Scholar Explains The 1807 Insurrection Act And Why This is Different From Martial Law

Epoch Times ^ | 12/19/2020 | Penny Zhou

[SeekAndFind]

Some GOP lawmakers and civil groups say Trump should invoke the 1807 Insurrection Act.

The law permits the president to send in the military to suppress a domestic rebellion if the insurrection has made “it impracticable to enforce the laws of the U.S. by the ordinary course of judicial proceedings.”

The Act is different from martial law, where some civil liberties under the constitution may be suspended.

A law professor previously explained that the insurrection act is meant to enforce the law, not replace it.

Author of The Constitution Study, Paul Engel, explains more about the Act.

“This is not martial law. This is how does the federal government assist states that are having issues with insurrection, domestic violence, inability to enact their own to enforce their own laws, or situations where, because of what’s going on inside a state, the federal government cannot enforce their own laws, whether that be an insurrection or other disturbance,” said Engel.

President Trump considered invoking the Act following unrest after George Floyd’s death which saw riots around federal buildings.

But Engel says in the case of this election, the states are violating their own constitutions if they did things like changing voting laws right before the election or encouraging illegal votes.

“We are dealing with a lot of turmoil. But I don’t know of any act in any state that is making it impractical to enforce the laws of the United States. They aren’t enforcing their own laws. But the Insurrection Act has to do with enforcing laws of the United States, not of the states individually,” said Engel.

He says instead, much of the power to deal with potential fraud lies in the hands of citizens in each state.

[Tench_Coxe]

"He says instead, much of the power to deal with potential fraud lies in the hands of citizens in each state."

Batlle of Athens, TN writ large.

[faucetman]

In the end, our only recourse is a bloody revolution.

“The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots & tyrants.” Thomas Jefferson.

[jpp113]

“the states are violating their own constitutions if they did things like changing voting laws right before the election or encouraging illegal votes.”

Yes, but they are violating the US Constitution as well. There are very real grounds for instituting the act but will the trigger ever get pulled? Thats the question.

[JohnBrowdie]

people that cite the tree of liberty quite invariably know nothing about the man. TJ was a coward and (probably) committed treason during both the adams and washington administrations.

he’s the most reprehensible of all of the founding fathers- and that’s before you consider the fact that he knocked up his dead wife’s enslaved sister.

[odawg]

“The law permits the president to send in the military to suppress a domestic rebellion if the insurrection has made “it impracticable to enforce the laws of the U.S. by the ordinary course of judicial proceedings.” “

Stealing a presidential election is a domestic rebellion and the courts refuse to enforce the laws.

[Blood of Tyrants]

It’s not so much the states’ inability to restore peace, it’s their unwillingness.

[Blood of Tyrants]

It’s where I got my screen name.

[Savage Rider]

The states are violating their state laws in a federal election. The federal law, in a broader sense, being violated is Article II of the Constitution.

[DoodleDawg]

“This is not martial law. This is how does the federal government assist states that are having issues with insurrection, domestic violence, inability to enact their own to enforce their own laws, or situations where, because of what’s going on inside a state, the federal government cannot enforce their own laws, whether that be an insurrection or other disturbance,” said Engel.

If you're calling out the troops to impose order then how is that not martial law?

[Mouton]

Trump should use the law, ask for citizen soldiers, and provide full pardons beforehand for any violations of law these patriots may be later accused of. I am ready to answer and so are a number of my relatives and friends. The state sponsored or allowed violations of voting laws, immigration laws, and state and local safety laws including riots, arson and assault are tantamount to firing canons on Ft Sumpter. Eisenhower did not defer from sending in the Army into little rock, Washington to LEAD the army against the rebels in the Whiskey Rebellion, Teddy Roosevelt threatening the use of the army to end the Coal strike and FDR having to threaten both California and Arizona from going to war over water.

[odawg]

I saw a documentary on those coal miners strikes. The army was sent out against the coal miners, replete with machine guns. I can’t remember who was president, but the coal miners were talked down by their leaders.

[Bellagio]

The so-called 'Scholar' who wrote this tripe is mistaken in understanding and also leaves out the reasoning and the WHY behind the creation of the insurrection act in the first place which was the brain-child of the President Thomas Jefferson that would grant him (the Federal government) the power to deploy Federal troops as a foil in 1806 against his rival and contemptuous candidate, Aaron Burr, which Jefferson anticipated that Burr was about to execute a plot of rebellion/insurrection against the Federal Government aimed to conquer/seize US lands and establish a new sovereign nation.

