THE PROHIBITION ISSUE The following informative texts focus on the controversial issues of gun and drug prohibition. We hope that you will review the below materials with an open mind. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- FAMOUS QUOTES FROM HISTORY "Prohibition... goes beyond the bounds of reason in that it attempts to control a man's appetite by legislation and makes a crime out of things that are not crimes... A prohibition law strikes a blow at the very principles upon which our government was founded." - Abraham Lincoln (December 1840) "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it." - George Santayana "To disarm the people - that was the best and most effective way to enslave them." - George Mason "The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government." - Thomas Jefferson "I ask, sir, what is the militia? It is the whole people, except for a few public officials." - George Mason, 3 Elliott Debates at 425-426 "A well-regulated militia, composed of the body of the people, trained to arms, is the best and most natural defense of a free country." - James Madison, I Annals of Congress 434 (June 8, 1789) "What, Sir, is the use of a militia? It is to prevent the establishment of a standing army (the bane of liberty)... Whenever governments mean to invade the rights and liberties of the people, they always attempt to destroy the militia, in order to raise an army upon their ruins." - Representative Elbridge Gerry of Massachusetts, I Annals of Congress at 750 (August 17, 1789) "The conclusion is thus inescapable that the history, concept, and wording of the second amendment to the Constitution of the United States, as well as its interpretation by every major commentator and court in the first half-century after its ratification, indicates that what is protected is an individual right of a private citizen to own and carry firearms in a peaceful manner." - Report of the Subcommittee on the Constitution of the Committee on the Judiciary, United States Senate, 97th Congress, Second Session (February 1982) "A wise and frugal government, which shall restrain men from injuring one another, which shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned - this is the sum of good government." - Thomas Jefferson The above quotes prove that the founders of America intended the Constitution's 2nd amendment to protect the individual right to keep and bear arms. It was NOT intended to provide a government militia monopoly on weapon ownership, as many Constitutional scholars have pointed out after careful research and analysis. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- THE GUN ISSUE Libertarians, like other Americans, want to be able to walk city streets safely and be secure in their homes. We also want our Constitutional rights protected, to guard against the erosion of our civil liberties. In particular, Libertarians want to see all people treated equally under the law, as our Constitution requires. America's millions of gun owners are people too. Law-abiding, responsible citizens should not need to ask anyone's permission or approval to engage in a peaceful activity. Gun ownership, by itself, harms no other person and cannot morally justify criminal penalties. America's founders fought the Revolutionary War to throw off British tyranny. Most of the revolutionaries owned and used their own guns in that war. After the war, in 1789, the 13 American States adopted the Constitution which created the federal government. But the people demanded a Bill of Rights (the first 10 amendments to the Constitution) to prevent our government from depriving citizens of their liberties (as the British had done). One of the most important protections we have against government tyranny is that we are presumed innocent of any crime until proven guilty, before jury, in a proper trial. But, gun control advocates would declare all gun owners guilty without trial, simply for owning guns, altho most of them have never used their guns to harm another person. Gun prohibition is contrary to the principles on which America was founded. Gun control advocates are much like the prohibitionists of the early 20th century. By making liquor illegal, they spawned organized crime, caused violent turf wars, and corrupted the criminal justice system. Today's war on drugs has exactly the same results. Prohibition did not stop liquor use; the drug laws cannot stop drug use. Making gun ownership illegal will not stop gun ownership. The primary victim of gun control legislation is the honest citizen whose civil rights are being trampled. Banning guns makes guns more expensive and gives organized crime a great opportunity to make profits in a new black market for weapons. Street violence would actually increase. Libertarians agree with the majority of Americans who believe they have the right to decide how best to protect themselves, their families, and their property. Millions of Americans have guns in their homes and sleep more comfortably because of it. Studies show that where gun ownership is illegal, residential burglaries are higher; conversely, where responsible gun ownership is widespread, as in some parts of Georgia, violent crime is lower. The police do not provide security in your home, your business, or on the street. They show up after the crime to take reports and do detective work. The poorer the neighborhood, the riskier it is for peaceful residents. Only an armed citizenry can be present in sufficient numbers to prevent or deter violent crime before it starts and to reduce its spread. Interviews with convicted felons indicate that fear of armed citizens significantly deters crime. A criminal is more likely to be driven off from a particular crime by an armed victim than to be convicted and imprisoned for it. Thus, widespread gun ownership will make neighborhoods safer. Most Democrats and Republicans ignore the fact that bans on semi-automatic "assault rifles" and other guns will not reduce crime. If we are really concerned about reducing violent crime, we should decriminalize drugs, as drug-related crimes created by inflated drug selling prices comprise a large majority of all crimes. Only law-abiding citizens will comply with gun bans - criminals are not going to give up their guns. Therefore, gun bans only increase the criminals' ability to victimize the innocent. Guns are not the problem - they are inanimate objects. Gun control advocates talk as if guns could act on their own, when