Warrant Article town of Grafton re: Enforcement of VictimlessCrimes

[Free libertarian]

It has occurred to me, for personal reasons many people have given up on achieving freedom and peace through a political process.  Others believe the political process is a necessary evil or a fact of life, albeit a sometimes ugly fact.  Rather than debate that issue,  I propose finding areas of commonality, if they exist.   Hey it's the least a duly elected Ambassador can do.   

One of those areas may be the warrant article process.  I propose writing and getting it passed, a warrant article for the town of GRAFTON, instructing the government servants that the enforcement of "victimless crimes" in the town of GRAFTON is to be forbidden.  Naturally there will be debate of what constitutes victimless crimes and how this would be written and implemented.  That's why this thread was started.

It's my understanding that the one area of commonality between the "in the system" and "out of the system" people,  many of you whom I count as friends, is the embracement of the non aggression principle.  I've given some thought to how this might be accomplished and would appreciate others input.

[MaineShark]

I like it.  Legally, I don't think the town government can directly order the police not to investigate crimes.  However, this has been done in some locations for certain crimes by ordering the police not to expend town funds on certain crimes.  Since he can't even drive his cruiser around, or make a photocopy, or pick up the phone without using town funds, it ends up being the same thing.

Very rough, but how about:
"The police force of the town of Grafton shall not expend town funds in the investigation or prosecution of any crime for which there is not a victim who can demonstrate real and articulable harm as the result of the act."

I can already see some holes that would need to be fixed, but that could be a rough framework.

Joe

[John]

I'm with you --- at least part of the way ...    
It is supposed to be Juries who ultimately enforce or - more properly - not enforce the laws. (Remember the hole presumed Innocent thingy we were lied to about back in the government school day?)

I have been talking about a Fully Informed Jury Article for Grafton for quite some time.

More than a few of my friends have poo hooed the idea of creating a Fully Informed Jury Article for the Grafton Town Meeting.
Does anyone remember that originally FIJA stood for Fully Informed Jury Amendment? And why to use that process?
I'm thinking it is time I get busy writing it and then getting the required number of signatures. I'll also bring the discussion of the FIJA over to the Grafton Forum.

What is the deadline and how many signatures do I need?

[John]

How does it need to start?
To see if the town of Grafton shall ... ?

[John]

A very rough 1st draft?

To see if the town of Grafton shall stop waisting tax money on hastling, and or jailing people who have harmed no one.
And to see if the town of Grafton shall, with/through any and all of its agents, henceforth stop any and all activity which has the effect (intentionally or otherwise) of directly and or inderectly initiating and or aiding in the investigation, arrest, and or prosecution of any and all victimless activies (sometimes referred to as crimes).
And to see if the town of Grafton shall henceforth request that any and all other government agencies and any and all of their agents refrain from this aggression within the town of Grafton.

[Free libertarian]

Thanks for the feedback guys.   John, let's get together and work  out the details.   I'll be in town later, if we don't connect today we will see each other sometime soon I'm sure.

Others feel free to continue to comment or critique.   

[Sam A. Robrin]

To see if the town of Grafton shall stop wasting tax money on hassling, and/or jailing people who have harmed no one.
And to see if the town of Grafton shall, with/through any and all of its agents, henceforth stop any and all activity which has the effect (intentionally or otherwise) of directly and/or indirectly initiating and or aiding in the investigation, arrest, and/or prosecution of any and all victimless activities (sometimes referred to as "crimes").
And to see if the town of Grafton shall henceforth request that any and all other government agencies and any and all of their agents refrain from this aggression within the town of Grafton.

Can't vouch for the format, but I cleaned up the spelling and punctuation a little.  Feel free to contact me if you want the same for further revisions.

[Lloyd Danforth]

Even if it passed in an election, the State will tell them they don't have to honor it. The oath the local cops swear to probably mentions enforcing  state laws and maybe  something about the state constitution.

[Jim Johnson]

I would change "hassling" to "interfering".

[Jacobus]

I'm not sure why people in such little towns think it is necessry to have police departments anyway.  How does one suggest the elimination of such?

I would think that there might be some common ground between polticals and non-politicals in reporting on what the government people are doing.  For example, demonstrating to local people all of the ways their "representatives" act against their liberty.  Politicals would hope this motivates people to vote for more pro-liberty people, and non-politicals would hope this motivates people to see that government can only act against their liberty and reject it altogether.  Some of the NHLA efforts might qualify in this regard.

[dalebert]

There are no cops in Westmoreland where Mark lives.

I live right next to a cop and I've had massive bonfires without permits on a regular basis with no problem.  I asked him about starting fires and permits when I first moved in and he looked at me and shrugged and said "Just do it.  Avoid it on really dry days."

[Lex]

Westmoreland probably pays through the nose to the nearby towns for the "service" and has no say in how that service is provided. Having a local police department means you have much more influence on who gets elected into the position and how it runs. For example, we get to vote on the budget and any warrant articles related to the police department. If we got rid of the police department in grafton we'd probably be forced to pay Canaan to come to Grafton and have no say in how Canaan police department is run (Canaan already comes to Grafton as it is for violent crimes).

This is currently the case with the high school & middle school. I'm sure someone at some point said, "Why does Grafton need a school?" and now we're paying more than half of our property taxes to the school district and have no say in how its run. We could run a school in Grafton for half of what we pay to the school district and have a lot more say in how it functions and where the funding comes from. (Grafton used to have several little schools all over town... 100 years ago.)

[Jacobus]

See, this is why I hate politics.  With all of the myriad dependencies among various levels of governments and various laws and interpretations, how am I supposed to know whether some political proposal increases or decreases freedom?  Maybe I can study really hard and figure it out, or I can just leave it to the "adults".

[Lex]

See, this is why I hate politics.  With all of the myriad dependencies among various levels of governments and various laws and interpretations, how am I supposed to know whether some political proposal increases or decreases freedom?  Maybe I can study really hard and figure it out, or I can just leave it to the "adults".

That was kind of the point of my post. By doing everything "in-house" we can do things our way and not have any of these dependencies. The moment you introduce dependencies is when things get complicated and other people start to take money from us and tell us how things will be.

[Jacobus]

No, it's already complicated.  In my naive mind, I think "let's remove town government department X" but you reply with "then that department would be out-sourced to some other government at higher local cost and with less local control".  That makes sense I guess, but how am I supposed to know when this is the case?  Maybe there is some town government department Y (maybe the sidewalk beautification comittee?) that if removed would not be taken over by some other layer of government. 

You have some good knowledge it seems about what stuff a local government has to do or else it would be imposed by a more distant government.  My comment "this is why I hate poltics" stems from:
* I don't have that knowledge and don't feel inclined to perform the work necessary to gain that knowledge
* Even if I did have that knowledge, it would put me in the uncomfortable position of advocating for things I disagree with (i.e. local police departments and schools) because they are less evil than the alternative