Time: Fri Nov 14 17:42:18 1997
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Date: Fri, 14 Nov 1997 17:38:09 -0800
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From: Paul Andrew Mitchell [address in tool bar]
Subject: SLS: Constitutional Issues ???
>From: martell1@cts.com
>Date: Fri, 14 Nov 1997 11:23:03 -0800
>To: pmitch@primenet.com
>Subject: Constitutional Issues ???
>
>Dear Paul,
>
>I came across this article and it raises the question " Do we or don't
>we have a constitution in effect presently? Is this the hook the govt.
>uses to defend it's position? Please answere when you can, for I know
>you are a busy man. Thanks!!
>
> On June 3, 1994, President Clinton signed Executive Order #12919
>gathering together into a single document all the power and athority of
>a multitude of Executive Orders issued by preceding presidents from John
>Kennedy on. Recent examination of this Executive Order has brought to
>light that the consolidation of previous presidential orders deliver
>unprecedented authority into the hands of the Chief Executive that
>exceed those powers granted him under the U.S. Constitution.
>
> Incorporated under the aegis of President Clinton's EO #12919 are
>powers originally claimed by President Kennedy in a series of Executive
>Orders signed into "law" in February of 1962 which, if invoked, would
>virtually suspend the greater portion of liberties guaranteed by the
>United States Constitution.
>
> In Section 3 of Kennedy's original EO #10995 entitled, "ASSIGNING
>TELECOMMUNICATIONS MANAGEMENT FUNCTIONS" there is the vague statement,
>"Such authority shall include the power to amend modify, or revoke
>frequency assignments." Innocuous as this sounds, it embodies the power
>of the Chief
>Executive, in time of "national emergency", to seize control of all
>radio and other telecommunications.
>
> On the same day that President Kennedy signed EO #10995, he also gave
>birth to four successive Orders that Clinton included in his EO
>containing provisions to disable constitutional rights. Executive Order
>#10997 empowers the Secretary of the Interior to seize all energy
>production facilities--specifically, "electrical power","petroleum",
>"gas", "solid fuels", and "minerals". Section 3, subsection (d) of that
>order, entitled "Claimancy"states:
>
> Prepare plans to claim materials, manpower, equipment, supplies and
>services needed in support of assigned responsibilities and other
>essential functions of the Department...to insure availability of such
>resources in an emergency. [emphasis and supplied]
>
> Note the word "claim" in reference to "materials, manpower,
>equipment, supplies and services". The legal definition, as supplied by
>Black's Law Dictionary is, "To demand as one's own or as one's
>right...means by or
>through which claimant obtains possession or enjoyment of a privilege or
>thing. Demand for money or property as of a right...." This means that
>the government may, upon declaration of a state of local or national
>emergency, seize any of the above, private or otherwise, including
>"manpower".
>
> As to what constitutes a national emergency again Black's definition
>is quite revealing:
>
> "A state of national crisis; a situation demanding immediate and
>extraordinary national or federal action. Congress has made little or no
>distinction between a "state of national emergency"and a "state of war."
>Brown v. Bernstein, D.C.Pa., 49 F.Supp. 728, 732. [emphasis supplied]
>
> EO #10998 places all food resources under authority of the Secretary
>of Agriculture.
>
> EO #10999 invests the Secretary of Commerce with control over all
>means of transportation, public and
>private.
>
> EO #11000 provides for the establishment of manpower resources at the
>discretion of the Secretary of Labor, with the authority to "claim"
>services (labor) and involuntary relocation of workers. Collateral
>authority for
>this conscription of labor is given in Title 50 app. United States Code,
>Section 2153 "WAR AND NATIONAL DEFENCE" under the section addressing
>civilian disposition entitled, "DEFENSE PRODUCTION ACT Of 1950" in which
>is set forth that civilian personnel may be assigned work without regard
>to payment or
>reimbursement.
>
> It is important to note that according to the "War and Emergency
>Powers Act" the United States has legally been under a state of national
>emergency since its enactment in 1933. It has never been repealed, thus
>leaving the president with instant powers to suspend the constitution.
>Most legal scholars and legislators who have studied the matter concur
>that the War and Emergency Powers Act has, in reality, already suspended
>the Constitution since the moment the act was signed into law by
>President Roosevelt. The actual suspension of those consitutional rights
>awaits only the impetus of a national emergency requiring it.
