A Case for 10th Amendment Sovereignty: Texas dukes it out with the Federal government over TSA personal violations that are against state Penal Code

The City of Houston has three major international airports, Houston Intercontinental, Hobby International, and Ellington. TSA security teams search at all three airports using the Whole Body Imaging machines and physically invasive pat downs which TSA officers are "trained" to touch private parts four times. It is an unfortunate event that the general public is not standing up, wholesale, against such procedures that are far from within the Federal government's authorized duty to conduct. This is a violation of Texas Statute which defines sexual assault extensively, including coersion by force of threat. If a person refuses this abuse, TSA, under its rules will fine the person $20,000 and restrict their movement by forbidding the person to travel.

Because of the conflict and gross violation of the 4th, 5th and 10th Amendments, three bills were introduced in the Texas Legislature with heavy bi-partisan support: HB1937, HB 1938, and HCR 80 deal with the dignity of persons traveling and reaffirm state law which protects citizens from sexual assault, including acts forced by coersion upon a person under threat. The bills also reaffirm the 4th Amendment that requires legitimate warrants from probable cause. (The TSA rules provide absurd penalties as mentioned above, plus possible jail time.)

Because the Texas legislature understood its role in enforcing laws that the federal government has no true jurisdiction on, a notice (read: threat) came from the Department of Justice, warning the legislature to kill HR 1937 or "consider the consequences." Senate sponsor Dan Patrick, moved to pull the bill.

This is quite unfortunate and causes wonderment, in light of important opinions defending the sovereignty of states to legislate, and the federal government's Consitutionally prohibited power to do so to the states. And one has to wonder why the state, on behalf of millions who travel in and out of Houston Intercontinental, Hobby International, and Ellington has dumped at least one of the bills, HR1937 instead of defending it. All good sound bills, this issue promises to return on the same or another form.

In an Opinion of the U.S. Supreme Court in 1997, Printz v.United States, Justice Scalia, speaking for the panel to reaffirm both the 4th and 5th Amendments and especially the 10th Amendment, said,

>...the Constitution protects us from our own best intentions: It divides power among sovereigns and among branches of government precisely so that we may resist the temptation to concentrate power in one location as an expedient solution to the crisis of the day." Id., at 187.
The Federal Government may not compel the States to enact or administer a federal regulatory program. Id., at 188. [Emphasis added.]

The Fourth Amendment to the Constitution clarifies what the Framers expected and was again reaffirmed in the 1997 case:

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated...

There are no caviats, exceptions, or exclusions. TSA under the federal order of President Obama clearly is not within Constitutional jurisdiction. The amendment further clarifies:

...and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

This clause of the amendment guarantees that innocent citizens are just that, innocent. Probable cause is not the same as "possible cause." The Framers (and Founders, who are not one and the same), were quite aware of flagrant violations of the people at the hands of their governments. "Possible cause" was the standard from which they bolted--knowing that governments who seize the people out of fear overcome them through tyrany.

The Fifth Amendment says, "No person [shall] be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due precess of law," which prohibits TSA from restricting their movement without conviction of, or suspiscion of an actual crime. (Recall the absurdly severe penalties for not complying to sexual abuse.)

The Tenth Amendment grants all rights to the states and people not specifically assigned to the federal government.

So when the Federal government claims national security as the precepice behind their assaults upon the people, it is a huge offense to the people. In the apt words of Constitutional researcher, Rob Natelson,

"Wow. This looks like someting that (Roman Emperor) Septimius Severus would have sent to the local officials...It reminds one eerily of the kinds of communications that started to come out from the Emperor to the local cities of the Roman Empire, beginning the course of the ultimate destruction of local government."

Citizens of Houston and elsewhere should write their Texas legislators regarding all three Resolutions requiring that HR1937 be revisited next year and the two remaining bills be defended.

We are not in Rome.

Less of the same is still the same

A recent article by the Heritage Foundation cites Representative Paul Ryan's plan to reduce the budget by nearly $6 trillion, $5.8 trillion, to be precise. The report also indicates Ryan's plan will eventually provide vouchers for health services in lieu of Medicare, "(approved by the government, of course)," by 2022. While the Representative's budget reduction plan is admirable for what it does, it also profoundly demonstrates a frustrating problem that all Constitutionalists see, for what it doesn't do. There is no loss of ideas floating around, claiming to be unique, avant garde, true conservative, and a return to the Founders ideals but in reality are nothing less than the status quo.

