Thoughts, essays, and writings on Liberty. Written by the heirs of Patrick Henry.

November 9, 2009

Pfizer Abandons Site Condemned In Infamous Kelo v. New London Case

In the annals of Supreme Court history, there are perhaps only a handful of cases that go down in history as more egregious than what happened in Suzette Kelo v. City of New London. In that case, the Supreme Court approved an eminent domain taking by the City of New London, Connecticut that involved taking [...]

Posted By: Doug Mataconis @ 11:13 am || Permalink || Comments (1) || TrackBack URI || Categories: Castle Doctrine, Constitution, Individual Rights, Property Rights
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October 28, 2009

The Institute for Justice Challenges Unjust Law Banning Compensation for Bone Marrow

In January 2008 I wrote a post calling for the repeal of the National Organ Transplant Act of 1984. As I mentioned in the post, many thousands of lives are being sacrificed because of the moral hang-ups of certain individuals who think its icky to sell organs to people who need them. How dare they. [...]

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September 17, 2009

Happy Constitution Day

Two Hundred Twenty Two years ago in Philadelphia, the Constitution Convention in Philadelphia completed it’s work.
At the close of the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia on September 18, 1787, a Mrs. Powel anxiously awaited the results, and as Benjamin Franklin emerged from the long task now finished, asked him directly: “Well Doctor, what have we got, [...]

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August 21, 2009

Leave Us the HELL ALONE

Crossposting something my wife wrote, from here:
I’ve been in an incredibly foul mood the last couple of days, and until this morning I did not understand why.
We’re planning on moving to where we actually want to be. We’re constantly being asked why we want to move to the middle of nowhere. I tell everyone, [...]

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August 16, 2009

The Battle Between the Right to Medical Care vs. Government ‘Medicine’

For decades the cost of medical care has risen relative to prices in general and relative to people’s incomes. Today [1994] a semi-private hospital room typically costs $1,000 to $1,500 per day, exclusive of all medical procedures, such as X-rays, surgery, or even a visit by one’s physician. Basic room charges of $500 per day [...]

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July 29, 2009

Obama, Gates, Crowley, and the Troubling Controversy that Seemingly Won’t Go Away

Up to now I have purposely avoided this whole disorderly conduct arrest of Henry Louis Gates Jr. for a number of reasons.
First reason being that compared to the other cases I’ve written about here and elsewhere, this is a very minor case of police misconduct. I have yet to read or hear any reports [...]

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July 19, 2009

Ain’t Nobody’s Business If You Do

THIS BOOK IS BASED on a single idea: You should be allowed to do whatever you want with your own person and property, as long as you don’t physically harm the person or property of a nonconsenting other.
Thus begins a book that everyone interested in politics should read; Ain’t Nobody’s Business If You Do: The Absurdity [...]

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July 4, 2009

Independence 1776. Independence 201x?

From the time of 1765 forward, the American people, in fits and starts, began moving closer and closer to breaking ties with Britain and declaring independence. They grew increasingly angry at being dragged into [or paying for] the wars of the Crown. The King had largely held a hands-off approach with the colonies, [...]

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July 1, 2009

Common Ground for the Left and the Right on the Bill of Rights

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June 27, 2009

Petty Meddlers Face Jackboot

Homeowners’ Associations are one of life’s little sour tastes of government. Petty meddling nannies who tell you that you can’t do X, or that you must do Y, in order to keep the neighborhood “uniform” or somesuch. Sadly, it’s also a microcosm for most peoples’ reactions to government. When it’s a neighbor [...]

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May 12, 2009

Obama Administration Setting Compensation — For Non-TARP Banks

I’ve said I was going to write a post — one that I’ve been thinking about since Obama’s 100-day mark — on how much worse his Presidency has been than I feared. I expected him to be a typical Democrat in the mold of a Clinton. I expected him to be a typical [...]

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May 11, 2009

Park Service Honors Freedom’s Heroes By Stomping On Property Rights

The passengers of United Flight 93 were heroes. Scared, unsure of what the future held, and in the face of everything that passengers previously understood about hijackings, they knew that it was their duty to try to overcome the odds and take down the hijackers on that flight. They didn’t turn to a [...]

Posted By: Brad Warbiany @ 11:55 am || Permalink || Comments (13) || TrackBack URI || Categories: Civil Liberties, Freedom, Property Rights
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April 29, 2009

The District of Corruption Owns Your Driveway

In Washington, DC aka the District of Corruption, the friendly local meter maids are now issuing parking tickets, on your driveway.
Beverly Anderson is mad as hell. She just started to get tickets for parking in her own driveway.
That’s right. The District of Columbia is ticketing people who park their cars in their own driveways.
“This is [...]

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April 28, 2009

Fake Cops, Fake Raid, Real Guns

Here’s yet another example illustrating why the practice of SWAT style raids should be ended: robbers posing as cops.
Here’s the news story from WRAL:
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This is the unedited surveillance video:
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As bad as this situation was, it could have ended much worse. It’s very fortunate that the armed [...]

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April 16, 2009

Keeping What What We Make Away From the Tax-man

The furor over the Tea Party movement has been quite exciting.  While I love watching government officials and their sycophantic propagandists energetically denounce people for daring to suggest that people should be permitted to keep their earnings,  I, like others, think the protests – in and of themselves – are insufficient to meaningfully change the [...]

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April 11, 2009

Reforming America’s Prison System: The Time Has Come

Sen. Jim Webb (D-VA) in his recent article calling for a major reform of America’s prisons in Parade Magazine brought some very disturbing, eye opening, statistics about America’s prison system to light. In summary this is some of what he found:
-Since 1984, America’s prison population has quadrupled from 580,000 to 2.3 million
-Though the U.S. accounts [...]

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March 30, 2009

Maryland House Passes Mayor Calvo’s SWAT Bill by 126 to 9 Vote

Despite the objections of the National Tactical Officers Association, the bill championed by Berwyn Heights Mayor Cheye Calvo passed the Maryland House by a wide margin:
Delegates adopted a bill, on a 126 to 9 vote, that would require law enforcement agencies to report every six months on their use of SWAT teams, including what kinds [...]

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March 23, 2009

I WILL NOT OBEY

As I have said here before, I am a senior technical executive at a large bank.
As it happens, a bank that was forced at gunpoint, by the secretary of the treasury and chairman of the federal reserve, to accept TARP funds (as all the top surviving banks in the U.S were).
Let me be clear: We [...]

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March 18, 2009

Eminent Domain, Alabama Style

Speaking of the Cato Institute’s new video telling the story behind Suzette Kelo’s legal fight against the City of New London, I’ve been working on a website for a new grassroots organization in Alabama hoping to promote “the property rights of all Alabamians, regardless of race or financial status.”
In Alabama, it is generally the poorest [...]

Posted By: Stephen Gordon @ 8:22 pm || Permalink || Comments (8) || TrackBack URI || Categories: Constitution, Equal Protection, Property Rights
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My Name Is Suzette Kelo And The Government Stole My House

The Cato Institute has a new video out telling the story behind Suzette Kelo’s legal fight against the City of New London, Connecticut and Pfizer, Inc, which resulted in one of the worst Supreme Court decisions in recent memory:

You can also listen to Suzette Kelo tell her story in her own words.
And, yes, as of [...]

Posted By: Doug Mataconis @ 1:26 pm || Permalink || Comments (1) || TrackBack URI || Categories: Castle Doctrine, Individual Rights, Legal, Property Rights
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