Montana legislator wants to add teeth to state's firearms nullification bill

In April 2009, the Montana legislature passed a bill that exempted from federal law all firearms both manufactured and sold within the state, which is not interstate commerce within the meaning of the U.S. Constitution, Article I, Section 8.

Now, Bob Unruh at WorldNet Daily reports that State Sen. Greg W. Hinkle (R-Thompson Falls) has introduced SB 114, which would require federal employees to obtain the county sheriff's permission to  make arrests, searches, and seizures. With some exceptions, federal officials violating this act would be subject to prosecution. The act specifically states that federal employees do not have the authority of a county sheriff within Montana. The act applies to all federal law enforcement activities within the State of Montana, except on federal lands. It is not limited to firearms enforcement. If a county sheriff is under investigation, the federal official must obtain permission from the state attorney general.

Mr. Unruh notes that this is an example of a "sheriffs first" bill, which is being talked about in several states.

This bill is downright gutsy. It will be interesting to see how the legislative process plays out on this bill. Stay tuned.

(Because of the time required to maintain a status report of legislation in other states, I will not be keeping a spreadsheet of state sovereignty and nullification resolutions this year. Readers desiring this information should check the Tenth Amendment Center site).

Gun rights activists back nullification measures

While I support the Second Amendment, I am not particularly enthusiastic about gun rights,which is why that issue is rarely reported here. However, it is appropriate to recognize that those who are enthusiastic about gun rights are also strongly in favor of State sovereignty resolutions and measures like Montana's to nullify Federal gun statutes as they apply to intrastate commerce. Here is an interesting (and for mainstream media, fairly objective) report from CBS News on that trend.

State Sovereignty Resolution Update - 3/25

For personal and work-related reasons, I have fallen behind again in reporting the progress of State sovereignty resolutions, so here's the latest:

Alaska HJR27 passed the Senate Apr. 9 by a vote of 19-0. It is awaiting Gov. Sarah Palin's signature, which I imagine won't pose much of a problem...

In Arkansas, HR1011 was reconsidered in committee Apr. 2, only to be defeated in the House the next day by a vote of 34-54.

According to the John Birch Society's Tenth Amendment Movement, Indiana's House resolution HCR50 died in committee Apr. 9, but according to several sources, their Senate resolution SR42 passed Apr. 19 by a vote of 44-3 with 3 abstentions.

After passing their famous nullification act (HB0246) against Federal control of locally-manufactured weapons, the Montana House got cold feet on the regular State sovereignty resolution HR3 and defeated it Apr. 15 in a tie vote 50-50.

The North Dakota Senate passed SR68 Apr. 20. It was returned to the House with an amendment somewhat weakening the language by removing references to the Federal government as being the agent of the States.

State Sovereignty Resolution Update - 4/17

Montana Governor Brad Schweitzer signed HB246 Apr. 15, making Montana the second State to enact a sovereignty resolution. The act also authorizes Montana to nullify certain Federal gun legislation within the State's borders.

State Sovereignty Resoluton Update - 4/7

Idaho enacted its HJM004 today with a voice vote in the State Senate, becoming the second State (after South Dakota) to do so in the current session.

Montana's Senate has approved HB 246, which unlike most State sovereignty resolutions, is a bill to forbid the Feds from enforcing firearms statutes with respect to certain weapons. The vote, taken Mar. 27, was 29-21. The bill is expected to be signed by Montana Gov. Brian Schweitzer. The gun site M4Carbine Forums has some additional information. When Gov. Schweitzer signs the bill, I shall mark it as enacted.

In a related development, ZDNet Health Care reports that the U.S. Supreme Court has held (Wyeth v. Levine) that Federal law cannot pre-empt suits against drug manufacturers for negligence in their warning labels. Justice Clarence Thomas filed a concurring opinion that states the 10th Amendment position quite clearly:

"[Judge Thomas writes:] 'I have become increasingly skeptical of this Court’s purposes and objectives” pre-emption jurisprudence. Under this approach, the Court routinely invalidates state laws based on perceived conflicts with broad federal policy objectives, legislative history, or generalized notions of congressional purposes that are not embodied within the text of federal law. Because implied pre-emption doctrines that wander far from the statutory text are inconsistent with the Constitution, I concur only in the judgment.

"'Only when acting under power granted by the Constitution can even the Congress pre-empt state law,' he wrote, citing the 10th Amendment. He also quoted the Federalist Papers to the effect that federal powers are 'few and defined,' those remaining with the states 'numerous and indefinite.'"

State Sovereignty Update - 2/27

A commenter to MRStep points to a resolution (HR61) introduced yesterday in the Virginia House of Delegates by Christopher K. Peace (R), which is shorter and milder than Oklahoma's.