>
> In 1933 a U.S. Congressman entered the following statement into the
>Congressional Record:
> "I think of all the damnable heresies that have ever been
>suggested in
>connection with the Constitution, the doctrine of emergency is the
>worst. It means that when Congress declares an emergency, there is no
>Constitution. This means its death. It is the very doctrine that the
>German chancellor is invoking today in the dying hours of the
>parliamentary body of the German republic,
> namely, that because of an emergency, it should grant to the German
>chancellor absolute power to pass any law, even though the law
>contradicts the Constitution of the German republic. Chancellor Hitler
>is at least frank about it. We pay the Constitution lipservice, but the
>result is the same....the
>Constitution of the United States, as a restraining influence in keeping
>the federal government within the carefully prescribed channels of
>power, is moribund, if not dead."
>
> The introduction to Senate Report 93-549, entered into the
>Congressional Record forty years later in 1973 states:
> "A majority of the people of the United States have lived all
>their
>lives under emergency rule....For 40 years, freedoms and governmental
>procedures guaranteed by the Constitution have, in varying degrees, been
>abridged by laws brought into force by states of national
>emergency....And, in the United States, actions taken by the government
>in times of great crisis have from, at least, the Civil War, in
>important ways shaped the present phenomenon of a permanent state of
>national emergency."
>
> Following the introduction the report's opening statement goes on to
>say:
>
> "Since March the 9th, 1933, the United States has been in a state of
>declared national emergency....This vast range of powers, taken
>together, confer enough authority to rule the country without reference
>to normal constitutional processes. Under the powers delegated by these
>statutes, the President may: seize property; organize and control the
>means of production; seize commodities; assign military forces abroad;
>institute martial law; seize and control all transportation and
>communication; regulate the operation of private enterprise; restrict
>travel; and, in a plethora of particular ways, control the lives of all
>American citizens."
>
> Not overlooked by those drafting the Constitution was the possible
>need to address national emergencies. The document contains certain
>provisions indicating that its signatories conceived of the possibility
>that some guarantees of personal liberties may, in the national
>interest, require suspension.
>
> Article 1, Section 9 states: The privilege of the writ of habeas
>corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in cases of rebellion [an
>internal occurrence] or invasion [external] the public safety require
>it." This grants the citizen the freedom from imprisonment or detention
>without due process. The proviso "unless when in cases of rebellion or
>invasion the public safety require it" indicates the necessity to
>provide for some contingencies that may also carry with them the
>possibility for abuse. No document of liberty, however, could possibly
>proscribe all potential for misuse of those liberties without actually
>eliminating them in the process. It has been said that communism is
>nothing more than democrasy with all potential for abuse legislated out.
>
> As a result of the Executive Orders listed above, in concert with the
>War and Emergency Powers Act, there exists within the United States a
>government within a government. It is hidden, semi-covert in nature, and
>does not recognize the U.S. Constitution or its constraints. It
>functions autonomously as a form of totalitarian regime in suspended
>animation, awaiting its time of activation. It is a government driven by
>presidential Executive Orders to be executed by federal agencies run by
>non-elected officials.
>
> Executive Orders amount to ready-wired buttons by which the president
>can suspend constitutional rights at any moment he determines that a
>"national emergency" exists. The great problem inherent is that no
>binding legal definition exists as to what constitutes a "national
>emergency". That definition lies entirely with the Chief Executive. When
>he declares a state of emergency, the aforementioned documents can be
>used to activate whatever federal agency is most suited to address the
>emergency. Those agencies include, but are not limited to, the Bureau of
>Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms (BATF), the FBI and the Federal Emergency
>Management Administration (FEMA).
>
> Because this nation is under a continual state of emergency due to
>the War and Emergency Powers Act, and the Constitution granting somewhat
>elastic powers of emergency in "cases of rebellion or invasion", the
>president can circumvent such fundamental protections as the Posse
>Comatatus Act which forbids the use of
>the military against U.S. citizens.
>
> This slow motion decay of constitutional rights was not unforeseen by
>the Founding Fathers. In a letter to Thomas Jefferson, James Madison
>once wrote, I believe there are more instances of abridgment of freedom
>of the people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power than
>by violent and sudden usurpations...."
>
> The Constitution of the United States of America, once the hub of
>American law and freedoms, has been moved to the position of the hubcap.
>It has become merely an ornamental relic that serves no real function
>other than that of making the American people feel as if the document
>still matters to those who govern.
>
> It appears that the modern electorate chooses their leaders for the
>same purpose that they attend a magic show. Their actual desire seems to
>be that the performer deceive them.
