Free Republic

In the wake of media reports that 40,000 new federal, state, and local laws will go into effect this year, there’s no better time for Americans to revisit the old maxim that “ignorance of the law is no excuse.” An unknown number of these new provisions are criminal laws that can deprive us of our liberty and brand us for life. No ordinary American can be expected to know every law, new and old, on the books, not even every criminal law. Anyone concerned about Americans’ being locked up for innocent behavior should resolve to help end overcriminalization. Overcriminalization strikes...

The Republican Party has been clobbered in recent elections by a mythical “war on women” largely driven by abortion. Hysteria about a war on women was fueled by a Republican proposal in Virginia’s General Assembly about trans-vaginal ultrasounds before abortions. Conservatives who think people should pay for their own birth control were misrepresented as woman haters. Rush Limbaugh’s inflammatory attack on flaky Sandra Fluke upset superficial people. Somewhere in the last ten to fifteen years, the Pro-Life movement took a massive detour – for the worse. Pro-Lifers stopped trying to educate the public and persuade people of the very obvious...

While it is now illegal to use 3-D printers to manufacture firearms without proper licensing, some Penn professors question the significance of that legislation. In September, Philadelphia became the first city to ban the use of 3-D printers to create part or all of a firearm by anyone other than a licensed gun manufacturer. The legislation follows debate over 3-D printed guns, which stems from a public computer file released by the Texas company Defense Distributed in May, which could be used to create a firearm called “The Liberator” on a 3-D printer. This November, the manufacturing company Solid Concepts...

As this session of the 113th Congress draws to a merciful close, much of the punditry has picked up on the refrain that this is the “most unproductive Congress in history.” Indeed, this Congress has passed just 28 bills, easily eclipsing the previous record for inactivity set by Congress in 2012, when it passed just 68 new laws. But why, we might ask, is this such a bad thing? Sure, there are things we might have wished Congress had accomplished. Something to address immigration or entitlement reform springs to mind. And it certainly would have produced less chaos if Congress...

YOUR GOVERNMENT: 1. Legislation 10.11.13 YOUR GOVERNMENT: 1. LEGISLATION My fellow Americans. Either the government belongs to you, or you belong to the government. It’s either one or the other. This government no longer belongs to you, and it hasn’t for a long time. But we can fix that. We can make it your government again. Which is why, as your Virtual President, I would like to have a series brief discussions about the practical ways we can return your government to it’s original owners: you, the American people. Channel: Mr. Virtual President

Due to Congress’s failure to pass legislation to fund the government, the information on this web site may not be up to date. Some submissions may not be processed, and we may not be able to respond to your inquiries. Barack H. (Hussein) Obama is the 44th President of the United States. His story is the American story — values from the heartland, a middle-class upbringing in a strong family, hard work and education as the means of getting ahead, and the conviction that a life so blessed should be lived in service to others. With a father from Kenya...

Why Christians Must Legislate Morality by Frank TurekWhen I have just a minute to communicate the importance of Christians being involved in politics, I call up this satellite picture of the Korean peninsula on my iPhone.1 Here we see a homogenous population of mostly Koreans separated by a well-fortified border. South Korea is full of light, productivity, and the gospel. They are a free country and one of the most Christianized countries in the world. North Korea is a concentration camp. They have no freedom, very little food, and almost no Christianity.I then ask, “What is the primary reason for...

<p>As a reaction to the crack epidemic of the 1980s, many federal drug laws carry strict mandatory sentences. This has stirred unease in Congress and sparked a bipartisan effort to revise and relax some of the more draconian laws.</p> <p>Traditionally — meaning before Barack Obama — that’s how laws were changed: We have a problem, we hold hearings, we find some new arrangement, which is ratified by Congress and signed by the president.</p>

Many freshman Democrats in the House are defying Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and not voting with the party on key issues. They told Politico they are there to represent their constituents and not make big points with House leadership. Dan Maffei (D-NY) has voted less with his party than any other freshman Democrat. He voted with Republicans to delay the mandates in Obamacare for one year. Fourteen of his colleagues joined him and Pelosi accused them of undermining her. Rep. Debbie Wasserman-Shultz (D-FL) took to the House floor to attack the defectors, but Maffei does not regret his actions:...