Contrary to what was designed, the system we currently have is a National, not a Federal, one. It is a somewhat socialistic, not a capitalist, one. And all the answers to date, seek to remain in the systems that are destroying us, rather than look at the blue print--the Constitution--that would give us a completely different set of solutions, answers, and paradigms. Ryan's plan--touted as the most conservative--does not remove a national system to restore the U.S. to a Federal governmental system. It simply attempts to make it smaller. If Americans want true improvement, they must look beyond reducing the size of government to changing the nature of governance back to the original intent.

There is not one idea currently being forwarded that removes our current socialistic system. Instead they simply act as a mechanism to slow down the system. The problem is not that we are going to fast (or even too slow) but that we are on the wrong track. In other words, today's solutions, while they may indicate a dramatic move to the right, no more demonstrate thinking outside the box than if King George backed off of blocking the harbor from other ships selling tea, but still refrained from giving the colonist what they really wanted, true representation and liberty--the freedom to live as they saw fit without intervention by the government.

Let us understand a couple of important paradigms that are missing in today's dialog on solutions. First, our choices are not "all or nothing," where if we stop programs such as federal Social Security funding, it means, over night, people will be, almost literally on the streets; And, if we stop federal funding of education, education will stop; if we stop road construction, roads will no longer be built; And, if we stop nearly all programs on the federal level, those programs will stop being provided. This is wrong thinking. The solution is not whether we want the program or not, but whether the states want the program or not. The federal government, under the Constitution has no choice in the matter of most bureaucracies: it just isn't within its jurisdiction to provide them. Period.

The only way to truly reduce federal spending to constitutional levels is to remove all programs and departments from Federal control to the states. While this idea might cause some to see black before their eyes believing the federal government to be the provider that removing the current provider is to remove the service, it is actually not the case.

Education, Road/Highway Construction, grants of all sorts, Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, Commerce, Health and Disease control, the Sciences/ Arts, Industry and all manner of funding for anything not listed in Art. I Sec. 8, nor prohibited in Sec.10, should be shifted to the state level. Dictating to the states that they must submit a transition plan to Congress to take over all of these bureaucracies that Congress has been funding. Since laws created on the federal level have actually forced virtually every bureaucracy upon the states , transitions would be relatively simple, given that they already exist. Congress need not, and indeed should not, approve state plans, but only observe that each state has come up with their own plan. Each state should be free to continue the departments on their individual state level, or phase any number of them out. But the money for these bureaucracies also stays with the states. Economy 101 will show that getting rid of the middleman will automatically reduce the expense of these "services". The Federal budget has thereby, just been drastically reduced--not by a few trillion dollars, but many trillions. And the states, shaped by their individual cultures and people will become more distinctly unique as the Founders expected.

To illustrate: Let's say hypothetically, that the federal budget for education is $400 billion. That is $400 billion that is first paid to federal employees for administering to each and every state, regulating each and every state, and dispensing funds according to how its dictates those funds. Because of the overwhelming size, this will take the lion's share of the budget, say, perhaps, 35%-40% of the budget. Once that level of staff is paid, money goes to the states for their staff, perhaps 20%, which varies according to the demographics of each state. Once those are paid, money finally trickles down to where legislators and bureaucrats claim the money goes--the classroom., which sees the remainder of 40% of the original budget. These numbers are simply to illustrate a point of how the dispersement works. Along with this dispersement system comes the mandates by the federal government, who sees no classrooms in person, yet tells the states and their respective local schools what they shall and shall not do according to legislators, not educators or parents. This is not news, yet we have not removed the department but only created a monster of it since its inception in 1965.

Social Security, arguably the grandest sacred cow in federal government is also the most destructive. Its Ponzy system actually bleeds the government like a parasite. Because so many people would be affected with a blunt termination of the system, it leaves many thinking the system must continue federally. This is simply not so. The system can transfer to the state level where each state could determine whether to phase out the system all together, privatize it, modify it, or continue it without the "middleman", regulating it as they see fit for their individual citizens.

All this arguing over the budget, and how much to cut where, reminds me of an incident when I was about 10 years old. While visiting at a friend's home, I and several others gathered around my friend's sister who was crying over a serious error in judgment she made to a painting. She decided to remove the object of distraction from the painting--it just didn't fit. Comments flowed in from everyone about the color she was mixing in preparation to repaint, and remove the error. One said her color was too dark. Another said it was too light. Being an artist myself, I simply looked at the painting and said the color she mixed depended upon where she started to repaint over her mistake. The problem was never about the right color, but where she was painting. Likewise, if we argue about how much to cut from the budget but don't realize the problem with the budget is only secondary to the fact that what is being budgeted simply doesn't belong there in the first place, we will never solve the problem.