>
>Bonfire for the Constitution (Part II)
> The Velvet Hammer
> In the event of a national emergency declared by the President of
>the United States, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), would
>be invested with the power to suspend the U.S. Constitution and is
>positioned to take control of the United States government and its
>citizens. As discussed in Part I of this report, the authority of eleven
>preceding Presidential Executive Orders (1939 through 1991) has been
>consolidated into Order #12919. This concentration of executive
>authority invests FEMA with absolute power over:
>
> All United States communications facilities (EO 10995)
> Electrical power, petroleum, gas, fuels and minerals, public and
>private (10997)
> Food supplies, agricultural lands and facilities (10998)
> Transportation of any kind, including private, and control of
>seaports, waterways and
> highways (10999)
> Civilian labor forces without regard to financial remuneration
>as authorized under the
> "DEFENSE PRODUCTION ACT OF 1950" (11000)
> Health, education and welfare institutions (11001)
> All airport and air transportation, public, private and
>commercial (11003)
> Railroads, inland waterways, and public storage facilities
>(11005)
>
> Additionally, FEMA, under Executive Order #11002, can order the
>postmaster general to begin a national
>registration of all residents of the United States for purposes of
>control of population movement and relocation.
>
> All of the aforementioned powers can be invoked with the stroke of a
>presidential pen and are free of
>congressional restrictions or intervention for a period of six months.
>The practical expression of these powerscan be the equivalent of a
>sentence without trial or jury with no recourse to appeal for at least a
>half a year.
>Many legal and paralegal analysts have seen, in the powers delegated to
>FEMA during any declared national
>emergency, the authority to forcibly relocate entire families into
>federal work camps, even as to the dividing of families and of children
>from parents.
>
> FEMA was created by President Carter under Executive Order #12148.
>Its legal authorization is Title 2,
>United States Code 5121 called the "Stafford Act." Within the text of
>that piece of "legislation" in Subchapter IV, section (B) is contained
>the wording:
>
> "Measures to be undertaken during a hazard (including the
>enforcement of passive defense
> regulations prescribed by duly established military or civil
>authorities, the evacuation of personnel
> to shelter areas, the control of traffic and panic, and the control
>and use of lighting and civil
> communications)."emphasis supplied
>
> In a telephone interview with FEMA attorneys, The Winds asked the
>legal definition of "passive defense
>regulations" as "prescribed by duly established military or civil
>authorities." Even FEMA's Counsel General, Michael Hirsh, was unable to
>give us any definition of those terms. The ambiguity of that wording
>veiled its meaning from even the highest ranking lawyer in the agency.
>
> KEEPING THE LAWS UNCLEAR
> In the principle document by which the New World Order is
>implemented, the ambiguity of legal terms is set forth as a necessary
>quality by which any interpretation desired may be secured. In the
>nebulous breadth of those ambiguities lies the latitude of
>interpretation to make laws and regulations say whatever those in
>authority want them to say. Concerning those laws they claim that they:
>
> "...have twisted their interpretations so as to make them contradict
>each other. We have succeeded
> in erecting great and magnificent results by perverting the laws.
>The first result was that the
> interpretations of the laws actually masked their true intent.
>Afterwards, those laws were entirely hid from eyes of the
>governments because it became impossible to make anything out of the
> tangled web of legislation."emphasis supplied.
>
> The Winds also asked FEMA's public relations office the primary
>reasons for the forced evacuation of
>residents during the recent flooding in North Dakota and the orders (not
>requests) for some residents to remain in their homes following the
>recent hurricanes in the southeast. FEMA's response, strangely, did not
>indicate concern for the safety and well-being of the citizens involved,
>as one might expect of an agency tasked with the oversight of America's
>domestic security in time of disaster. Rather, their reasons for
>violating the constitutional rights of those citizens was a hedge
>against being sued by them or their survivors if they were injured or
>killed as a result of not being evacuated. Money, not lives, was their
>expressed justification for removing owners from their homes, in one
>instance, and commanding them not to leave them, in another.
>
> Executive Order #11051 assigns responsibility of the Office of
>Emergency Planning (later to become FEMA), and authorizes all Executive
>Orders into effect in times of increased international tensions and
>economic or financial crisis or national emergency.emphasis supplied
>
> Again, the vagueness of the wording leaves wide the door of
>interpretation. As to what constitutes an "emergency" the Stafford Act
>defines it as thus:
>
> "Emergency--'Emergency' means any occasion or instance for which, in
>the determination of the President, Federal assistance is needed to
>supplement State and local efforts and capabilities to save lives and to
>protect property and public health and safety, or to lessen or avert the
>threat of a catastrophe in any part of the United States."emphasis
>supplied
>
> KEEPING DISSIDENT GROUPS QUIET
>
> Former Chief of FEMA's Civil Security Division, General Frank
>Salzedo, once stated that his interpretationof FEMA's role is, among
>other things, "prevention of dissident groups from gaining access to
>U.S. opinion, or a global audience in times of crisis." The
>Constitution, on the other hand, states:
>
> "Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom of speech, or of
>the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to
>petition the government for a redress of grievances."
