Category Archives: rights

Another Federal Agency

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…that needs to be eliminated and its work force returned to the private sector.  The Federal Election Commission believes that the 1st Amendment and inconvenient parts of the Federal Election Campaign Act don’t apply to it.

A Boston TV station [emphasis added]

had invited two congressional candidates (a Democrat and a Republican) into its studio to appear on “On the Record” in the weeks leading up to the 2012 election and formatted the joint appearance as a 30-minute debate.

Another candidate (a Libertarian) who was not invited filed a complaint alleging that the value of WCVB’s production costs and airtime constituted unlawful corporate contributions to the two candidates who were invited.  Corporate contributions to federal candidates are illegal and people who make them face stiff fines, injunctions, and can even go to prison.

The Federal Election Campaign Act, which established the FEC, regulates money in federal campaigns to protect American citizens from corrupt politicians.  It also expressly forbids the agency from regulating the press.  Congress enacted this “press exemption” to protect the profoundly important First Amendment right of the press to inform the public about campaigns and candidates without government interference.

WCVB invoked the First Amendment and the campaign act’s press exemption.  When the FEC considered the matter in November 2013, the staff recommended that the agency disregard both.

That the FEC ultimately—and officially—accepted the legitimacy of WCVB’s decision-making process for selecting those candidates simply emphasizes the arrogant mendacity of the agency.  As the WSJ so correctly notes,

A decision to approve implies the power to disapprove.

Neither are within the scope of FEC authority, and the FEC knows that.

Remember, too, that this is the same FEC that insisted that it had the authority to ban books.*  Such an agency has no place in the lives of Americans, much less in our government.

 

*This exchange involving Justice Samuel Alito and Deputy Solicitor General Malcolm Stewart, arguing for the FEC in Citizens United:

Alito: Do you think the Constitution required Congress to draw the line where it did, limiting [the “electioneering communications” ban] to broadcast and cable and so forth?  What’s your answer to [the] point that there isn’t any constitutional difference between the distribution of this movie on video [on] demand and providing access on the Internet, providing DVDs, either through a commercial service or maybe in a public library, providing the same thing in a book?  Would the Constitution permit the restriction of all of those as well?

Stewart: I think the Constitution would have permitted Congress to apply the electioneering communication[s] restrictions…to additional media as well.

Alito: That’s pretty incredible.  You think that if a book was published, a campaign biography that was the functional equivalent of express advocacy, that could be banned.  …  The government’s position is that the 1st Amendment allows the banning of a book if it’s published by a corporation?

Stewart [In answer to a related follow-up question from Justice Anthony Kennedy]: [A] corporation could be barred from using its general treasury funds to publish the book….

Another Judge Gets One Right

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This one seems small, but it has large implications.

It seems that a motorist in Ellisville, MO, flashed his headlights at oncoming motorists to warn them of a speed trap.  An Ellisville police officer saw that and, in keeping with the city’s policy of suppressing such warnings, promptly arrested the motorist, who then faced a $1,000 fine and points against his driver’s license toward its suspension.

During the course of the motorist’s subsequent lawsuit over this violation of his 1st Amendment right, the city recognized the error of its policy and eliminated it.

Federal Judge Henry Autrey remained unimpressed, though, as he ruled against the city and for the motorist.  In his ruling, Autrey wrote that flashing one’s headlights

sends a message to bring one’s driving in conformity with the law—whether it be by slowing down, turning on one’s own headlamps at dusk or in the rain, or proceeding with caution.

There’s not even anything controversial about that form of speech.  Autrey also wrote, on the matter of Ellisville having corrected its policy,

The chilling effect of Ellisville’s policy and custom of having its police officers pull over, detain, and cite individuals who are perceived as having communicated to oncoming traffic by flashing their headlamps and then prosecuting and imposing fines upon those individuals remains, regardless….

Indeed.  The formality of the ruling was necessary to alleviate a bit of that effect.

Silencing Critics

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It isn’t enough that the Obama administration, and Democrats generally, are so terrified at the Conservative message that the President sicced his IRS on Conservative political entities in an effort to suppress their political speech as it was expressed as financial support for Conservative and Republican candidates in the 2012 elections.

Now they’re attempting to codify that suppression with a new Treasury rule for the IRS regarding what Democrats will permit 501(c)(4) entities to do in the coming elections.

Here is what a 501(c)(4) entity is, according to the Legal Information Institute:

(A) Civic leagues or organizations not organized for profit but operated exclusively for the promotion of social welfare, or local associations of employees, the membership of which is limited to the employees of a designated person or persons in a particular municipality, and the net earnings of which are devoted exclusively to charitable, educational, or recreational purposes.

