The following article is based off a speech given on 09-25-10 at the 25th Annual Gun Rights Policy Conference in San Francisco, CA.
Michael will be a featured speaker at Nullify Now! in Orlando on 10-10-10 and Chattanooga on 10-23-10. Get tickets here – http://www.nullifynow.com/tickets/ – or by calling 888-71-TICKETS

I’ve often been told that when you’re giving a speech – if all you get is applause and cheers – and you never piss anyone off – you’re no better than a low-life politician, because you’re not challenging anyone’s conventional mode of thought. Hopefully, I get at least a few eyebrows raised here in my 8-9 short minutes….

So let’s start out with the easy stuff, ok? I’m a tenther. That means I believe that the federal government should exercise only those powers that we the people delegated to it in the constitution – and nothing more. For example, no Obamacare mandates, no bank bailouts, and definitely no federal gun laws – period.

Question. How many people here own a gun, or manufacture or sell guns?

And how many of you are proud felons – meaning, when the government makes rules to restrict your right to keep and bear arms, you simply ignore them because they don’t have the authority to do so?

HEMPCON

I recently went to an event called Hemp Con down in my part of the state – Los Angeles. This is a big event at the LA convention center – with loads of vendors and businesses from every angle you can think of in support of the marijuana industry. There were home security companies to help protect your weed, solar power companies to help you grow your weed, doctors giving out medical marijuana cards to virtually anyone with $80 and an hour of time. There were even delivery services – you can get your marijuana delivered to you 24 hours a day…in 30 minutes or less. The pizza companies have nothing on these guys! It was amazing if you think about it from an economic standpoint – this was capitalism, the free market – working its wonders around an industry.

What’s the point?

Virtually EVERY single one of those businesses was either directly violating federal law, or aiding someone else in doing so because marijuana is illegal, according to the feds – but not the constitution – in all situations. In 2003, Tommy Chong was arrested for merely selling pieces of glass – pipes that could be used to smoke marijuana. And today, 7 years later, we’ve got what seemed to be the WalMart of weed in Downtown Los Angeles. And guess what – no ATF or DEA thugs shut the place down. Business functioned, people did what they wanted to in freedom, and that was that.

FREEDOM TO TRAVEL

Another quick story.

In 2005, the Bush administration got the REAL ID act passed, which was – in the eyes of many – a new form of a national id card. We were warned that if this act wasn’t followed, people wouldn’t be able to travel, enter federal buildings, get on planes, and the like.

Much of my girlfriend’s family lives in Missouri, a state that’s not in compliance with the Real ID act. Her relatives do a little traveling from time to time. They get on airplanes and show their non-compliant Missouri driver’s license. No federal agents stop them and prevent them from boarding a plane.

Well, most state DL’s – including those in Missouri – don’t comply with the Real ID Act. That law is still on the books in DC – it’s never been repealed. It’s never been challenged in court either. But – due to 25 states refusing to comply with the “law” – in much of the country that Real ID act is virtually null and void.

Here in California- the state always seems to be on its knees, begging the feds for something. Well, except on marijuana. In 2005, the Supreme Court ruled that state medical marijuana laws were illegal. At that time there were 10 states that had such laws. Do you know how many were repealed? Zero. And today, there’s 14 states defying Washington dc, and getting away with it.

Today, we see the Firearms Freedom Act movement growing along these lines – it’s already passed in 8 states. Following that lead, 5 states have passed laws saying no to Obamacare mandates too.

THE LESSON

What’s the lesson? This is the blueprint – when enough people say no to unconstitutional laws, regulations….and mandates….and enough states pass laws to back those people up – there’s not much the federal government can do, but slowly and consistently back off. There’s no tanks rolling into Los Angeles to shut down the dispensaries, and there’s no jack-booted thugs forcing people to get new driver’s licenses in Missouri. This is far from perfect, but it can work, and it is working right now.

So here’s the final question – and the big challenge to you today.

The next time you begrudgingly follow some federal “law” that restricts your right to keep and bear arms – or the next time you hear about a gun rights case that will be decided in 2, or 4, or 6 years – with the hope that some judge will give you permission to exercise your rights, ask yourself this question:

Do you….gun rights activists….have as much courage as the pot smokers?

For the sake of liberty – I hope you do – because I believe that we the people need to exercise our rights whether they the government wants to give us “permission” to or not!

Michael Boldin [send him email] is the founder of the Tenth Amendment Center.