>
> The question arises as to how General Salzedo's statement could
>survive being filtered through the First Amendment. What he said amounts
>to "government-speak" for the potential of creating an American
>Tienanmen Square. One of the Executive Orders gathered into Clinton's EO
>#12919 was an Order signed by President Nixon known as the "Omnibus
>Emergency Preparedness Decree". Howard J. Ruff, economist and publisher
>of The Ruff Times says "Since the enactment of [that] Order, the only
>thing standing between us and dictatorship is the good character of the
>President, and the lack of a crisis severe enough that the public would
>stand still for it." The former slave and Civil War activist, Fredrick
>Douglas, once said that the limits of a tyrant's power are set by the
>willingness of the people to tolerate him.
>
> During activation of these Executive Orders, FEMA answers only to
>the National Security Council which answers only to the President, and,
>as mentioned previously, once these powers are invoked even Congress
>cannot intervene or countermand them for six months.
>
> GUN MOUNTED OVER THE MANTLE
> The command and control structure for the oversight and
>administration of these extra-constitutional powers (the teeth to
>execute and enforce the above orders) is already in place. FEMA is the
>administrating agency for several top secret facilities. The most
>notable is burrowed deep into the bedrock beneath Mount Weather near
>Berryville, Virginia. Also known as the Western Virginia office of
>Controlled Conflict Operations, this underground command post was
>originally constructed for the purpose of housing top officials of the
>U.S.
>government during a national emergency such as imminent nuclear war. It
>is still contained within the "black" budget that does not appear in
>FEMA's published budgetary documents. Mt. Weather, along with other such
>secret installations as the one beneath a luxury resort in West Virginia
>called Greenbrier, officially does not exist.
>
> Wallace Stickney, former FEMA director under George Bush, recalled
>that even the members of Congress approaching his agency to question
>some budget expenditures were not allowed access to the knowledge of
>where the money was directed--and they were the ones responsible for
>budgetary oversight. Even more
>astonishing is the fact that Stickney himself was denied such access. He
>said, "I was aware funding was being passed through but didn't know
>where it was going--nor did Congress, which demanded to know. Normally,
>as Iunderstood it, nobody questioned the arithmetic."
>
> If a nuclear attack occurred during Stickney's tenure in office, he
>was not to be included among those privileged to partake in the safety
>of the underground complex. He would have been required to remain at his
>post and, in the parlance of the nuclear disaster planners, be cindered.
>That insecurity for FEMA's current director, James Lee Witt, ended when
>President Clinton conferred cabinet status on him in February of 1996.
>
> There is within government a quasi-legal concept called the "Rule of
>Necessity". Simply put, this doctrine says that whatever is necessary to
>preserve the nation against its foes, whether external or internal, will
>be
>done--apparently without regard to any violence done to the
>Constitution. It is to address the Rule of Necessity that Executive
>Orders are created. EOs did not have their beginnings in the desires of
>American presidents to transform the executive office into a de facto
>dictatorship. The first Presidential Executive Order was issued by
>George Washington in 1789, but no numbering system or uniformity was
>applied until 1907 when the Department of State retroactively designated
>an EO issued by Abraham Lincoln in 1862 as Executive Order 1.
>
> What has become of this executive privilege since the Civil War has
>been rather like an insidiously introduced, systemic infection aimed at
>the total debilitation of the U.S. Constitution.. As to whether these
>extreme powers of the Executive Branch will actually be
>implemented--there is an old saying in the theatre that if there is a
>gun mounted over the fireplace mantle in the first act, it will be used
>before the end of the final act. Itain't hangin' up there for nothin'.
>
>
===========================================================================
Paul Andrew Mitchell, Sui Juris : Counselor at Law, federal witness 01
B.A.: Political Science, UCLA; M.S.: Public Administration, U.C.Irvine 02
tel: (520) 320-1514: machine; fax: (520) 320-1256: 24-hour/day-night 03
email: [address in tool bar] : using Eudora Pro 3.0.3 on 586 CPU 04
website: http://supremelaw.com : visit the Supreme Law Library now 05
ship to: c/o 2509 N. Campbell, #1776 : this is free speech, at its best 06
Tucson, Arizona state : state zone, not the federal zone 07
Postal Zone 85719/tdc : USPS delays first class w/o this 08
_____________________________________: Law is authority in written words 09
As agents of the Most High, we came here to establish justice. We shall 10
not leave, until our mission is accomplished and justice reigns eternal. 11
======================================================================== 12
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