THE GOVERNMENT'S WAR ON YOUR LIFE AND PROPERTY By Jarret B. Wollstein ######################################################################### Your most fundamental right as a U.S. citizen is the right to be left alone by the government. So long as you harm no one else, you should be able to live your own life as you see fit, peacefully enjoy your property, and to be free from assault by your own government. Respect by authorities for your fundamental human rights is the essential difference between a police state and a free society. In a police state, the government can legally ransack your house or your business at will, seize anything you own, and assault you with impunity. In a free society, government is prohibited by law from assaulting you or taking your property. Nearly 800 years ago, the Western world rejected unrestricted search and seizure by government agents as barbaric and intolerable. In 1215, the English nobility forced King John to sign the Magna Carta which greatly expanded human rights and sharply limited arbitrary arrests, searches and seizures for the aristocracy. Gradually, these protections were strengthened and extended to ordinary citizens. By the early 17th Century, the sanctity of hearth and home had become recognized in England as a fundamental human right. This right was eloquently stated by William Pitt: The poorest man may in his cottage bid defiance to all of the forces of the Crown. It may be frail -- its roof may shake -- the wind may blow through it -- the storm may enter -- the rain may enter -- but the King of England cannot enter -- all his force dares not cross the threshold of the ruined tenement! Accustomed to the protection of English law, our colonial American fore-fathers were outraged when British soldiers entered their homes at will, searched for contraband, and seized their property. Twentieth-Century Supreme Court Justice William Brennan called these invasions, "the single immediate cause of the American Revolution." After America's successful revolution against English tyranny in 1776, our Founding Fathers sought to ensure that Americans would never again be subject to the abuse, destruction and degradation of random searches and seizures. To protect us from such government violence, they enacted the 4th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. It reads: ======================================================================== [Amendment IV.] The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the person or things to be seized. ========================================================================= Today, 200 years after the enactment of the Bill of Rights, our 4th Amendment protection from destructive government searches and seizures is nearly gone. Anything you have is now fair game for the state to search or seize. The Internal Revenue Service -- for example -- has virtually unlimited power to search our records and seize our assets. If the IRS decides you are trying to avoid taxes, they can issue their own administrative subpoena to get your bank records, the files in your office, the information in your home or office computer, and even intercept your phone calls -- all without any court order. If the IRS thinks you owe taxes, their agents can seize your bank account, your paycheck, your car or your house, without a warrant, trial or indictment. If tax agents believe that you might be able to avoid paying taxes they demand, they can impose a "jeopardy assessment" and seize everything you own and will ever earn -- without trial, hearing or indictment. Under the Anti-Injunction Act of 1924, you are even barred from filing a lawsuit to restrain the IRS from seizing your property. IRS seizures can have deadly consequences. In February, 1989, to collect back taxes, the IRS seized all of the funds of a nursing home in Toledo, Ohio. The home was forced to close immediately, in freezing winter temperatures. Eighteen of the 199 residents died during relocation. When Senator Howard Metzenbaum demanded an explanation, he was told by the IRS the seizure was "extremely routine." Here's how one former IRS collection agent describes the mentality of his fellow collection agents: "Some [agents] were vicious -- they'd brag back at the office, "Boy, did I make that guy jump," or "I had that woman crying when I told her I'd put her on the street with her kids." or indictmentOne agent who bragged about padlocking some guy's business said the man was so upset he asked, "How do you expect me to pay now?" The agent said, "I told him, Go get your wife to peddle [herself]." [Source: Statement of former IRS collection agent Mike Klein, quoted in Art Harris, "The Tax Man and the Big Sting," Washington Post, April 16, 1989, p. F4.] In 1990, the IRS placed liens and levies against the bank accounts, homes and cars of over 2,631,000 taxpayers. Today the IRS can legally seize everything you own, except for $1,650 in personal property and $1,100 in business assets. Two hundred thousand-dollar homes have been seized for the alleged non-payment of as little as $107 in taxes. Million-dollar businesses have been confiscated because of disputes over a few thousand dollars in taxes. Many people have been driven to suicide because of the contemptuous way the Internal Revenue Service treats we, the people, who are its supposed employers. The