At a press conference on 2/3/2016 in Manchester, NH, Free State Project
principals Matt Philips, Jason Sorens and Carla Gericke announce the
completion of the first "deliverable": the 20,000th signer of the FSP's Statement of Intent, thus "Triggering the Move." Now comes the fun part.
Minus the "Early Mover" cachet (let's be fair), it's not too late to join in, y'know. But if ya need more convincing, 101 Reasons: Liberty Lives in New Hampshire.
As of today, The Free State Project is the most successful intentional migration movement in American history. This is because today the organization has announced that 20,000 participants have signed the Statement of Intent to move to New Hampshire, where they will “exert their fullest practical effort toward the creation of a society in which the maximum role of government is the protection of individuals’ rights to life, liberty and property.”
The 20,000 mark is significant, because it ‘triggers the move’ – the mass migration of the Free State Project participants who have all agreed to move to New Hampshire within the next five years. So far, almost 2,000 have already relocated to the state.
“In the last few months, using various social media targeting tools, we expanded our audience and a significant number of new people signed the pledge,” says Carla Gericke, President of the Free State Project. “Early movers have already made their mark on the Granite State by passing life-saving drug reform legislation, expanding school choice and protecting first amendment rights – this has drawn in a whole new crowd of participants. Just imagine what can be accomplished with 10 times as many people.”
Since the first early movers flocked to New Hampshire, Free State Project participants have followed their individual passions to the center of some of the state’s most contentious political fights. They were instrumental in organizing resistance to Real ID in 2008, legalizing same-sex marriage through the legislature in 2009, and establishing a medical cannabis program in 2013.
The Free State Project started in 2001 with an essay by Jason Sorens, who was then a graduate student at Yale. Sorens, who is now a lecturer at Dartmouth College, theorized that if 20,000 committed activists moved to a single state with a small enough population, they could push policy and culture in a more free, open direction. In 2003, early participants chose New Hampshire as the state to migrate to. Now that the move has been triggered, the Free State Project will continue the effort to attract more participants, and inspire signers to move to the Live Free or Die state sooner rather than later.
"I'm thrilled by how far the Free State Project has come since the essay I wrote 15 years ago. Freedom lovers from around the country have turned concept into reality by moving to New Hampshire and building all kinds of exciting efforts to secure liberty and prosperity for all--efforts I could never have imagined back in 2001. Good ideas are powerful, and the idea of freedom is spurring many thousands of Americans to commit to move to the Granite State for a better life."
This news comes on the heels of the announcement that NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden will be the headline speaker at the Free State Project’s 9th annual Liberty Forum, held in Manchester, New Hampshire from February 18-21.
“This is the culmination of over a decade of grassroots and volunteer work, and I am thrilled to be announcing that the Free State Project has surpassed the 20,000 signer mark,” says Gericke. “Early movers are bringing their businesses, families and charities with them to New Hampshire – not to mention disposable income. So far we’ve purchased more than $30 million in real estate alone, and I can’t wait to see what kind of larger impact will be made as a result of individual efforts within this growing and thriving community.”
The Free State Project will hold a press conference to announce this news at 11AM on February 3 in the Frost Room of the Radisson Hotel in Manchester, NH. If you’d like to reserve a media pass for the press conference, or want to interview Carla Gericke or Jason Sorens, please contact Brinck Slattery at brinck(at)contentfac(dot)com or at (603) 703-2846.
The NH Senate Transportation Committee hears public testimony on SB262, "relative to the form of drivers' licenses and identification cards," 3/3/2015. The third NH coming of the seemingly-impossible-to-kill-actually-dead REAL ID Act.
Word is that they "Exec'd" the bill (voted on the committee's recommendation to the full Senate) before I'd even gotten home: "Inexpedient to Legislate." Evidently, at least some of the committee must remember the very public opposition to REAL ID back when we got the ban passed that this bill is trying to repeal -- for your convenience, citizen. Yeah, I wouldn't want to be on the pointy end of that, either...
How the hell do we KILL this thing...? HB455, 'authorizing optional enhanced drivers' licenses and optional enhanced nondrivers' picture identification cards,' before the NH House Transportation Committee, 2/22/2011. More history here.
But first, The Man, NH's channeler of Patrick Henry, our primary champion on nullifying REAL-ID in NH already, my own Rep. Neal Kurk, dissects -- eviscerates? -- the bill line by line...