The Tenth Amendment Center reports that the South Carolina House passed its State Sovereignty resolution yesterday, which contains the same secession trigger as New Hampshire’s. The measure now faces a vote in the State Senate.

The same source has also reported that a second resolution (HCR 172) has been introduced in the Kentucky House of Representatives by Rep. David Floyd (R). It is mostly similar to HCR 168 introduced by Rep. Stacy on Feb. 25, but adds an interesting line about Federal mandates violating the Bill of Rights in the Kentucky Constitution.

I have learned from the Mental Militia Forums (link from a link…) that the Montana resolution, which provides for the nullification of Federal gun statutes, passed its House Feb. 11 by a 60-40 vote.

MRStep has learned that the Utah Legislature adopted a sovereignty resolution similar to Oklahoma’s in 1995.

Montana House approves sovereignty bill

Montana's News Station (actually a chain of CBS television stations in that State) reports that the Montana House of Representatives has voted in favor of their sovereignty resolution in a second reading. Strictly speaking, Montana's HB 246 is a bill to nullify Federal firearms statutes within the State of Montana, something that to my knowledge has not been attempted since before the War between the States. The bill still faces a third reading in the House and votes in the State Senate.

Virtual buckeye to an anonymous commenter.
The above post reflects corrections made 2/18/2009.

Moving secessionism from thought to action

Sebastian Ronin, of the Novacadia Alliance has laid down the gauntlet to the North American secessionist movement in a blog post entitled "Secessionists Asleep at the Wheel". His real question is, are we serious or not? I am reproducing most of his post here, because it so clearly presents the problems North American secessionists are encountering.

“It took just about a month for the mainstream media to catch up to a story on the disintegration of the United States. The story, by Russian Professor Igor Panarin, first broke on November 25, 2008 . I refer, of course, to the WSJ article which ran on December 29: As if Things Weren’t Bad Enough, Russian Professor Predicts End of U.S.“The WSJ article is getting a lot of play in the blogosphere. The original Izvestia story, as was covered by Global Futures, was touched on with a post in [the Novacadia Alliance] blog and can be jumped to here (link to the original Global Futures article inclusive).

“The motives for such an esteemed gatekeeper as the WSJ to run with this story is left to individual imaginations. It is safe to say that the determination of motive will vary with the degree of one’s political smarts and where one sits within the conspiracy cosmos, i.e. alternative interpretation of “the news.” The acknowledged role of the corporate media within such “conspiracy cosmos” goes without saying.

“More to the point, the issue for the NAmerican secessionist movement (NASM) around this story is not if Professor Panarin is a nut job or to the degree, if any, that his theories on the break-up of the United States serve Russian propaganda purposes. The issue for the NASM here is the degree to which it has been caught with its pants down.* By all rights, a representative body of the NASM should have been all over this story and the wide public attention it received like a dirty shirt; it should have been collecting PR premiums hand-over-fist via the positioning of the NASM in the public psyche.

“Unfortunately, the NASM is asleep-at-the-wheel because it is currently structured to be asleep-at-the-wheel, i.e. there is no structure; there is no representative body. Within a context of political organization, the movement is straddled and limited by an uncoordinated gaggle of state/provincial and regional secessionist initiatives ranging from the politically astute and professional (Quebec, Vermont, The South, Texas, Alaska), to fledgling start-ups, to the ongoing competition amongst Cascadian organizations as to who can design the prettiest web site.

“The Middlebury Institute, widely recognized as being the clearing house for secessionist news and information, makes no mention of the Panarin story. The American Secession Project is likewise out of the loop, which stands to reason as it seems that activity there has been dormant since 2007.

“Perhaps the current state of the NASM is no better reflected than with the dismal flop of the recent Third North American Secessionist Convention. After the major international media breakthroughs accomplished at the Second NAmerican Secessionist Convention held in Chattanooga, TN in 2007, the NASM took a step backwards with the Third NAmerican Secessionist Convention held this past November in Manchester, NH. For the media the convention was a non-event, possibly due to a combination of Obamamania, lack of interest (choreographed media boycotting of the convention possibly inclusive), and/or poorly executed press releases. Based on the haphazard organization, a majority no-show of secessionist organizations, lack of parliamentary procedure and decorum, and the tired parading of the usual secessionist “assets” and ringers, one convention delegate opined that maybe it was just as well that the media were a no-show…

“If, indeed, the NASM has in its collective mind the intent to harness a revolution of perception and consequent action amongst its autonomous, regional satellites for the full benefit of a Post-Peak Oil public, then the current organizational non-structure and general invisibility of the NASM will not suffice.