Gary Marbut, president of the Montana Shooting Sports Association, discusses gun rights and activism in Montana, the Firearms Freedom Act and the various states where this is being passed or considered, the Commerce Clause of the US Constitution, litigation in federal court, the Raich case on medical marijuana, Real ID, and the judicial branch’s disdain for the 10th Amendment.

Mentioned in this show:

Montana Sport Shooting Association

ProGunLeaders.org

Montana Firearms Freedom Act

Tennessee Firearms Freedom Act

Minnesota Firearms Freedom Act

South Carolina Firearms Freedom Act

The bill is sponsored by South Carolina State Senators Bright, Bryant, Mulvaney, Davis, Shoopman, S. Martin and McConnell.  They join Montana, Utah, and Texas in an effort to limit federal regulation of guns, and specifically invoke the 9th and 10th Amendments as restrictions on federal power:

“the regulation of intrastate commerce is vested in the states under the ninth and tenth amendments to the United States Constitution, particularly if not expressly preempted by federal law. Congress has not expressly preempted state regulation of intrastate commerce pertaining to the manufacture on an intrastate basis of firearms, firearms accessories, and ammunition”

Read the full text of the legislation below:

A BILL TO AMEND CHAPTER 31, TITLE 23 OF THE 1976 CODE, RELATING TO FIREARMS, BY ADDING ARTICLE 9, THE “SOUTH CAROLINA FIREARMS FREEDOM ACT”, TO PROVIDE THAT A FIREARM, FIREARM ACCESSORY, OR AMMUNITION MANUFACTURED AND RETAINED IN SOUTH CAROLINA IS EXEMPT FROM FEDERAL REGULATION UNDER THE COMMERCE CLAUSE OF THE CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES.

Whereas, the tenth amendment to the United States Constitution guarantees and reserves for the states all powers not granted to the federal government in the Constitution; and

Whereas, the ninth amendment to the United States Constitution guarantees to the people rights not granted in the Constitution and reserves to the people of South Carolina certain rights. The guaranty of those rights is a matter of contract between the state and people of South Carolina and the United States; and

Whereas, the regulation of intrastate commerce is vested in the states under the ninth and tenth amendments to the United States Constitution, particularly if not expressly preempted by federal law. Congress has not expressly preempted state regulation of intrastate commerce pertaining to the manufacture on an intrastate basis of firearms, firearms accessories, and ammunition; and

Whereas, the second amendment to the United States Constitution reserves to the people the right to keep and bear arms as that right was understood at the time that South Carolina was admitted to statehood in 1788, and the guaranty of the right is a matter of contract between the state and people of South Carolina and the United States as of the time that the compact with the United States was agreed upon and adopted by South Carolina and the United States in 1788; and

Whereas, Article I, Section 20 of the South Carolina Constitution clearly secures to South Carolina citizens, and prohibits government interference with, the right of individual South Carolina citizens to keep and bear arms. This constitutional protection is unchanged from the 1895 South Carolina Constitution, which was approved by Congress and the people of South Carolina, and the right exists as it was understood at the time that the compact with the United States was agreed upon and adopted by South Carolina and the United States in 1895. Now, therefore,

Be it enacted by the General Assembly of the State of South Carolina:

SECTION 1. Chapter 31, Title 23 of the 1976 Code is amended by adding:

“Article 9

South Carolina Firearms Freedom Act

Section 23-31-700. This article may be cited as the ‘South Carolina Firearms Freedom Act’.

Section 23-31-705. For purposes of this article:

(1) ‘Borders of South Carolina’ means the boundaries of South Carolina described in Article I, Section 1 of the 1895 South Carolina Constitution.

(2) ‘Firearms accessories’ means items that are used in conjunction with or mounted upon a firearm but are not essential to the basic function of a firearm, including, but not limited to, telescopic or laser sights, magazines, flash or sound suppressors, folding or aftermarket stocks and grips, speedloaders, ammunition carriers, and lights for target illumination.

(3) ‘Generic and insignificant parts’ includes, but is not limited to, springs, screws, nuts, and pins.

(4) ‘Manufactured’ means that a firearm, a firearm accessory, or ammunition has been created from basic materials for functional usefulness, including, but not limited to, forging, casting, machining, or other processes for working materials.