IRS has become a law unto itself, a government agency with nearly unlimited power, unrestrained by the Bill of Rights or common decency. America was founded in a revolution against precisely such tyrannical power. Over 2,000 federal, state and local government agencies can now seize your property. In the last 20 years, many other agencies have been given almost unlimited power to search our records and seize our assets without trial, including the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Drug Enforcement Administration, the U.S. Marshall's Service, the Department of Customs, the FBI, the Coast Guard, your local police, and even the Department of Housing. Where did these agencies get such power? In 1970, Congress enacted the "RICO racketeering statutes" (greatly expanded in 1984). Promoted as a weapon against organized crime, RICO statutes greatly broadened the power of civil asset forfeiture. >>> Continued to next message --- * SLMR 2.1a * "Rebellion under Tyranny is Obedience before God." --- WILDMAIL!/WC v4.10 * Origin: PR/Surv/Patriot/Liberty San Jose, CA 408.229.9753 (976:1775/1.0) 0SEEN-BY: 91/0 92/0 16 20 110 2401 93/0 300/507 1600/0 120 195 487 1992/2048 0SEEN-BY: 1997/0 2500/0 100 115 200 256 300 2523 2524 2525 2531 2532 2533 2536 0SEEN-BY: 2500/2537 2541 2543 2600/10 2700/0 2800/0 2900/0 3000/0 3100/0 6000/0 0SEEN-BY: 6100/0 200 6200/0 6400/0 6500/0 6600/0 6700/0 6800/7 7000/0 1 2 3 4 5 0SEEN-BY: 7000/6 0PATH: 6100/200 1600/120 0 91/0 92/0 7000/0 From: ERIC GRAY #0 @9:6100/200 via 9:7000/0 PRNet Re: Federal War on Libert 2/3 0AREA:SURV_NEWS 0EID:BD40 F63C2A80 This message was from KEVIN O'KEEFFE to ALL, originally in conference MilitiasPA and was forwarded to you by ERIC GRAY. ------------------------- >>> Continued from previous message To be charged with a crime you must be indicted by a Grand Jury. You are presumed innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. You have the right to an attorney and to a trial by jury. You have the right to confront your accusers and subpoena witnesses in your defense. In contrast, civil forfeiture laws permit government agencies to seize your property and cash -- without trial or indictment. You are, in effect, presumed guilty until you prove your innocence. You have no right to a public defender and no right to a trial before your assets are seized. This makes getting back seized property extremely difficult, if not impossible. Few people can afford to spend tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars to fight the government in court. If you do manage to scrape up the money to hire an attorney after your property has been confiscated, authorities can now legally seize any monies you pay your attorney, either before or after trial. All they have to do is simply allege that those funds are "tainted". Consequently, even the wealthiest defendant can find it impossible to hire competent counsel if the prosecutors even hint that they might seize attorney fees. When the SEC froze the assets of multi-millionaire Robert Altman in Washington, D.C. last year, he suddenly found he couldn't even pay his utility bills or afford to have his lawn cut. No matter how wealthy you are, if the government can freeze or seize everything you own without trial, you can be economically destroyed overnight. And it's not just the wealthy who are targets. You, your family, anyone can be a victim of a police confiscation. In Boston, Minneapolis, Washington, D.C. and other cities, police have begun seizing -- on the spot -- cars of men accused of trying to pick up prostitutes. Even if the men are found innocent of solicitation in court, their cars may still be subject to confiscation. How can that be? The reason is the standard of proof for civil forfeiture is much lower than the standard for criminal conviction. A policeman's statement that "he saw a man talking to a known prostitute" is often good enough. In most cases the prostitutes are costumed policewomen who do everything they can to entrap the men. In Utah in 1986, a woman resisted the confiscation of her cars on her property by armed men in plain clothes who refused to identify themselves. Seven months pregnant with twins, she was beaten to the ground with the butt of an automatic rifle. One twin was born dead, the other brain-damaged. Her assailants turned out to be IRS agents and U.S. marshals. A few weeks after this incident, the female agent in charge of the operation received an official commendation. [Source: Larry King Show, 7/31/90.] In December 1988, Detroit police raided a supermarket to make a drug bust but failed to find any drugs. After police dogs reacted to traces of cocaine on three $1.00 bills in the cash register, the police seized the entire contents of the storeAs registers and safe, totalling $4,384. Using "drug residue" as a criteria, police could seize virtually all of the cash in the country. According to a seven year study by Toxicology Consultants, Inc., "An average of 96 percent of all the bills we analyzed from 11 cities tested positive for cocaine." ["Drugs Contaminate Nearly All The Money in America," Presumed Guilty, The Pittsburgh Press, August 1991, p. 15.] Houston police stopped 46-year-old Ethel Hylton at Houston's Hobby Airport and told her she was under arrest because a drug dog had scratched at her luggage. They searched