S.W.A.T. December 2007 - McKeesport Police Department

ENEMY AT THE GATE
CANARY IN THE COAL MINE
OF AMERICAN LIBERTY
BY STEWART RHODES
Prior to the American Revolution,
the British legal system morphed
into a perverse tool of injustice
and oppression in support of usurping
power rather than a safeguard to liberty.
Our current legal system is well along
the same path.
A case in point is that of Arkansas
Militia commander Wayne Fincher, convicted
in federal court for the “offenses”
of possession of a homemade machine
gun and an unregistered short-barreled
shotgun. [See http://www.arkansasmilitia.com/.]
USURPING POWER
NEVER GRANTED
Nowhere in Article I, Section 8 of
the Constitution is there enumerated a
power to regulate or prohibit the keep-
ing and bearing of arms. Where does
Congress “fi nd” this power? While the
1934 National Firearms Act was originally
justifi ed under the power to tax,
the real growth of federal power came
in Wickard v. Filburn (1942), where the
The Court thus created
a federal police power
out of thin air, turning
the Tenth Amendment
on its head.
New Deal Court “found” that Congress’
power to regulate commerce between
the states reached even a farmer growing
wheat for his own consumption, because
such had an indirect “impact” on com-
merce. The Court thus created a federal
police power out of thin air, turning the
Tenth Amendment on its head.
FLEETING STEPS
TOWARD SANITY
Surprisingly, the Court shifted back
toward the Founders’ intent with United
States v. Lopez (1995) and United States
v. Morrison (2000), reading back into the
Constitution some limits on the power
to regulate commerce. Following Morrison,
the Ninth Circuit ruled, in United
States v. Stewart (2003), that it was unconstitutional
for Congress to regulate
the mere possession of homemade machine
guns, which are not for sale and
have not moved in commerce.
This was very good news to Fincher,
who planned to argue that his own en-
34 S.W.A.T. » DECEMBER 2007 SWATMAG.COM