Section 23-31-710. (A) A personal firearm, a firearm accessory, or ammunition that is manufactured commercially or privately in South Carolina and that remains within the borders of South Carolina is not subject to federal law or federal regulation, including registration, under the authority of Congress to regulate interstate commerce.

(B) This section applies to a firearm, a firearm accessory, or ammunition that is manufactured in South Carolina from basic materials and that can be manufactured without the inclusion of any significant parts imported from another state.

(1) Generic and insignificant parts that have other manufacturing or consumer product applications are not firearms, firearms accessories, or ammunition.

(2) Basic materials such as unmachined steel and unshaped wood are not firearms, firearms accessories, or ammunition.

(C) Basic materials are subject only to intrastate commerce regulation.

(D) Firearms accessories that are imported into South Carolina from another state and that are subject to federal regulation as being in interstate commerce do not subject a firearm to federal regulation under interstate commerce because they are attached to or used in conjunction with a firearm in South Carolina.

Section 23-31-715. This article does not apply to the following:

(1) a firearm that cannot be carried and used by one person;

(2) a firearm that has a bore diameter greater than one and one half inches and that uses smokeless powder, not black powder, as a propellant;

(3) ammunition with a projectile that explodes using an explosion of chemical energy after the projectile leaves the firearm; or

(4) a firearm that discharges two or more projectiles with one activation of the trigger or other firing device.

Section 23-31-720. A firearm manufactured or sold in South Carolina under must have the words ‘Made in South Carolina’ clearly stamped on a central metallic part, such as the receiver or frame.”

SECTION 3. This act takes effect upon approval by the Governor.

There is a secession movement afoot and its proponents are determined to put a halt to the federal government’s ambitions to destroy and reconstruct an entire economy and dissolve the last remnants of individual liberty. Twenty-eight states are invoking the law of the land, the U.S. Constitution, by rolling out legislation to assert their sovereignty as free states in order to keep from being undermined by the never-ending swarm of unrestrained federal decrees.

The speed with which the federal government intends to take over private institutions and usurp states’ rights and individual autonomy is unprecedented. When the Bush-Obama regime maneuvers are compared to the Hoover-FDR New Deal era, it looks like today’s hare vs. yesterday’s turtle. The state’s various propaganda arms, from big media to institutionalized special interest forces, are being empowered to publicize and sell the agenda of the totalitarian state by painting it in glossy colors that warm the hearts of unresisting Americans. There are, however, growing pockets of dissenters who conclude that life, liberty, property, and the futures of their children are more important than the trivial things that occupy the minds of the submissive class. For that reason, the state’s militarized police force, which has been given unparalleled powers by the contrived crises following 9-11, has snowballed in size and is being fortified in expectation of confronting rebellion from those citizens who intend to resist the tyranny of an over-reaching Leviathan.

Since the Bush II regime took control and 9/11 became its launch pad for sweeping hegemony, the police state has moved more swiftly than ever to demonize resistance and criminalize dissent. The most recent example is the Missouri Information Analysis Center (MIAC) report that profiled individuals according to their political convictions, especially those ideas that agitate against the institutionalization of unconstitutional acts that are intended to grow state power at the expense of individual liberties. Ron Paul, Chuck Baldwin, Bob Barr (!), guns & ammo, taxes, the Federal Reserve, secession, and resistance to universal government service or anti-privacy actions – all of those topics have become keywords in the crusade to criminalize individuals who refuse to be rounded up like cattle and marched toward serfdom.

Two years ago, a similar thing happened in Alabama when its Homeland Security Department released a report pigeonholing freedom activists as “anti-government types” who “claim that the U.S. government is infringing on their individual rights, and/or that the government’s policies are criminal and immoral.” Such groups, the report said, “May hold that the current government is violating the basic principles laid out by the U.S. Constitution…” Don’t bother to look up that report, however, because LewRockwell.com blogger Chris Brunner’s post on the Alabama report spread like wildfire ’round the Internet, resulting in that report being pulled from the website.

In addition, the MIAC report was quickly stifled by hordes of liberty activists, leading Chuck Baldwin to say, “the most effective way to fight an ever-encroaching federal leviathan is to focus on our individual states.”

The struggle for sovereignty, though begun on the part of spontaneous individuals with leanings toward the radical principles of our nation’s founding, has reached state legislatures across America in the form of sovereignty bills. According to the Christian Science Monitor, twenty-eight states are now commencing resolutions as a reaction to the sudden and massive expansion of federal powers. Even the Republic of Lakotah is declaring its withdrawal from all treaties and agreements imposed on it by the US government. The notion of state secession, once written off as a subject matter for political crackpots and eccentrics, has become a legitimate and practical solution for undoing the years of accumulated assaults on individual liberty that has come from the centralized state.