her bags and strip-searched her, but found no contraband. In her purse they discovered $39,111, which they seized. The money was a settlement from an insurance claim and her life savings, accumulated through more than 20 years of work as a hotel housekeeper and hospital janitor. Despite complete documentation of where she got the money, despite never being convicted of any crime, Ms. Hylton never got her money back from police. [Source: Presumed Guilty by Andrew Schneider and Mary Pat Flagherty, The Pittsburgh Press, August 1991.] The U.S. MarshallAs Service now has a inventory of over 30,000 seized cars, boats, homes and businesses, valued at over $1.2 billion. Virtually all of this property was taken without indictment, trial or conviction. Asset seizures have increased from $27 million in 1985 to over $2 billion in 1992 -- an increase of 3,700%! Police and other government agencies are now targeting Americans, not based upon what crimes they might have committed, but how much property might be seized. Police are personally keeping the property they confiscate from innocent Americans -- like you. What happens to your property once police confiscate it? They keep it and use it. Often for whatever they want. As the San Jose Mercury News stated on August 30, 1993, "Rules are few; audits are fewer. In many counties, independent oversight is virtually nonexistent." Here is how some police use money they confiscated: Nueces County, Texas. According to the New York Times of August 2, 1993, Sheriff James T. Hickey, awarded himself a $48,000 retroactive pay raise from the forfeiture fund. He also gave his lawyer $100,600 for legal services to be rendered after he left office. Warren County, New Jersey. The chief prosecutor allocated himself a confiscated yellow Corvette (from "Presumed Guilty"). Little Compton, Rhode Island. According to a May 18, 1993 article in USA Today, the seven member police force awarded its officers two new Pontiac Firebirds, a four wheel-drive Jeep, a new 28-foot boat, and $500,000 in salary and benefits for the police lieutenant. But these cases of outright robbery are comparatively minor! Former sheriff's sergeant Robert Sobel told the Los Angeles Times (4/13/93), that officers in his unit alone had stolen $60 million in seized property during 1988 and 1989. At the current rate of growth of government seizures, within 17 years all property in America will belong to the state. The growing use of violent police state tactics against innocent Americans. Even when police searches don't economically destroy their victims, the emotional damage can be devastating: In Florida armed state police boarded Greyhound buses, blocked exits and asked passengers for "permission" to search their luggage for drugs. Those who refused were immediately arrested on the grounds that their refusal constitutes "reasonable suspicion" of guilt. The Florida State Supreme Court ruled this procedure unconstitutional and compared it to the tactics of Nazi storm troopers. The case was appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court. In the summer of 1991, the U.S. Supreme Court said that such police searches are permissible, for the "greater social good" of combatting drugs. Armed police across the country are now randomly searching buses and trains, and may soon start searching airplanes. Dozens of police officers and civilian volunteers occupied the junior/senior High School in Highland, Indiana to search for drugs. Exits were blocked and all 2,780 students were "summarily ordered to sit with their books and purses and bags between their feet and their hands on their desks in plain view." The police had no search warrant, and no students were ever advised of their rights. >>> Continued to next message --- * SLMR 2.1a * "Rebellion under Tyranny is Obedience before God." --- WILDMAIL!/WC v4.10 * OLX 2.2 TD * LEGAL REFORM: Fewer laws, and stricter punishment. --- GOMail v2.0t Beta [94-0145] * Origin: The Desert Reef * SURV * Tuc.Az * V.34 * 602 624 6386 (9:6100/200) 0SEEN-BY: 91/0 92/0 16 20 110 2401 93/0 300/507 1600/0 120 195 487 1992/2048 0SEEN-BY: 1997/0 2500/0 100 115 200 256 300 2523 2524 2525 2531 2532 2533 2536 0SEEN-BY: 2500/2537 2541 2543 2600/10 2700/0 2800/0 2900/0 3000/0 3100/0 6000/0 0SEEN-BY: 6100/0 200 6200/0 6400/0 6500/0 6600/0 6700/0 6800/7 7000/0 1 2 3 4 5 0SEEN-BY: 7000/6 0PATH: 6100/200 1600/120 0 91/0 92/0 7000/0 From: ERIC GRAY #0 @976:1775/1 via 9:7000/0 PRNet Re: Federal War on Libert 3/3 0AREA:SURV_NEWS 0EID:A826 F63C2AA0 This message was from KEVIN O'KEEFFE to ALL, originally in conference MilitiasPA and was forwarded to you by ERIC GRAY. ------------------------- >>> Continued from previous message During the three-hour raid, sixteen drug-sniffing dogs examined every student. "Four junior high school students -- all girls -- were removed from their classes, stripped nude, and interrogated. Not one of them was found to possess any illicit material." [Source: The Great Drug War by Arnold Trebach, Macmillan Publishing, 1987, pp. 221-222.] Police can now kill you with impunity. ===================================== Acting on a "tip" that illegal drugs had been used in his house, on the night of August 25, 1992, heavily armed DEA agents broke down the front door of the home of San Diego corporate executive, Donald Carlson. According to attorney