in fact it is the individual who pulls the trigger. Let us put the responsibility where it belongs - on the owner and user of the gun. If he or she acts responsibly, without attacking others or causing injury, no crime or harm has been done. But, if a person commits a crime with a gun, then it is necessary to impose severe penalties. We need to hold negligent gun users fully liable for all harm that his negligence has done to others. Rather than banning guns, it's time to encourage responsible gun ownership as well as education and training programs. A responsible, well-armed and trained citizenry is the best protection against domestic crime and the threat of foreign invasion. America's founders knew that, and it's still true today. Let's not leave America's citizens defenseless against armed bandits! ---------------------------------------------------------------------- SHOULD WE DECRIMINALIZE DRUGS? Libertarians would like all Americans to be healthy and free of drug dependence. But drug laws don't help - they make the situation worse! The victims of the "war on drugs" are personal liberty and its companion responsibility. It's time to consider the re-legalization of drugs. The lessons of the alcohol prohibition era are clear. After alcohol was made illegal by the 18th amendment, organized crime resulted. The streets became battlegrounds as criminals rushed to supply the demand for liquor. They bypassed law enforcement and judges. Adulterated booze blinded and killed people. Civil rights were trampled in the hopeless attempt to keep Americans from drinking. When the American people saw what Prohibition was doing to them, they supported the 21st amendment, ratified in 1933, which repealed the 18th amendment. The gangster era had finally ended. Today's war on drugs is a re-run of Prohibition. Millions of Americans are occasional, peaceful users of some illegal drug. They are no threat to anyone. They are not going to stop without education. The current "anti-drug" laws have not stopped them. Unfortunately, drug abusers are being sentenced to jail instead of being helped with their addictions, and this forces murderers and thieves to be set free (due to limited prison space) to once again victimize society. Only a small percentage of drug users commit crimes like burglary and car theft in order to supply their artificially-expensive habits. But the result of the war on drugs is that a police state situation is emerging. Our Constitutional rights are now suffering, since we are all now suspected of drug use if we use cash in money transactions, or even if we just carry a lot of cash. Gary Steinweg's commentary on this subject (see below) explains how property is now being seized without any crime having been committed. Today's illegal drugs were legal before 1914. Cocaine was even found in the original Coca-Cola recipe. Americans had few problems with cocaine, opium, heroin, or marijuana. Drugs were inexpensive and crime was lower than it is today. Most users handled their drug of choice and lived normal, productive lives. Addicts out of control were a tiny minority back then. The first laws prohibiting drugs were racist in origin - to prevent Chinese laborers from using opium and to prevent blacks and Hispanics from using cocaine and marijuana. That was unjust and unfair, just as it is unjust and unfair to make criminals of peaceful drug users today. Most drug users are social drinkers or occasional users. Organized crime would be deprived of profits if drugs were decriminalized. The police could then focus its efforts on protecting us from real criminals and keeping them in jails without overcrowding. It is time to legalize drugs and let people take responsibility for themselves. Drug abuse is a tragedy and a sickness. Criminal laws only drive the problem underground and put money in the pockets of the criminal class. With drugs legal, compassionate Americans could do more to educate and rehabilitate drug users who seek help. Individuals have the right to decide for themselves what to put into their bodies as long as they take responsibility for their actions. The repressive "war on drugs" has clearly failed. It's time to try a new approach to the problem of drug abuse. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- SEIZURES OF PROPERTY UNDER DRUG FORFEITURE LAWS by Gary Steinweg, edited and revised by Kevin Brook Under the guise of the "war on drugs", innocent Americans are losing their lives, liberty, and Constitutional rights at an alarming rate. Under recently instituted state and federal forfeiture laws, government agencies may seize property if a judge (not a jury) determines that said property is associated with drugs. Doesn't matter how. The government does not have to charge the owner with a crime to take his/her property. For example, a charter/instructor pilot was chartered to fly an individual with a briefcase from point A to point B. When the airplane landed, it was surrounded by federal and local officers. Turns out the passenger was a suspected drug dealer, and his briefcase was full of money. Since drug dealers always seem to carry lots of money in briefcases, the money was seized AND SO WAS THE INNOCENT INSTRUCTOR'S AIRPLANE. The pilot had never met the passenger before and had no idea what was in the briefcase. He was never charged with anything, but he is now bankrupt and his means of livelihood has been STOLEN from him. This is but one example of similar incidents being repeated at an ever-increasing rate across this country, and it gets worse... A 61-year-old reclusive millionnaire refused to sell his 200-acre Malibu Canyon ranch to the government as part of an expansion to an adjacent federal recreation area. It wasn't long before 24 government agents stormed his home and shot him dead when he attempted to investigate the commotion with a gun in his hand. (He had refused on several occasions to sell his property to the state. When he was raided, he was shot to death when he responded to his wife's screams. He had just had eye surgery and could not see very well, but he started to lower his gun when officers at a distance identified themselves and told him to drop the gun. It is at this time that he was shot.) Their probable cause? An air surveillance expert reported seeing marijuana plants growing in pots on his property, and his younger wife was observed spending a lot of his inherited fortune. No drugs were found. Why were he and his wife under surveillance