With revolutionary die-hards behind him, Mr. Pitts has fired a warning shot across the bow of the Washington establishment. As the writer of one of 28 state “sovereignty bills” – one even calls for outright dissolution of the Union if Washington doesn’t rein itself in – Pitts is at the forefront of a states’ rights revival, reasserting their say on everything from stem cell research to the Second Amendment.

…And although Pitts [state rep from South Carolina] hails from Abbeville, the place where the South’s first secession votes were cast, he insists that today’s efforts to check federal power aren’t limited to regional pockets or even political affiliation. “The mainstream media would portray some of us as rednecks, whether we’re from Pennsylvania, Oregon, or South Carolina,” says Pitts. “But this is a wake-up call. And if Washington doesn’t heed that wake-up call, revolution is on the horizon.”

That is from a recent issue of the Christian Science Monitor. Walter Williams, a respected academic and popular, syndicated columnist, declared this in his most recent column:

Our Colonial ancestors petitioned and pleaded with King George III to get his boot off their necks. He ignored their pleas, and in 1776, they rightfully declared unilateral independence and went to war. Today it’s the same story except Congress is the one usurping the rights of the people and the states, making King George’s actions look mild in comparison. Our constitutional ignorance – perhaps contempt, coupled with the fact that we’ve become a nation of wimps, sissies and supplicants – has made us easy prey for Washington’s tyrannical forces. But that might be changing a bit. There are rumblings of a long overdue re-emergence of Americans’ characteristic spirit of rebellion.

Emory Professor and constitutional scholar Don Livingston notes, in his Secessionist Paper No. 19: What is Secession?, “talk about secession makes Americans nervous. For many it evokes images of the Civil War, and is emotionally (if not logically) tied to slavery, war, and anarchy. That the word “secession” is laden with these negative connotations should be surprising since America was born in an act of secession.” He goes on to describe secession as an act that “does not seek to overthrow or alter the government of a modern state, but seeks merely to limit its jurisdiction over the seceding territory.”

But still, the negative connotations of secession live on, even within some libertarian circles. Perhaps the most puzzling thing I keep hearing from some libertarians is that those of us who adhere to secessionist ideas are wacky outliers who offer no value “to the movement,” and instead, we only throw up red flags that warn others to avoid us, and libertarianism as a whole. Thus we are led to believe that our founding fathers, the architects of rebellion and the champions of Jeffersonian principles, were reactionary wackos.

The anti-radical libertarians ask for practical solutions, with “practical” being the code word for something that is acceptable to the majority of the Oprahized masses. This kind of thought is known as “libertarian lite,” or as I call it, “car wash libertarianism.” The car wash libertarians persuade others – “especially those new to libertarianism – to stay away from the radical, “crazy” stuff and hold true to the agenda of getting “our people” elected through legitimate political means. The car wash libertarians still have a voice in the modern LP, which is also known as GOP 2.0. These libertarians are in the game not for reasons of deep-rooted principles and love of liberty, but for the social, bonding aspects, with some mild libertarianism sprinkled on the side. They love attending their local meetings and dinners each month and discussing who is going to run for what local post, and when, and applying strategy. How fun it all is. City council or board of county commissioners? Now those are appointments that will have a significant impact upon an America that is quickly descending into a Communistic hellhole.

Truth is, the car wash libertarians will be the ones cowering in a corner the day they come for our guns (under a massive, federal gun control act) and our children (under federal, child “protective services” laws or a national service act). But they may have a post or two at some tiny township, with such important duties as arranging for an annual dinner at the VFW or setting up the car wash fundraiser to pay for new lamp posts along Main Street. The car wash libertarians tend to have scant knowledge of history, monetary policy, constitutional disputes, and the political philosophers who have, over the years, defended states’ rights and the natural rights of the individual against the totalitarian, centralized state. In fact, they tend to shy away from the intellectual life because it’s not as fun, or as social, as the monthly meetings and supper club invites.

