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Universal National Service Act of 2003
Congressional Record ^

Posted on 02/14/2003 11:52:24 AM PST by floridarocks

Universal service for males and females ages 18-26. New Senate Bill s.89. Can see it at http://thomas.loc.gov


TOPICS: Activism/Chapters
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To: billbears
Pick up your name badge at your local 'volunteer' center and be prepared to set aside more of your time doing what the government wants you to do.

I already give half my money to the government, and they can't even prevent 19 numbnuts from flying planes into buildings.

Now they want my time also?

81 posted on 02/14/2003 2:38:34 PM PST by Mulder (Guns and chicks rule)
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To: MineralMan
Every person who lives under tyranny is a threat to my liberty, freee. Every person.

Do you consider your neighbors a threat to your liberty? Because they, like yourself, ARE living under tyranny.

82 posted on 02/14/2003 2:39:45 PM PST by Mulder (Guns and chicks rule)
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To: MineralMan
Every person who lives under tyranny is a threat to my liberty, freee. Every person. The people of Bosnia had no liberty, and were a threat to liberty-loving people everywhere. It's not a direct, immediate threat, but a threat nonetheless.

I'm interested in this theory of yours. Could you expand on it? Could you give a convincing argument, using logic and reason about how the freedom of foreigners affects my liberty?

I look at it this way: the Soviet Union collapsed. Big deal. Was there less gun control afterward? Did the Bill of Rights get a big boost? Did no knock searches stop?

I can't find any tangible benefit to my own liberty from liberating foreigners. But I can easily make the argument that global adventurism plants the seed of terrorism that necessitates a War on Terror that is entirely incompatible with liberty. Or, take the draft in Vietnam for example. Americans lost their liberty and in many cases their lives. And the tangible return in American freedom? None. But we got COINTELPRO out of it...

83 posted on 02/14/2003 2:42:06 PM PST by freeeee
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To: RightWhale
Everyone breaks some law or other every day. Anybody who drives a car breaks the law all the time. A national blanket indictment and conviction and there it is. Letter of the law.

According to the bootlickers, "they deserve what they get".

84 posted on 02/14/2003 2:42:30 PM PST by Mulder (Guns and chicks rule)
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To: Mulder
"Do you consider your neighbors a threat to your liberty? Because they, like yourself, ARE living under tyranny."

Piffle. I don't live under tyranny. I do as I please, have a business that earns my living without harming anyone. I vote freely in every election, even though my side often loses. You may consider that you live under tyranny, but that's your opinion and the opinion of maybe 1% of the population only.

You have a Libertarian's definition of tyranny, it seems to me, and I reject that definition. We live in the same nation that existed in WWI and WWII, and for which so many fought and died.

You dismiss them. That's your right. Nobody's coming to arrest you for your point of view. They're not coming for me, either.

I reject your extreme definitions of liberty and tyranny. And guess what? I'm a citizen here, just like you.
85 posted on 02/14/2003 2:44:49 PM PST by MineralMan
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To: templar
From the Supremes back in 1918....

No need to read any further. The 1910's were as definitive a time as any when our legitimate government was overthrow.

The Federal Reserve Act, Income Tax, and our involvement in WWI all occured during this ominous decade.

Anyway, given the record of the Supreme Court over the last century, you can pretty much take the opposite of what they rule and have a good chance of being right.

86 posted on 02/14/2003 2:46:08 PM PST by Mulder (Guns and chicks rule)
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To: Kozak
If a country can't save itself through the volunteer service of its own free people, then I say: Let the damned thing go down the drain!"

Thanks for the quote.. I agree with what he said.

87 posted on 02/14/2003 2:46:51 PM PST by Mulder
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To: freeeee
"Every person who lives under tyranny is a threat to my liberty, freee. Every person. The people of Bosnia had no liberty, and were a threat to liberty-loving people everywhere. It's not a direct, immediate threat, but a threat nonetheless.

I'm interested in this theory of yours. Could you expand on it? Could you give a convincing argument, using logic and reason about how the freedom of foreigners affects my liberty?"

Better men than I have defended my position. I haven't time to write a book on the subject, but others have. Right now, I have work to do to earn my living, so I'll do that, and come back to your question another day.

I will leave you with this, which may well not be my original thinking, although I cannot remember reading it elsewhere, and don't have time to do the research:

When any man is not free, I am not free. When any man starves and I do not go to his aid, I starve with him, morally. I do not fight only for my personal freedom. I fight for the freedom of the man in another state and for the man on the other side of the planet. If we are endowed by our creator with certain liberties, then we are all so endowed. I cannot rest when others are enslaved.

That's my statement. I believe it. I act on my beliefs. Your beliefs and actions may vary.
88 posted on 02/14/2003 2:49:27 PM PST by MineralMan
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To: MineralMan
I do as I please

Do you? Try walking down the sidewalk with a revolver on your hip. That will likely get you arrested even here in Florida, one of the "better" states when it comes to guns.