But instead, congress didn't pass/sign the act until March 3, 1807. By then Aaron Burr had already been in custody for 11 days. Burr was captured before the plot was carried out and tried for Treason, in which he was exonerated under the Chief Justice John Marshall US Supreme Court.

Since 1807, the Insurrection Act has been amended several times to meet different political challenges.

In 1861, Abraham Lincoln expanded the law to form the legal basis for waging the Civil War. Without it, he wouldn’t have had the authority to send federal troops into a state without the governor’s permission.

After the Civil War, the Insurrection Act was further amended to give the president authority to enforce the 14th Amendment and the conditions of Reconstruction in the South. That authority is now found in Section 253 of Title 10 of the U.S. Code, which gives the president the right to take military action within a state when “any part or class of its people is deprived of a right, privilege, immunity, or protection named in the Constitution and secured by law, and the constituted authorities of that State are unable, fail, or refuse to protect that right, privilege, or immunity, or to give that protection.”

The revised Insurrection act indeed AUTHORIZES Trump to use Federal Troops within a state...

"... in restoring when “any part or class of its people is deprived of a right, privilege, immunity, or protection named in the Constitution and secured by law, and the constituted authorities of that State are unable, fail, or refuse to protect that right, privilege, or immunity, or to give that protection."

The opinion made by the so-called 'Scholar' Klien is sadly mistaken by his interpretation when he claims...

1) "The law permits the president to send in the military to suppress a domestic rebellion if the insurrection has made “it impracticable to enforce the laws of the U.S. by the ordinary course of judicial proceedings.”

2) “We are dealing with a lot of turmoil. But I don’t know of any act in any state that is making it impractical to enforce the laws of the United States. They aren’t enforcing their own laws. But the Insurrection Act has to do with enforcing laws of the United States, not of the states individually,” said Engel.br>
Wrong!

The Insurrection Act has everything to do with rebellion against FEDERAL LAW and jurisdiction; AKA Constitution... not state laws and their enforcement unless state laws blatantly usurps Constitutional law and a remand by a SCOTUS/DOJ order to comply was deliberately ignored.

The Insurrection Act can most certainly be invoked if the DOJ/Executive has reason to believe a plot or actions by domestic subversives are uncovered and found to be of 'Clear and present Danger' against the US, its laws and its guaranteed civil liberties; and a threat by violent means, to effect political and economic change involves such danger to the security of the State, its interests, its jurisdiction, or in its ability to function and/or engage in its lawful functions to protect the interests of the United States, the union, the citizens of the several states and the laws that govern such authority.

[higgmeister]

Do you have the same contempt for his Declaration of Independence?

I very strongly suspect the same sort of thing happened within my family.   You might consider, in the mores of the time, the dying wife probably charged her half sister with taking care of Thomas after she was gone.   He hadn't done anything his Father-in-law had not done in the previous generation.   Judging the people of past times with your mores is a precarious business when you consider what "they" would think of our messed up circumstances today.

I am more inclined to think of Thomas Jefferson as President Kennedy referred to him in his Remarks at a Dinner Honoring Nobel Prize Winners of the Western Hemisphere:

I think this is the most extraordinary collection of talent, of human knowledge, that has ever been gathered together at the White House, with the possible exception of when Thomas Jefferson dined alone.

[Nateman]

It would be neat if all the judges and other officials who either would not enforce the Constitution or actually made rulings counter to it were arrested and tried under military tribunals. I’d love to attend the hangings about now.

[tired&retired]

Excellent comments.. Thank you

I printed them out to share...

[tired&retired]

Your comment should be forwarded to Epoch Times

[Amendment10]

"Some GOP lawmakers and civil groups say Trump should invoke the 1807 Insurrection Act."

I strongly suggest that patriots electronically sign the following White House petition, patriots requesting that Trump invoke the Insurrection Act, possibly using military.

https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/we-people-united-states-request-president-trump-invoke-insurrection-act-take-back-our-republic-wmilitary

[AzNASCARfan]

Hope everybody is stocked up and ready... my expectation is seeing it invoked within the next 5 weeks... I may be wrong, but much prefer ready and wrong than not ready.

[JohnBrowdie]

have we had this exact conversation before? say, a few years ago? this honestly sounds very familiar, right down to the family similarity.

if so, we agreed to agree to disagree on this one.

lol.