(B) Subparagraph (A) shall not apply to an entity unless no part of the net earnings of such entity inures to the benefit of any private shareholder or individual.

It’s that educational part that’s important: educating the public about political matters and about where politicians stand on those matters is, well, educational.  It’s just that overt political activity can’t be the predominant activity of a (c)(4) entity.  This is one of the outcomes of the Supremes’ 2010 Citizens United decision regarding the unconstitutional ban of a Hillary Clinton documentary in the runup to the 2008 Democratic Party primaries.

Here are excerpts from Treasury’s new proposed rule for executing that suppression:

1.  Communications

Communications that are made within 60 days of a general election (or within 30 days of a primary election) and clearly identify a candidate or political party.
…
3.  Activities Closely Related to Elections or Candidates

Holding an event within 60 days of a general election (or within 30 days of a primary election) at which a candidate appears as part of the program.
…
Treasury and the IRS are planning to issue additional guidance…public focus regarding the proportion of a section 501(c)(4) organization’s activities that must promote social welfare.  Due to the importance of this aspect of the regulation, the proposed guidance requests initial comments on this issue.

This timing of activities, also, was addressed by the Supremes in Citizens United.  Moreover, Treasury is moving to keep their follow-on rule regarding proportionality under the radar until after the 2014 elections, thus leaving the claimed ambiguity in place for further 2012-style IRS suppression of Conservative entities.

Clearly, Treasury is intent on facilitating the IRS’ ability to harass and to outright silence government-disapproved organizations—especially those impertinent enough to disagree with the administration.

All of this is in an election year, no less.

The full text of Treasury’s announcement concerning the rule can be seen via The Washington Post.

Improvements in Police Technology

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Criminals may not have a chance in 2025, when the cop of the future will be an imposing crime-fighting machine, able to see around corners in urban environments, identify suspects at a glance, safely pursue stolen cars and effortlessly bring unruly crowds under control.

And

Police departments around the country are already testing technologies like Google Glass, lapel cameras and tracking devices that allow safer pursuit of fleeing suspects.  But this is merely a glimpse of what’s to come, according to experts contacted by FoxNews.com.  They said increasing reliance on data mining, predictive analysis and all manner of gadgets will make getting away with crime harder than ever.

These technologies are ripe for misuse, too, by arms of the government, like police departments.  Does that mean we should work to deny these technologies to the police?  Absolutely not.  We expect them to put their lives on the line in order to “protect and serve” us; we have a moral obligation, if nothing else, to equip them with the tools and training needed to do that most efficaciously.

No, what we need to be vigilant about is this: our government cannot be permitted to deny us ordinary citizens those same technologies.

Think 2nd Amendment and the efforts of nefarious governments to disarm the citizenry, with the deleterious outcomes of those efforts.  Technology qua technology can be a weapon, too.  And, as gun statistic after gun statistic demonstrates, weapons widely in the hands of us ordinary citizens actually leads to reduced crime rates.

California Gun Control Foolishness

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California now requires handguns to do microstamping on the weapons’ firing pins so as to mark the bullet casing to facilitate tracing a weapon used in a crime back to the weapon’s registered owner.  (Actually, they’ve been requiring it since 2007; they’ve only just begun enforcing that this year.)

Leaving aside the lack of legitimacy of this move toward gun control and even the fact that the technology for doing this microstamping isn’t yet stable, much less proven, it’s foolish to the point of dishonesty (since I don’t agree that even California state legislators are slack-jawed, drooling idiots) for a number of reasons.

Police handguns are exempted from the microstamping requirement.  This is selective enforcement.  Aside from that, why should the police be exempted when their employers, the citizenry, are not?  On top of that, to the extent microstamping is a good idea, it would be useful for demonstrating police misbehavior in a shooting—or for demonstrating that the shooting was justified.

The traceability of the firearm that’s claimed for microstamping ignores the fact that the weapon used may have been lost by the legitimate owner, or (quite likely) stolen from him.

It’s easy enough to file the microstamping off the firing pin, just as it’s easy enough to file a firearm’s serial number off the firearm.

Forensics traces markings on bullets left by the rifling of a firearm’s barrel to the original firearm.  Except when the barrel used in a crime is ditched and a new barrel inserted, a thing easily done in a couple of minutes.  So it is with the firing pins of most…handguns.  In the ordinary process of stripping the firearm for cleaning and maintenance, both the barrel and the firing pin are taken out of the piece.  It’s that simple.

This is a law that can’t work as advertised, quite apart from what we might think of the degree of gun control that’s appropriate.  Smith & Wesson and Sturm Ruger recognize this, and both companies are moving to stop selling their firearms in California.

Which is gun control, toward which the state’s legislature may have been moving with this law all along.