in 1860 was in response to Northern states asserting their sovereignty over the issue of slavery so effectively that federal slavery laws were unenforceable. “According to the standard version of history, states’ rights was a doctrine invented by Southern politicians to perpetuate slavery,” he writes. “But what if the lessons of history are wrong, and the doctrine of states’ rights was actually an antislavery ide...

...from Tenth Amendment Center SACRAMENTO , Calif. (April 23, 2018) –  Last week, a California Senate committee passed a bill that would increase oversight and transparency of law enforcement surveillance technology. Passage of the bill would take the first step toward limiting the unchecked use of surveillance technologies that violate basic privacy rights and feed into a broader national surveillance state. Sen. Jerry Hill (D-San Mateo) introduced Senate Bill 1186 ( SB1186 ) on Feb. 15. The legislation would require a local law enforcement agency to draft a  Surveillance Use Policy for each type of surveillance technology it operates and the information collected. It would then have to submit the policy to its governing body for approval at a regularly scheduled hearing, open to the public. If the plan is not adopted, the law enforcement agency would be required to cease using all surveillance technology within 30 days. The proposed law would require law enforcement agenc...

...from Tenth Amendment Center COLUMBIA , S.C. (April 20, 2018) – Yesterday, a South Carolina House committee passed a bill that would legalize medical marijuana for qualifying patients in the state, setting the foundation to nullify unconstitutional federal cannabis prohibition in practice. A bipartisan coalition introduced House Bill 3521 ( H3521 ) last year and it carried over to the 2018 session. The legislation would authorize the use of cannabis by patients suffering from an extensive list of “debilitating medical conditions.” The bill would also set up a regulatory scheme authorizing doctors to recommend medical marijuana,for issuing cards to qualified patients, for establishing dispensaries and for regulating marijuana cultivation in the state. According to the Times and Democrat , the House Medical, Military, Public and Municipal Affairs Committee approved H3521 on Thursday. “I believe we did the right thing by approving this bill. Our intent is to help the ...

...from Tenth Amendment Center Illinois  HB4286 , introduced by Rep. Will Guzzardi, would prohibit police from procuring certain types of military equipment from military surplus programs. Through the  federal 1033 program , local police departments procure military-grade weapons including automatic rifles and armored vehicles. This bill would ban some equipment and prohibit state and local law enforcement agencies from using federal funds to purchase what is allowable. Read more about the legislation  HERE . Making it more difficult for local police to acquire military gear cuts some of the ties between state and local law enforcement. Without state resources, the feds find it nearly impossible to operate. Passage of HB4286 would take the first step toward limiting police militarization and increase transparency by stopping the SECRET purchase of military equipment. The State Government Administration Committee failed to act on this legislation by the deadline ...

...from Tenth Amendment Center In 1788, James Madison offered a blueprint for stopping “unwarrantable measures” enacted by the federal government. In Federalist #46 , the “Father of the Constitution” advised a refusal to cooperate with officers of the union.” He said even in a single state, this strategy would create “difficulties” and “impediments.” And if several states refused to cooperate at the same time, it would “present obstructions which the federal government would hardly be willing to encounter.” Interestingly, Madison didn’t limit this strategy to “unwarrantable” or unconstitutional federal actions. He said states should refuse to cooperate with the general government even to stop “a warrantable measure” that happened to be unpopular. Fifty-four years later, the Supreme Court codified Madison’s strategy into law. In the first of four cases that form the foundation of a legal principle known as the anti-commandeering doctrine , Justice Joseph Story argued that the state...

...from Tenth Amendment Center Many people simultaneously claim to support the Second Amendment while insisting the federal government should be able to ban “military-style weapons.” These are actually mutually exclusive positions. In fact, the whole purpose of the Second Amendment was to ensure the people would always have access to “weapons of war.” On February 14, 2018, Nicholas Cruz shot and killed 17 students from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla. Cruz, 19, had been suspended from the school for disciplinary reasons. Despite a long history of bad behavior, as well as attention from law enforcement, Cruz was not treated as a legitimate threat. In an attempt to reduce the school-to-prison pipeline, the district failed to report activities and generally kept him under the radar of local law enforcement agencies. Attorney General Jeff Sessions also admitted that the FBI failed to act on numerous reports of erratic and threatening behavior on the part of Cruz....