Are federal laws necessarily Constitutional by mere virtue of their passage? Was Congress really intended to be the arbiter of its own authority? Here by special request of the orator, Rep. Dan Itse addresses the NH House of Representatives, in the afternoon session of 5/13/2010, on an amendment to SB455 which would opt NH out of the Constitutionally unauthorized nationalized health care scheme, preceded by an introduction of the amendment by its sponsor, Rep. Gene Chandler. Complete session video can be found here.
The stirring address by "the Representative from Weare," Neal Kurk, regarding REAL ID nullification to which Itse refers may be viewed here. More on NH's nullification and sovereignty efforts, including the legendary HCR6, here.
This billboard is part of the Federal Government people's "Department of Homeland Security". You really do have to provide credentials to government people when they say "Papers Please". We don't even need to put on a fake German accent to drive home the oppression of that.
You can't vote to end this at a state level. So the question is, if NOW isn't the time to secede and leave the oppression of the FedGov behind, when is?
"DO YOU HAVE APPROVED TRAVEL DOCUMENTS."
"TO GET HOME!"
Are ya feelin' the chill yet? Ya really should.
Really...
Let's hope the entire NH legislature gets the message -- as it finally did for REAL ID -- for next session's anticipated enhanced version of HCR6, state sovereignty. But what will it take for our federal servants to get the hint? Do we really need to care...?
Testimony before the NH House Commerce Committee on HB478-FN: "relative to remotely readable devices and relative to the illegal use of a payment card scanning device or reencoder." RFID, in an acronym.
Part 1
Part 2
And the bulk of Dr. Katherine Albrecht's isolated culminating testimony. See the hacker video referenced by Dr. Albrecht here.
Surprise, surprise: unanimous testimony. Even the Representative who believes that there aren't really any hard limits intended on the feds' power still supports HCR6! This is soooo cool.
The Executive Session is scheduled for 2/12/2009. I expect to be posting video of that here, too.
A response from (only) one of my Representatives to my instructions regarding HCR6 prompted further communication back on 2/1. Following is the bulk of my reply.
The text of HCR6 is dense, in the spirit and style -- when not in the very words -- of the founding documents, appropriately enough. If it were written for today's government-indoctrinated middle-schoolers, it would hardly be as powerful, nor as interesting, nor as serious. It reiterates the history, and original intentions and accepted justifications long ago conveniently ignored. It evokes the founding principles, with similar resolve. Let's face it: nothing else has worked. And I would assert that very soon (if not already) nothing will work.
"That a committee of conference and correspondence be appointed, which shall have as its charge to communicate the preceding resolutions to the Legislatures of the several States; to assure them that this State continues in the same esteem of their friendship and union ... and that the co-States, recurring to their natural right in cases not made federal, will concur in declaring these acts void, and of no force, and will each take measures of its own"
This is similar to, "a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation." It is thus my reading that, like the original contract, our course is not to be dependent on the respective decisions or requirements of other sovereign states -- although we trust they concur with our reasoning -- the original contract being between the states, not between the states and the federal government created by the contract.
No requirement for such concurrence is stipulated, however. They may take a similar course, or remain unintendedly subservient to the feds. Their choice. But as far as NH is concerned, "all powers previously delegated to the United States of America by the Constitution for the United States shall revert to the several States individually." That was the original intent. Yet NH still wouldn't nullify the Constitution: the feds would have done that themselves by violating it, like any other contract. NH agreed to participate in the Republic, given that the federal government was to be limited. If it's no longer limited, the contract is no longer in effect. All HCR6 does is restate the obvious, and put the feds on notice that we're actually going to pay attention from here on.
"That any Act by the Congress [etc.] which assumes a power not delegated ... and which serves to diminish the liberty of the any of the several States or their citizens shall constitute a nullification of the Constitution"
Which again, this is the original intent. This does suggest that the resolution could be triggered by such acts even though they didn't directly affect NH. Invasion of the Confederacy, for example. Or, say, a Republic of Alaska.
To the assertion that "an accumulation of offenses, even though large, cannot substitute for a smoking gun," I must ask, if an "accumulation," even though large, isn't sufficient, then the loss of which specific intended state prerogative would constitute a smoking gun? Standing on principle is rarely convenient, and time is not on our side.