In spite of the radicalism of many of the early LP’ers, in 30+ years the LP has made no advances whatsoever, except that a few of them hold feeble local offices where it is their brand of politics in charge as versus the other guy’s rules. One guy’s coercion in place of another guy’s coercion offers us no progress whatsoever in terms of quelling the federal expansion that is speedily choking off life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. The rapid-fire socialization of America, I hope, will have the effect of turning many of these libertarians toward more radical plans of action.

The Feds are engaged in a sweeping series of measures to take complete control of the financial system (which is forever destroyed) and selected business entities; ratchet up plans for perpetual war; socialize health care; further implant federalized education and criminalize homeschooling; grab guns and ammo; remove children from the homes of dissenters; commence race wars and class wars; force young adults into mandatory state service camps; send protesters to FEMA camps; and on and on and on.

At this point, none of this can be undone through time-consuming, political means. Rahm Emanuel, Eric Holder, and the other agents of Obama’s unfreedom brigade were brought to Washington D.C. for one very specific purpose: to centralize every last bit of property and life and put it all under federal rule, from money to education to personal behavior. Note the condescending and arrogant behavior of King Obama on the 60 Minutes television show as he laughed at the inability of majority opinion to do a damn thing to stop his freight train of power grabs and federal takeovers.

Perhaps the most significant move on the part of the Feds, outside of crushing the free market through rapid nationalization, is the move on the part of the centralizers to extinguish the single most important characteristic of a free society – the right to bear arms. A society in which individuals cannot bear arms is a society doomed to eternal serfdom and oppression from self-serving overlords. Attorney General Eric Holder has long been an advocate of snuffing out gun rights, yet he got through the confirmation process with nothing more than a few feeble whimpers from helpless Republicans playing partisan games. Even worse is a recent occurrence that is perhaps unprecedented on the part of modern presidential administrations. Rahm Emanuel, in his capacity as Chief of Staff, is being utilized outside of his official role and is acting in the role of propagandist by lobbying for absolute and unconditional gun control. Emanuel, an Israeli citizen, is attempting to target gun owners by categorizing them in terms that will brand them as terrorists (the government’s favorite buzz word) in the eyes of their fellow Americans. Yet there has been no challenge to Emanuel for stepping outside his role and becoming an official flag-bearer for the disarming of America.

Gun rights is one of the most visible issues causing states to retreat and claim the federal government has gone way beyond its limits. In Montana, elected officials have signed a resolution declaring that any ruling by the Federal government on the Second Amendment violates its statehood contract. In fact, Montanans are moving to add more lenient concealed weapons laws to what’s already on the books. In Tennessee, state Senator Doug Jackson, a Democrat, has filed legislation that would ban the sale of micro-stamped firearms and ammunition. Such laws will mean a federal registry of gun owners, and Jackson calls this insanity “a preamble to gun confiscation.”

The other prime mover spurring claims of sovereignty on the part of states is rejection of the Federal Reserve and its illiberal policies that enslave the citizens of states by locking them into its inflationary fiat money machinations and debases their currency. Legislators in some states, such as Georgia and Montana, have agitated in favor of throwing off the Federal Reserve in favor of instituting a sound money policy advocating the use of gold and silver as opposed to the Fed’s legal tender notes. In Montana, Representative Bob Wagner introduced a sound money bill (HB 639), though it later died in committee along partisan lines. As times go on and the economic landscape becomes even gloomier, we are more likely to see many more of these kinds of initiatives on the part of state legislatures.

Gold, as such, is a tool for protection against the collapse of the dollar, which is why opponents of the Federal Reserve desire to buy it and hold it. Guns are the tools with which you defend yourself, not only from the local criminal who wants what you have, but even more so, they provide free men with the capability for physical resistance from a federal government whose expansion of powers and oppressive tactics are out of control. Think Rahm Emanuel and Eric Holder, and ask why it is that they champion an agenda that puts guns only into the hands of the government and its approved agents.

The only way to get this oppressive tyrant – known as the federal government – off our back is to break away from it and start anew. That twenty-eight states are starting to fan the flames of rebellion by moving towards a sovereign itinerary is fairly remarkable. States and people must declare their sovereignty and remove the tentacles of the federal government’s oppressive laws from their necks. Only a breakup of this monstrous and out-of-control, despotic giant can restore freedom and keep us all from descending further into the federal government’s grip.

Karen De Coster [send her mail] is a Certified Public Accountant, has an MA in Economics, and works in finance and accounting in the securities industry. See her website and her blog.

Copyright © 2009 Karen De Coster