in the first place? Do I think the raiding officers went there hoping to seize his property? Absolutely. It's free and easy money for government agents. (The ranch was worth over 5 million dollars. After a 5-month investigation by Ventura County District Attorney Michael Bradbury, it was found that the raid had no legal justification. His evidence includes a copy of the pre-raid briefing which contained local area property value appraisals and the key finding that the Deputy securing the search warrant used FALSE information to do so, then led the multi-agency assault team to the isolated ranch in hopes of finding drugs.) Officers participating in such confiscations receive a lot of "brownie points." The raiding officers assault innocent people because they follow orders from the government bureaucracy. Thus, if we want to stop these types of terrible incidents from occurring, we must elect freedom-minded people to public office so that the laws can be changed. I was astounded when I first heard of property being confiscated PRIOR TO and WITHOUT a trial by jury. "Operation Zero Tolerance," a program enacted in the San Diego area, was my first hint of this tyrannical change in our government's behavior. Honest and law-abiding fishing boat operators had their vessels confiscated because one of their crew had a marijuana cigarette. The actual offenders were only fined $100 and given suspended sentences. But the innocent fishing vessel owners' lives were disastrously disrupted. The motive is clear for anyone to see. Confiscated property is worth a lot of money, especially at those "seized property auctions" held all across the country. People who pay with cash for airline tickets in many cities around America often become victims of the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA). Paid "informants" receive substantial profits as commissions from stealing innocent people's money. Often 10% or more of the total value of seized items and money go to the agents that seized them. This evil incentive has had devastating effects on many Americans. In 1991, the Pittsburgh Press reported in a 6-day series entitled "Presumed Guilty - The Law's Victims in the War on Drugs" about other innocent and non-violent people who have lost cash and property due to drug prohibition. For example, in April 1989, Mexican-American John Sotello had his truck seized, despite a lack of proof that he had drugs. It was seized because he was carrying $23000 in cash which he was going to use at heavy equipment auctions. Law enforcement personnel often target racial and ethnic minorities for drug searches (on roads, in airports, etc.) because they fit a mythical "drug courier profile." The Pittsburgh Press reported on other tragic consequences of the War on Drugs. Marijuana has a variety of beneficial medicinal uses in the treatment of glaucoma, cluster headaches, and other medical conditions. But American doctors cannot prescribe marijuana and therefore some people have had to move to the Netherlands (where marijuana is legal) in order to prevent declining health and vision. One man from Louisville, Kentucky commented that: "To send a man trying to save his vision to prison, and steal the home and land that he and his wife had worked decades for, should have the authors of the Constitution spinning in their graves." We're on the verge of losing more of our Constitutional rights. We must take a stand against current irrational drug prohibition policies. There are three basic rights that the War on Drugs violates: 1. The accused is presumed innocent until proven guilty. 2. Property may not be confiscated without due process. 3. The accused is entitled to a trial by jury. A few years ago, I cheered each time I heard of a drug trafficker having all his assets seized. Then I started hearing about innocent people - people in no way involved with illegal activity - having their assets seized because of some vague association with drugs. Besides the above examples, there are incidents in which parents' cars were seized because of their child's friend having a marijuana cigarette in his possession, and where rented houses have been seized because the tenant was involved with drugs (owner was unaware). Since these violations of the Constitution went into effect in the mid-1980s (because of Republicans and Democrats), there has been an increase in the number of horror stories every year. At first, the drug enforcement agencies were somewhat cautious. However, they quickly discovered that whereas other government agencies have to live within a budget allocation, seizing cash and property provided an unlimited source of additional funds. The drug enforcement agencies have gotten into such a feeding frenzy that they are starting to kill a lot of innocent people as they mount their raids on wrong addresses. Their only concern when this happens is how to cover it up. Many innocent Americans have been forced into bankrupcy because of civil court expenses incurred while fighting the government agencies. In early April 1994, 75-year-old Reverend Accelyne Williams was subjected to a violent assault by a 13-member SWAT team (which carried rifles and bullet-proof vests and shields). The raid took place in a section of Boston, Massachusetts known as Dorchester. As it turns out, the SWAT team had come to the wrong address. But, tragically, Reverend Williams (who did not possess any drugs) died of a heart attack which was brought about as the result of this shocking experience. How many more innocent people will have to die before we end these violent government assaults? You can help change government policies when you vote in elections. The Bill of Rights was included in the Constitution to prevent the government from becoming all-powerful. Our founding fathers recognized that power corrupts and that absolute power corrupts absolutely. I am now concluding that the War on Drugs is a sham with the real objective of unlimited government power and the elimination of our rights. The War on Drugs has created crime where no crime should exist. The War on Drugs has created firearm violence where no violence should exist. If gun control is enacted, millions of citizens will become instant criminals, and for refusing to turn in their weapons, their property too will be seized - unless we prevent such gun control from being enacted. Remember when you vote in elections that only Libertarians are consistently against unlawful seizures of property!