Posted on 07/14/2008 5:38:32 AM PDT by Diana in Wisconsin
And what does the Constitution say about what you can do with your private land? The Constitution is gone and the SS are out is full force.
Hmm. We have a large Amish presence where I live. They all wear the blaze orange and have the triangular sign on the back of their carriages.
Problem with Indiana is that the land is much higher priced and they prefer to not pay that much for a simple family farm. Plus the incidence of tornadoes is much higher (per acre).
Still, the Mennonites have been settled in much of North central Indiana for a century and a half and have had a chance to influence the law to make the state tolerable for the Amish.
This gives them a choice ~ buy cheap and put up with Hochdutsche harassment in Wisconsin and the rest of the Upper Midwest, or pay more and be officially tolerated in Indiana.
No doubt it's a really tough choice for them ~ their money or their comfort ~ the Mark of the Beast is surely flashing before their eyes!
The problem is that, once you make one exception, it become difficult to say no to the next person who seeks an exception. If I replace the word Amish with Muslim in the story, the story takes on new meaning for me. It's like the Muslim woman in FL who wanted special dispensation to have her picture taken with her veil in place for her driver's license. It would seem that the law of the land should prevail and special exceptions should be avoided.
I think I'd wear dayglo orange supplementd with flashing lights, and a good body armor vest.
Indiana has been equally soft on Moslems, so, yeah, they have some ~ at the same time I think themore “militant” Moslems would be happier isolated on reservations in Northern Wisconsin ~ lots of empty space up there and cold as blazes in Winter. Tone them down you know.
Regardless, where is call for religious freedom? If these were muslims would they be fined? Where is a the ACLU?
Disparity of treatment happens all the time. Unless the powers that be want to make an example of a celebrity, as happened with Martha Stewart, or their antics have made them unpopular, as in the cases of Paris Hilton or Leona Helmsley, there is a double standard and they walk away from legal scrapes with little or no jail time. The same applies to politicians, especially if they are members of minority groups, e.g., Congressman William Jefferson of Louisiana.
The most important issue is not equal treatment under the law, but rather the limitation of government power so that the law interferes with property rights less frequently.
My grandmother told me that a lot of people refused to get social security cards because they thought it was the 'mark of the beast' from Revelations. I wonder how the Amish stood on that issue. This article seems to imply that the Amish interpreted the Bible passage to mean that you couldn't 'mark' your 'beasts', like cows.
They have a pretty good business going over there. The entire town is a tourist trap with buses coming daily to gawk at them and buy high priced goods. You can check out the town here.
many of those in WI are what are known as old order Amish...much more strict in their religious views...
They were going to have to drive to every Amish farm anyway because they don't have phones, typically. More evidence of a lack of awareness of what it means to be Amish and live a certain kind of simple life. Guess the WI Ag Dept. will have to write a codicil in the regs to require phones along with the registration.
I disagree, and really, so do you. You mentioned exceptions of TV celebrities and one Congressman (one of the few who wasn't smart enough not to get caught) via unequal application of the law...exactly what I said should not be done. Such exceptions are what jaundice the rest of us towards the application of the law.
It would seem to me that equal and consistent application of the law would actually reinforce your desire for the protection of private property rights. They are not mutually exclusive goals. As to Mr. Jefferson, I don't think he's dodged the bullet yet.
LOL! If those guys are hunting deer, they’re aiming waaaaaaaay too high! :)
I wondered if that was the difference.
I think the problem isn’t so much the unequal application of the law, but that there are too many damned laws on the books in the first place.
Good God, there isn’t ANY aspect of our lives now that isn’t subject to some dim-witted “code” someplace, and THAT fosters contempt for even the appropriate laws every society does need.
What I wouldn’t give for them to just leave us the hell alone...
Regards,
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