Or try not paying your property taxes. See what happens to that house that is "yours".

Become too vocal in politics, and you'll have regualtors come searching your business for any violation, as occured under the Klinton regime.

America's still better than anywhere else, but that fact alone doesn't mean we live under tyranny.

Nobody's coming to arrest you for your point of view. They're not coming for me, either.

We're a few years away from that. Just wait until Hitlery is elected.

89 posted on 02/14/2003 3:00:03 PM PST by Mulder
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To: MineralMan
From your page:

"I'm a part-time bouncer (which means I'm unimpressed with people who make threats from behind a keyboard.) ."

Me too.

The Second Amendment isn't a threat as much as it is a precaution.

-Eric

90 posted on 02/14/2003 3:07:03 PM PST by E Rocc
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To: templar
Article III of the Constitution establishes the Supreme Court and the Federal judiciary. It reads thus:

"Section 1. The judicial power of the United States, shall be vested in one Supreme Court, and in such inferior courts as the Congress may from time to time ordain and establish. The judges, both of the supreme and inferior courts, shall hold their offices during good behaviour, and shall, at stated times, receive for their services, a compensation, which shall not be diminished during their continuance in office.

"Section 2. The judicial power shall extend to all cases, in law and equity, arising under this Constitution, the laws of the United States, and treaties made, or which shall be made, under their authority;--to all cases affecting ambassadors, other public ministers and consuls;--to all cases of admiralty and maritime jurisdiction;--to controversies to which the United States shall be a party;--to controversies between two or more states;--between a state and citizens of another state;--between citizens of different states;--between citizens of the same state claiming lands under grants of different states, and between a state, or the citizens thereof, and foreign states, citizens or subjects.

"In all cases affecting ambassadors, other public ministers and consuls, and those in which a state shall be party, the Supreme Court shall have original jurisdiction. In all the other cases before mentioned, the Supreme Court shall have appellate jurisdiction, both as to law and fact, with such exceptions, and under such regulations as the Congress shall make."

The text of the Constitution established the Supreme Court as the highest court and grants that body the authority over all cases arising under the Constitution and Federal laws. The question arises: did the framers of the Constitution intend for Federal courts to rule on the Constitutionality of Federal legislation? Remember that under the English system of government from which our own derived, the independence of the judiciary was not fully established. For the answer, we must turn to The Federalist Papers.

In Federalist Paper No. 81, Alexander Hamilton addressed the fears of the anti-Federalists that the Supreme Court would be vested with an authority superior to that of the legislature (Congress). He pointed out that most of the states already had a similar body, separate from the legislature, although New York, Hamilton's home state, did not. He further states: "In the first place, there is not a syllable in the plan under consideration which DIRECTLY empowers the national courts to construe the laws according to the spirit of the Constitution, or which gives them any greater latitude in this respect than may be claimed by the courts of every State. I admit, however, that the Constitution ought to be the standard of construction for the laws, and that wherever there is an evident opposition, the laws ought to give place to the Constitution. But this doctrine is not deducible from any circumstance peculiar to the plan of the convention, but from the general theory of a limited Constitution..."

In other words, while the Supreme Court was to recognize the Constitution as the supreme law of the land, it was not to interpret Federal law according to a "spirit of the Constitution," what 20th Century conservatives sneered at as auras and penumbrances. Further, the Constitution was limited in nature. Additionally, Hamilton wrote this prior to the consideration of the Ninth and Tenth Amendments, which clearly restricted Federal power to those areas specifically delineated in the Constitution.

With respect to the power of judicial review, Hamilton noted that neither British nor American precedent permitted the legislature to overturn specific judicial decisions. However, he also affirmed the primary role of the Congress in establishing the correct interpretation of the Constitution. "A legislature, without exceeding its province, cannot reverse a determination once made in a particular case; though it may prescribe a new rule for future cases. This is the principle, and it applies in all its consequences, exactly in the same manner and extent, to the State governments, as to the national government now under consideration." Hamilton is stating that Congress, and not the Supreme Court, is the ultimate arbiter of Constitutionality. Keep in mind that Hamilton, of the Founding Fathers, was the most receptive to a loose interpretation of the Constitution.

The doctrine of the Supreme Court as the final arbiter of Constitutional matters was established in the 1803 case of Marbury v. Madison. In that case, Chief Justice John Marshall declared that the Supreme Court would be the arbiter of the Constitutionality of congressional legislation. This declaration would appear to be in disagreement with Hamilton's Federalist Papers arguments, although both men were of the Federalist Party. That this role was questioned by prominent Americans is evident in Andrew Jackson's statement that the Supreme Court had made a decision (relative to a treaty with the Five Civilized Tribes), they, and not he, should enforce it. Abraham Linclon refused to honor a writ of habeas corpus from Chief Justice Taney, under Lincoln's interpretation of the wartime powers of the Presidency.