“It is put forward for strong and serious consideration that the NASM must evolve in tandem with the historical condition. If not, then we may as well all grab our marbles and go home. To work towards the bankrupt political status of [Canadian] Green Party [or U.S. third party] lobbying is not an option. Actually, as a responsible political force and voice, the NASM should be ahead of the unfolding condition; it should be able to pre-empt the condition in order to most effectively ensure its political positioning. As is, the condition, e.g. the entry onto the Post-Peak Oil slope, financial and economic meltdown, imperial over-reach, NWO geopolitics, etc., is outpacing the isolated managerial and political capacities of the NASM in leaps and bounds.

“The onus falls on NAmerican autonomous secessionist organizations to make the democratic, coordinated and organizational efforts to catch up to the condition in order to reap full public relations benefits, to position the NASM in the NAmerican political psyche. The garnering of support and call for the creation of an organizational, coordinating and legally incorporated and registered body such as a North American Secessionist Congress may be the route to go. The necessity to do so would seem to be obvious and crucial. The will to do so, unfortunately, is another thing altogether."

His analysis of the North American secessionist movement is right on target. Of all the secessionist bloggers out there, Mr. Ronin seems to have the firmest grip on reality. Since the best-known secessionists (Kirkpatrick Sale and Thomas Naylor) are academics, it will be difficult to make the transition that he suggests. While the statements of the Middlebury Institute have been useful, they can do little more than set a tone. We are at a point now where we need to understand and apply practical political action.

Secessionism is, by its very nature, splintered. While a (future) movement in Ohio could be nurtured and given some technical support from a North American secessionist organization, Ohio's independence will have to be built by Ohioans, rooted in Ohio's customs, developed in the environment of Ohio's politics, and deal with Ohio's issues. The same is true of any other state or region desiring independence.

One promising approach for local secessionists is to hook up with political action groups that support personal liberty, such as those spawned by Ron Paul's Campaign for Liberty. The Ohio Republic joined one such group in supporting the successful effort to persuade the last Ohio General Assembly to prevent it from supporting a call for a U.S. Constitutional Convention; which is likely to replace our existing Constitution with a new one far less friendly to personal liberty. The advantage for the secessionist movement is that members of such groups are apt to consider secession as a viable option. An idea currently under consideration is to take to the Ohio General Assembly a proposal for a joint resolution, or even a "secession trigger" in our State Constitution; in the event that a Constitutional Convention attempts to replace the U.S. Constitution, or ratifies the North American Union. This is a logical next step following last year’s assertion of State sovereignty by the Oklahoma House of Representatives, and the statement by 39 elected officials in Montana threatening secession if Heller v. D.C., a gun-rights case then pending in the Supreme Court, had been determined against the rights of gun owners.

Independence will not come all at once. We have to take baby steps to warm people up to the idea. We have been fortunate to have favorable or neutral media coverage; but the media could, and probably will, turn very hostile when corporate interests realize that the dissolution of the United States and Canada will generally work against the interests of multinational corporations. If we are to secede, we must develop person-to-person contacts and hold discussions at the local level; not just with each other, but with local politicians -- most of whom will pooh-pooh us at first; but as we organize and make ourselves heard, the derision will give way to serious thought, and then to serious action.

It would certainly help if we had a cohesive North American Secessionist Congress with alert leadership and sharp PR people, to inform the public on issues common to all of us; but if the battle is to be won, it has to be won in each State and each region on its own terms.

* The Ohio Republic was on it.

Montana threatens secession

Reason magazine reports that Montana wants to ensure that the Second Amendment is an individual, not a collective, right.

"In a joint resolution, the Montana politicians argue that when Washington approved the state constitution, including a clause granting 'any person' the right to bear arms, upon the Treasure State’s entry into the Union in 1889, the federal government recognized that clause as consistent with the Second Amendment."

Montana argues that if the Supreme Court decides in D.C. vs. Heller that the right is a collective one, it would breach the Constitutional compact made with Montana on its admission.

“A collective rights holding in Heller would not only open the Pandora’s box of unilaterally morphing contracts, it would also poise Montana to claim appropriate and historically entrenched remedies for contract violation.”

That remedy for a Constitution is known as secession.

Secession, while not explicitly authorized by the Constituion was recognized as a legal right by the Federal Government early in the Lincoln Presidency. This explains why Jefferson Davis was not tried for treason, and why the Congress during Reconstruction after the Civil War repeatedly changed its policy on readmission of the seceded States.

The idea is getting less loony all the time. Thanks to Rebellion for bringing this to my attention.

Additional information on Montana (June 16).