AUGUSTA, Maine — Gov. Paul LePage has wielded his veto pen more than any other Maine governor in recent history — and the session isn't over yet. Throughout the contentious session, the Republican governor has spiked 57 bills the Democratic-led Legislature sent to his desk, recently surpassing former Independent Gov. James Longley, who previously held the record for single-session vetoes with 49 in 1977. In a statement, LePage quoted former President Calvin Coolidge, who said, "It is better to block a bad law than sign a good one."

A new bill that limits the murder of the unborn to 20-weeks and requires abortion clinics to meet basic medical standards has been officially filed in the Texas State House. HB 2 declares that the state has an obligation to protect the unborn. Texas Gov. Rick Perry, R-Texas, called a second special session of the Texas legislature to pass the late-term abortion ban bill. “I am calling the Legislature back into session because too much important work remains undone for the people of Texas. Through their duly elected representatives, the citizens of our state have made crystal clear their priorities...

The North Carolina Senate took the House-passed HB 937 and made a good gun reform bill into a near great one. The North Carolina Sheriffs' Association in now balking on passage of the bill due to the elimination of the archaic and racist pistol purchase permit system run out of each county's sheriffs' department. As the alert below from Grass Roots North Carolina makes clear, what they really object to is a loss of power and a loss of revenue. News stories about the recent shooting in Greenville, North Carolina are now trumpeting that the Pitt County Sheriffs' Department...

COLUMBUS, Ohio -- Republican lawmakers have introduced a new wave of legislation that would continue to expand gun rights in Ohio. Among the proposed changes are measures that would allow public officials to carry firearms in the Statehouse and other "non-secured" public buildings, ban law enforcement from melting down confiscated guns and loosen the state's definition of "automatic firearm." The fresh legislation piggybacks on years of significant changes to Ohio's gun laws, which began in 2004 when Republican Gov. Bob Taft signed a law legalizing concealed handguns. The proposals have gun advocates rejoicing and opponents reeling. House Bill 191, introduced...

It is getting ever harder to do business in the United States, argues Niall Ferguson, and more stimulus won't help: Our institutions need fixing. Not everyone is an entrepreneur. Still, everyone should try—if only once—to start a business. After all, it is small and medium enterprises that are the key to job creation. There is also something uniquely educational about sitting at the desk where the buck stops, in a dreary office you've just rented, working day and night with a handful of employees just to break even. As an academic, I'm just an amateur capitalist. Still, over the past...

Do you support Routt County Sheriff Garrett Wiggins’ decision to join a lawsuit opposing new gun legislation in Colorado?

In a stunning sign of the political resurgence of bankers, Wall Street lobbyists not only have the ear of lawmakers, they have their pens as well. Rather than leaving it to members of Congress to draft legislation that softens financial regulations, bank lobbyists are helping to write it themselves, emails reviewed by The New York Times show. One bill that sailed through the House Financial Services Committee this month was essentially written by lobbyists for giant Citigroup. After the House committee drafted a bill that would force regulators to exempt trades of certain types of derivative trading from the new...

I wanted to give you a quick summary on the 3 urgent bills that need attention IMMEDIATELY. They are: Senate Bill 346 (SB 346) is designed to discourage people from giving to Tea Party groups who wish to replace RINO's with conservatives. It is a Saul Alinsky device to identify donors so they can be targeted and then discouraged from giving to conservatives. It is incredible, as the WSJ points out in an editorial in today's paper, that a Governor in Texas would even contemplate such a thing. But such is the fear in the RINO Establishment's nostrils. It not...

Since the Reno Gazette Journal can't be linked, here is a short blip from today concerning Nevada and Universal Background Checks. A bill mandating background checks almost every time a gun changes hands has cleared the Nevada Senate. After a lengthy debate Wednesday, senators voted 11-10 along party lines advancing SB221. It now heads to the Assembly. Several Democrats say the bill is the start of better gun policies in the Silver State. In an effort to eliminate any cost to the state, the bill was changed to funnel background checks on all private sales directly to the National Instant...

Tensions were high as both sides of the gun control aisle spoke during a Senate Law and Public Safety Committee held earlier this month in Trenton, NJ. As the hearing progressed, gun-rights supporters grew frustrated at the legislators move to amp measures that would only pertain to law-abiding gun owners and not the criminals they aimed to stop. In a particularly heated exchanged, 2nd Amendment advocate James Kaleda, 36, was asked to keep his comments relative to bills being heard. “I am on the bill. And I will be heard,” Kaleda said. But Committee Chairman Donald Norcross (D-Camden) called Kaleda...

I thought that stench smelled familiar... Heritage Foundation   h/t Doug Ross