That the Supreme Court is the final arbiter of Constitutional matters did not appear to be the intention of the Framers, as evidenced by Hamilton's writings. By this interpretation, had the Supreme Court in 1918 ruled the military draft un-Constitutional(which it did not), the Congress, which passed the Selective Service Act, could have deemed it Constitutional. The high court's 1918 decision makes a good case for states to conscript men into military service, but does not do so for the Federal government. Rather, it rested on the doctrine of "implied powers," i.e., if the Constitution authorized a military establishment, it also implied the Federal government's power to conscript men into that establishment. However, the doctrine of implied powers flies in the face of the restrictions on Federal authority in the Ninth and Tenth Amendments.

The Federal Constitution should be amended, by the same process as used to prohibit alcohol or establish an income tax, to establish Federal authority for the draft.

91 posted on 02/14/2003 3:10:01 PM PST by Wallace T.
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To: Mulder
Yes, didn't you realize that you can't decide how best to volunteer your time and money? We need an entire section of the government to do it for us
92 posted on 02/14/2003 3:25:44 PM PST by billbears (Deo Vindice.)
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To: Mulder
Amen.
93 posted on 02/14/2003 3:26:40 PM PST by Junior (The New World Order stole your tag line)
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To: Wallace T.
The Federal Constitution should be amended, by the same process as used to prohibit alcohol or establish an income tax, to establish Federal authority for the draft.

Why? The authority is already, de facto, in place through the constitutional right to raise armies (it doesn't say hire armies or ask for armies), the right to call the militia into service (all able bodied men) and the supreme court agreeing with congress that this is constitutional. If anything, an ammendment would be required to forbid the draft. Perhaps you should try that route if you oppose the draft that strongly since, as it stands now, the draft can be instituted by congress at will.

94 posted on 02/14/2003 4:31:57 PM PST by templar
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To: Mulder
B Anyway, given the record of the Supreme Court over the last century, you can pretty much take the opposite of what they rule and have a good chance of being right.

Being right or wrong has nothing to do with what the law is. the law is what is in the books, and that includes Supreme Court rulings. There are constitutionally authorized ways of changing the law on any level, but simply disagreeing with it isn't one of them. You have three choices: You can change the laws, you can obey them as they are or you can seek citizenship in another country. If you wish to live as a law abiding citizen.

95 posted on 02/14/2003 4:43:38 PM PST by templar
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To: floridarocks

One of our defects as a nation is a tendency to use what have been called “weasel words.” When a weasel sucks eggs the meat is sucked out of the egg. If you use a “weasel word” after another there is nothing left of the other.

-- Theodore Roosevelt
Speech, May 31, 1916,
St. Louis, Missouri.
Works, vol. 24 (1926).
Referring to Woodrow Wilson´s proposal for “universal voluntary military training.”


96 posted on 02/14/2003 4:48:39 PM PST by Willie Green (Go Pat Go!!!)
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To: templar
You can change the laws, you can obey them as they are or you can seek citizenship in another country.

You'd be surprised by how many fine Americans simply ignore them.

If you wish to live as a law abiding citizen.

There are hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of laws on the books. There is no such thing as a "law abiding citizen" anymore.

We have a system where most laws are ignored (either in part or whole) by both the serf and the samurai classes.

The few laws that are strictly enforced fall into one of two categories. It is either a legitimate enforcement of laws protecting life and property, or it is a political vendetta against a person (like Traficant) or group (gun owners).

97 posted on 02/14/2003 4:51:37 PM PST by Mulder
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To: rmmcdaniell
I did not serve. How does that change the fact that Mineralman's beliefs are incompatible with freedom?

You seem to value your own opinion of another freeper's beliefs so highly that you state it as fact. So go ahead, prove it it's fact.

And, BTW, I suggest you don't threaten to kill me if we should ever meet in person. It would quite likely have a negative result for you.

98 posted on 02/14/2003 5:05:34 PM PST by templar
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To: Mulder
So what do you suggest? Anarchy? The fact that a lot of citizens accidentally break laws because it is impossible to even know what they all are does not mean they are not law abiding when faced with a clear legal directive. And the ones who willingly choose to disobey the laws are not law abiding citizens anymore, they are outlaw. Sometimes a persons personal convictions may require him to disobey a law, but that does not mean that he is still a law abiding citizen, and he should be willing to face the penalties for so doing.
99 posted on 02/14/2003 5:12:34 PM PST by templar
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To: templar
And the ones who willingly choose to disobey the laws are not law abiding citizens anymore, they are outlaw.

LOL! So the 85% of drivers who willingly speed on the highways are "outlaws"?

Anyway, the use of the term doesn't bother me in the least, since our country was founded by a group of outlaws.

and he should be willing to face the penalties for so doing.

As should those who pass or attempt to enforce laws infringing upon the Rights of Free men and women.

100 posted on 02/14/2003 5:18:12 PM PST by Mulder
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