Brenda Grantland, they were searching for drugs so they could seize his home. During the DEA raid, Carlson was shot at least three times, and seriously wounded. No drugs were found. For six weeks, Carlson was kept alive by a respirator tube down his throat. He's now permanently disabled. Prosecutors refused to file charges against police. Here's another recent example: The National Park Service had unsuccessfully tried to buy Donald Scott's ranch to incorporate it into a surrounding park. According to the report of Ventura County DA Bradbury, police lied about seeing marijuana on Scott's property, and "the Los Angeles County Sheriffs' Department was motivated...by a desire to seize and forfeit the ranch for the government. This search warrant became Donald Scott's death warrant." Legalized murder is becoming legalized mass murder. In May 1993, over 200 heavily-armed BATF and FBI agents attacked the compound of the Branch Davidians in Waco, Texas, to serve a search warrant for firearms. A letter of June 11, 1993, signed by President Bill Clinton, reveals part of their motivation: "The compound had been under surveillance for some time and federal agents determined that cult members were illegally stockpiling weapons. The large number of guns and ammunition, and the presence of children . . . led agents to begin seizure of the compound." [emphasis added] After ordering fire trucks out of the area, the FBI fired hundreds of projectiles of poison gas into the wooden buildings filled with kerosene lanterns, propane gas tanks, and innocent women and children. Then they drove a tank through the building. The siege ended with over 100 people being either shot to death or burned alive. Attorney General Janet Reno said, "We had to act to protect the children," and "The FBI acted properly." Bill Clinton and our courts agree. They have ruled that police can use deadly force to "protect" themselves, during a raid. So if they have a valid search or seizure warrant for your house, that now means they have a virtual license to kill you -- particularly if you own a gun or are even suspected of having any illegal drugs. The murderers of Don Scott were never indicted. The butchers of Waco have been hailed by President Clinton as heros. If police can get away with the murder of Don Scott and scores of innocent women and children in Waco, how safe are you and your family? It is obvious that not just the 4th Amendment, but our entire Bill of Rights has been destroyed. A government that we entrusted with protecting our lives, rights and property, has become their greatest enemy. A tidal wave of uncontrolled governmental power is threatening to destroy the tattered remnants of our liberty. What you can do to fight it? =========================== What can we do? What can any one person do in the face of such enormous and growing police power? First, inform yourself. Read publications like Freedom Network News, Liberty magazine and other groups fighting for your liberty. Second, speak out. Give articles like this one and ISIL issue papers to your friends and neighbors. Show them videos like "Waco, The Big Lie" distributed by ISIL. Speak up at town hall meetings. Arrange for articulate, pro-liberty spokesmen to appear on radio and TV. Third, work with others. Form a local action groups. Start a letter-writing campaign. Organize meetings. Find out who the victims of police confiscation are in your area, provide them with emotional support and do what you can to help them. Picket and demonstrate sheriff's sales of confiscated assets. Challenge politicians at public meetings. And make sure and get media coverage. Freedom or slavery for America? =============================== Today America is at the end of a historic cycle. Every nation goes from liberty to complacency to bondage. In 1791 Benjamin Franklin predicted that liberty in America would not last more than 200 years. Now his prophecy is coming true. In the end, the only power that government has is the power that we give it. Even the Soviet tyranny could not survive once many people actively opposed it. If we don't take back control of our lives now from the growing American police state, we will have no one to blame but ourselves for the deadly consequences. ======================================================================= JARRET B. WOLLSTEIN is a Director of the International Society for Individual Liberty and one of the founders of the modern libertarian movement. He is the author of five books and hundreds of articles. His ISIL issue papers have sold over 2 million copies. Some of the material in this article was presented in a speech before the Libertarian Party National Convention, September 1992. That speech was broadcast nationally by C-SPAN TV to an estimated listening audience of 5 million. --- * SLMR 2.1a * "Rebellion under Tyranny is Obedience before God." --- WILDMAIL!/WC v4.10 * Origin: PR/Surv/Patriot/Liberty San Jose, CA 408.229.9753 (976:1775/1.0) 0SEEN-BY: 91/0 92/0 16 20 110 2401 93/0 300/507 1600/0 120 195 487 1992/2048 0SEEN-BY: 1997/0 2500/0 100 115 200 256 300 2523 2524 2525 2531 2532 2533 2536 0SEEN-BY: 2500/2537 2541 2543 2600/10 2700/0 2800/0 2900/0 3000/0 3100/0 6000/0 0SEEN-BY: 6100/0 200 6200/0 6400/0 6500/0 6600/0 6700/0 6800/7 7000/0 1 2 3 4 5 0SEEN-BY: 7000/6 0PATH: 6100/200 1600/120 0 91/0 92/0 7000/0