Tuesday, January 5, 2016
The Bundys, Oregon, Federal Land and the Constitution, Part 1
On Saturday, 300 peaceful marchers, both local and out-of-state, protested on behalf of two Oregon ranchers who reported to prison this week. After the march, a militia group took control of a federal wildlife building. The occupation occurred without violence, but the militia said it plans to stay at the facility to protest "overreach" by the federal government. The two ranchers were convicted of arson. They burned brush and creeping weeds on federal lands to prevent fires and to protect the grazing land they leased from the federal government. Harney County ranchers Dwight Hammond Jr., 73, and his son Steven Hammond, 46, reported to federal prison in California on Monday. The Hammonds lit the fires on lands managed by the US Bureau of Land Management (BLM) in 2001 and 2006. They were convicted of arson in 2012. Acting US Attorney Billy Williams said : "Fires intentionally and illegally set on public lands, even those in a remote area, threaten property and residents and endanger firefighters called to battle the blaze." The Hammonds have already served time -- Dwight three months in prison and his son one year -- but a judge said the sentences were too short under federal law and ordered them back to prison for four years each. ~~~~~ The militia, joined by some marchers, took over a federal building -- the unoccupied headquarter building of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge 30 miles south of Burns in the high desert of eastern Oregon. The area is very remote, about 280 miles southeast of Portland. Property was not damaged. Some militia were armed, others weren't. The FBI said it's "working with the Harney County Sheriff's Office, Oregon State Police, and other local and state law enforcement agencies to bring a peaceful resolution to the situation." The militia is led by Ammon Bundy, 40, and his brothers. Bundy is the son of Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy, who made headlines in 2014 for his standoff with federal agents over grazing rights on lands he said belonged to Nevada, not the BLM. Cliven won as the Justice Department decided not to prosecute him because, according to many legal analysts, DOJ would have lost. Ammon Bundy told the Oregonian : "We're planning on staying here for years....This is not a decision we've made at the last minute....The facility has been the tool to do all the tyranny that has been placed upon the Hammonds. The only violence that, if it comes our way, will be because government is wanting their building back...We’re putting nobody in harm’s way. We are not threatening anybody. We’re 30 miles out of the closest town." The Hammonds, the county and the town of Burns distanced themselves from the Bundys. Sheriff David Ward said that the occupiers were only "claiming to be part of militia groups supporting local ranchers." In reality, "these men had alternative motives to attempt to overthrow the county and federal government in hopes to spark a movement across the United States." ~~~~~ Federal lands are lands in the United States whose ownership is claimed by the US federal government, pursuant to Article IV, section 3, clause 2, of the Constitution. According to a 2012 Congressional Research Service (CRS) report, the federal government owns roughly 635 million acres of the 2.27 billion total acres in the US - about 28% - almost entirely in the far West, reports the CRS -- Nevada: 84% / Alaska: 69% / Utah: 57% / Oregon: 53% / Idaho: 50% / Arizona: 48% / California: 45% / Wyoming and New Mexico: 42% / Colorado: 37% / Montana and Washington state: 30%. Land in the far West was acquired for national parks and mineral rights as America moved toward the Pacific. Compared to these 12 far West states where the federal government owns on average 58% of all land, in the other states, only 4% on average is federally owned. ~~~~~ Dear readers, efforts to retake control of federal lands began over a century ago in the West. It is the basis of the Bundys' fight. It also represents a fundamental divide in American political thought and constitutional interpretation. Tomorrow, we'll explore this key issue.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
The only thing that is clear is that the government of Obama is out to make an example of the Hammonds. Their case represents the resistance of rural ranchers and farmers to the aggressive tactics of the government and the radical “environmentalist” movement, which aim at eliminating the few private landowners remaining in the region. The Hammonds are the last holdouts in an area that has seen the Bureau of Land Management revoke permits, block water usage, and use every means to harass them and force them to move out.
ReplyDeleteUsing a map from The BLM (Bureau of Land Management) a line drawn on the east side on NM, CO, WY, Mt. if you notice almost 70% of the map from there to the pacific Ocean is red indicating the lands owned by the Federal Government.
ReplyDeleteThis maps the conquest of the region by faceless bureaucrats in Washington – in the same way that the post-9/11 rampage of US imperialism maps the conquest of the Middle East. And it’s the same gang at work. No wonder ranchers and their families and supporters are taking up arms against the federal government – this is no more surprising than the Iraqi resistance to the US Army of occupation.
Why friends does the federal government need to own so much land – land they have essentially stolen from the owners and American public. It’s not for national parks – heavens the feds cannot keep all the park land they have open to the public due to lack of monies.
No this is a war against the American Cowboy – at least the spirit of the American Cowboy.
This is the illegal growth of the federal government slowly weekly, monthly, annually creeping to be own and control.
The Bundy’s, federal land grab, guns, the Constitution, the what-ever is not what this is all about friends.
ReplyDeleteThis is about treasonous moves by the Obama administration in order to create the atmosphere for groups like those in Oregon to become so unbinding to the laws that Obama will no other choice than to rush in with federal soldiers and police to stop what he will call “Rebellious Anarchy”
Obama will also put off his intervention long enough to influence both political parties nominating conventions and possibly the presidential election itself. Or he will simply ‘cancel’ the election and remain in the presidency via some executive order.
I say none of this lightly. I am dead serious.
Although I agree with the cause of the two ranchers - and burning brush is far from arson - and their peaceful protesters, I don't think they can win their case in the court of public opinion, or possibly in any court.
ReplyDeleteDuring the time the Constitution was being written Thomas Jefferson favored eliminating all remnants of feudalism, and pushed for allodial (sp) ownership. But James Madison, who wrote the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution, had a more moderate view, and struck a compromise that sought to at least protect property rights somewhat by explicitly mandating compensation and using the term "public use" rather than "public purpose," "public interest", or "public benefit”
How do legal scholars like Justice Scalia keep from going nuts when day in and day out they have to deal with written law that has a loop hole after each word and no common sense.
Much like the Bundy’s we who live in the real world, we who say what we mean and mean what we say are lost causes.