And thus the pot inexorably approaches boil. We have a country dense with drowsy frogs. The Alien and Sedition Acts. The War of Northern Aggression. The Federal Reserve. The 17th Amendment. The New Deal. The Great Society. The Welfare/(undeclared)Warfare state. The alphabet-soup of unauthorized federal agencies unilaterally passing unconstitutional de facto "law." The explosion in federal "crimes," precipitating, e.g., "federal police" (?!?) raids on lawful state commerce. The USAPATRIOT Act. NCLB. The Military Commissions Act. Extraordinary rendition. Suspension of habeas corpus. $1T wealth-redistribution "bailouts" with nonexistent money (lucky future generations don't get a vote, eh?). REAL ID. Manifestly unauthorized violations of the 1st, 2nd, 4th, 5th, etc., etc., etc. The ongoing and escalating transfer of extraordinary power from the states (where it belongs, where citizens can far more easily ride herd) to the feds, by the feds. By the hands of the states' own ostensible "representatives."
Who at the federal level will stand for state sovereignty now? No one. There's no reason to. It's not in their interest. Ron Paul is branded a crazy old man, an anachronism, given a "laugh track," for actually honoring his oath.
We must all consider where our line in the sand is. For some -- including, by their writings and actions, the Founders -- it's a time and condition long since passed.
To the assertion that this is primarily an exercise in futile and even marginalizing and alienating navel-gazing, it's true I don't expect it to get very far [yet now, a mere 5 days and one hearing later, I'm not so sure anymore], either (but I had similar concerns over REAL ID, so...). There's so little respect for, or even understanding of the rule of supreme law anymore that I've little doubt it will fall on many deaf and/or confused, even hostile ears, regardless of the language. We no longer have an electorate that even remotely appreciates liberty or why the government established to protect it was expressly limited.
We have, too, I'd wager, a strong majority of the state legislature, itself, that hasn't even read the Constitution it's sworn to uphold. How does an honorable individual do that?
Yet we also have a servant federal government that is more than happy to encourage and profit from the ignorance. The American Empire was built and is now crashing for lack of jealous citizen oversight. Not that that's necessarily a bad thing, per se, but it's taking the original intended Republic with it, if anyone still cares. We're rapidly running out of time. We need the conversation. Desperately and soon.
"A Constitution of Government once changed from Freedom, can never be restored. Liberty, once lost, is lost forever." -John Adams-
"In the long history of the world, only a few generations have been granted the role of defending freedom in its hour of maximum danger. I do not shrink from this responsibility... I welcome it." -John F. Kennedy-
"Cowardice asks the question: is it safe? Expediency asks the question: is it political? Vanity asks the question: is it popular? But conscience asks the question: is it right? And there comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor political, nor popular - but one must take it simply because it is right." -Martin Luther King, Jr.-
Ahh, memories. I can't remember if this video had been isolated before, but figured it should be done. This is the House floor debate on HB1582, "prohibiting New Hampshire from participating in a national identification card system," NH's first (ultimately failed, but nevertheless glorious) attempt to opt out of REAL ID, from the afternoon session of 3/8/2006.
It had come out of the House Transportation Committee with a 12-1 ITL (the always euphemistic "Inexpedient To Legislate") recommendation, and was placed on the Consent Calendar (meaning no opposition was expected). Rep. Dickinson removed it from the Consent Calendar (it requires only one sufficiently unaccommodating rep). Rep. Kurk (at 1 min) channeled Patrick Henry. Rep. Giuda (at 13 min) was eloquent. The feeble and submissive arguments against the bill essentially came down to if the feds order it, we just need to bend over and smile, because they're the boss of us. The ITL recommendation was correctly and soundly rejected on a roll call vote of 84-217, and the subsequent OTP ("Ought To Pass") motion was approved by simple voice vote.
The Senate's Public and Municipal Affairs Committee got it next, and actually recommended OTP. But then (queue "Vader" theme), US Sen. Judd Gregg and US Rep. Jeb Bradley both saw fit to interfere with state politics by backdoor, backroom, stealth lobbying of the State Senate, against the demonstrated will of their shared constituents (that's "NH voters," for the, um... central-planning federalist politicians in the audience -- damnit, I'm so sick of these "Royal Governors from D.C."...). 'Course, to their undying ignominy, the Senate did consciously and resolutely choose to side with the Crown over their Constitutional sovereigns.
I mention this largely because if ya haven't heard -- and I just saw his first commercial last night -- ol' Jeb wants to "represent" NH citizens again. If you're in NH's 1st Congressional District, may I strongly recommend John Stephen instead, for both the GOP nomination and the general election.
Of course, 2007 eventually saw successful passage through a now-resigned (but hardly contrite) Senate of HB1582's successor, HB685, although not without its own share of political machinations.
