Etiam non princeps sed usque ad genua, Principis Pacis!
Listen, O isles, unto me; and hearken, ye people, from far; The LORD hath called me from the womb; from the bowels of my mother hath he made mention of my name. (Isaiah 49:1 KJV)
Posted on 02/04/2012 3:14:23 PM PST by stillafreemind
Matthew Zimmerman got a ticket in February 2010 for driving with steel cleats on his tractor. He drove over newly paved road. He was 13 years old at the time of the citation. His punishment was $500 or 30 days in jail. There was a possibility for both, plus pay for road damages.
Matthew (pictured in Des Moines Register) is 15 now and has had the Iowa Supreme Court weigh in on his case.
(Excerpt) Read more at voices.yahoo.com ...
So it is perfectly ok that they destroy public property?
We've got hot and cold running illegal aliens and this DA doubles down on the hunt for the dreaded Mennonites running a tractor over a paved road to go between fields.
>>>So it is perfectly ok that they destroy public property?
It’s debatable that the wheels in question are any more destructive to roadways than many of the trucks on the roadways... Go read the case. It was decided as it was because the county enacted an ordinance that pretty much specifically targeted followers of this particular brand of Mennonite religious belief & customs - and nothing else.
Mennonite is not Amish. They are both offshoots of the Anabaptist movement. Something like the difference between Conservative and Ultra-Orthodox Jews, with the Amish being the Ultra-Orthodox.
I doubt he’s doing more damage to the roads than a full sized and loaded semi typically does.
What’s an Amish doing driving a tractor anyway?
Next thing you know, they’ll want a radio.
Exactly. And what most people don’t know is that the Amish broke away from the Mennonites, not the other way ‘round.
The Mennonites don’t have proscriptions against all technology, and various sects are mostly completely modern in their use of technology. I’ve known Mennonite sects that drive pickups and tractors the same as any other farmer. Their wives don’t dress in severe clothing, only plain, full, shin-length dresses and a bit of cotton lace over their hair. The men wear Wrangler jeans or Carhartt overalls, same as everyone else. Most of the men don’t wear straw hats, only seed and fertilizer caps from the local dealers.
They have tractors. They use the gas engines to power other machines on the farm.
Some of the groups do anyway. They just aren’t allowed to drive them into town. When it comes to the Anabaptist groups, keep in mind the phrase “It all depends”, because it does all depend on each church district and what it’s council decides the rules are going to be.
But this kid is an ultra conservative Mennonite, which is similar.
We have a large Amish population around here -- one of the strictest sects. I can assure you though that just about every barn has a DVD player stashed away. For the porn. Rumspringa's sort of do-it-yourself thing up here if you get my drift.
A 1,000 bu grain cart on a single axle with rubber tires does more damage to a public road than a small tractor on steel rims.
And you don’t see too many of the BTO’s running big carts getting cited for being overweight on a single axle, do you?
Farmers drive their tractors on the roads all the time, out in the country. How else can they get from one field to another? Unless it’s a really, really big or unusual tractor, I wouldn’t say it did the road much damage. In any case, they live there, pay taxes, and are citizens of the town. They are probably what keeps the town going. So, their reasonable needs should be accomodated.
We have tractors driving on our local roads here in Vermont, from time to time. No problem. The big cause of road damage is frost heaves. If anyone objected, it would probably be some flatlander, as they call newcomers, who moved in and immediately wanted to “improve” things.
I’m a flatlander myself, since I wasn’t born here. But I think the original citizens have a basic right to do things their way. And they usually have a lot more common sense than the newcomers.
You just made that up.
I agree, even after having it all explained to me.
..so
...We should shun him !!
“Not to sound dense, but if he’s a Mennonite, what’s he doing on a tractor? Wouldn’t a horse-drawn vehicle be more appropriate?”
Mennonites use tractors, with a proviso:
The tractors cannot have _rubber_ wheels.
Hence, the “steel wheels”, which are quite usable for “field usage”.
I’m not a Mennonite myself, but I will _guess_ that this restriction is to restrict the tractor a device that is “limited” to field work only, and not a “road worthy” vehicle (such as a car might be with rubber tires). This permits the Mennonite to have a mechanized vehicle while not having one which gets too “close” to a motor vehicle of the outside world.
The problem is that now and then, to get from the barn to the field, you have to drive over a paved road...
No. I’ve traveled through various communities where large(r) farms operate and have seen absurdly large grain carts on county roads where they shouldn’t be. People turn a blind eye because they’re farming communities, but the truth is, all that weight on a single axle is well outside of any road specification, much less any bridge spec.
Steel wheels? Not really a huge issue. Crushing the road foundation? Yea, that’ll become an issue in time...
BTW, should you doubt the existence of a 1,000 bu cart:
http://www.brandtpmc.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=5&Itemid=11
Sorry, one more link for your perusal:
http://epdfiles.engr.wisc.edu/pdf_web_files/tic/bulletins/Bltn_002_Vehicle_Load.pdf
Heavy loads that aren’t distributed crush the road foundation. It’s a real problem in areas where massive loads go through. I became aware of the situation when I’d sit in county government meetings and we’d be talking about why we were having to fix Route thus-n-such *again* when it seemed as tho we forked up to fix it only five years earlier. The reason was massive mining equipment being moved over the road - I’m talking of loads that ran upwards of 130K+ lbs...
The degree to which Amish and Mennonites use technology varies with the judgement of their local bishop (yes, they have bishops). Some technology is not used because of a strict prohibition on participating in money lending from either side — thus anything that cannot be paid for at the time of purchase is not permitted since it is considered to be borrowing to use a good or service and pay for it later. (If you ever see an Amishman or Mennonite on a cell phone, it’s sure to be a pre-paid phone.) Otherwise it’s up to the local bishop to decide which technology violates the injunction “be ye not conformed to this world”. Hence, the “black bumper Amish”, whose bishop decided that the internal combustion engine was no more worldly than a horse and permitted his flock to drive cars, so long as they were the cheapest model, black and had no chrome, but are otherwise just like their horse-drawn carriage riding coreligionists.
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