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NYC MAYOR MICHAEL BLOOMBERG
UNLEASHES HIS SMOKER-FREE
CITY ACT
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 Opinion
of Mayor Bloomberg's Ban
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a Letter / Make a Phonecall
Restaurant/Bar
Owner/Manager Information
Private Property Rights A
Few Important Facts to Combat the Propaganda
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DONATE: We, your customers and targeted individuals, are seeking large donations from restaurant owners, bar owners, cigar bar owners, pool hall owners, bingo hall owners and any other interested parties (even those who would like to remain anonymous) in order to receive equal air time in the public forum. We DO NOT accept donations from the tobacco industry and any received will be promptly returned. We will accept donations from tobacco retailers (they don't make it, they just sell a legal product).
Click here for contact information.
Donations are NOT tax-deductable. NYC C.L.A.S.H. is a corporation.
What
some smokers need to think about
Conservative
Party of NY Denounces Bloomberg's Smoking Ban
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got moral support
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got mail
Know
Who DOESN'T Want Your Business - Then Don't Give it to Them
Contact
Us: Email or Phone
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DECEMBER 18, 2002
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Mayor Bloomberg signed INTRO 256-A into law (Local Law 47) on December 30, 2002. The law took effect 90 days later on March 30, 2003. Prior to the NYS law (effective July 24, 2003) superceding the NYC law, this is how the restrictions stood:
Smoking no longer allowed in:
ANY Restaurant
ANY Bar - unless they can build an enclosed smoking
room to the bill's specifications and no employees can enter. This
exemption will expire in 3 years. Bars run and operated by the owners only
(no employees) are also exempt. Good luck finding any of those.
Nightclubs - same smoking room applies as above
Private Clubs
Bingo Halls
Pool Halls
Convention Halls
Catering Halls
75% of Outdoor Dining Areas
The following is the vote record
for Local Law 47:
It includes statements (paraphrased) made by some council
members that were found to be of most interest:
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Addabbo Gallagher Golden Monserrate Lopez - "Cannot support this bill when the city is failing to use money for anti-tobacco initiatives as was intended or fully carry through with anti-tobacco programs." McMahon - "Will cause irrepairable damage to the hospitality industry." Reed - "Offended by the bill and the 'compromise,'
as if they pretended they've offered options."
ABSTAINED Clarke - "Elitist compromise." Sanders
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IN FAVOR: (note: a handful of them stated that a close eye should be kept on the possibility of economic damage and the law be revisited if there is such an occurrence. Those who said that and still voted for this bill deserve no kudos for their empty concern) |
Please take the time to write to 6 of the 7 members who voted against this legislation and thank them. Ms. Lopez does not have email access. But that's okay. She may have voted no for all the wrong reasons.Then take some more time and write to the 42 members who decided that you and the employees they are allegedly "protecting" are too stupid for our/their own good and who are convinced that we need them to make life choices and decisions for us.
Or just write one letter, sent to all, thanking those who voted against the ban and telling the others exactly how you feel about their vote against freedom of choice.
We will not let this go into effect without a fight. That includes before it goes into effect and after (should there be no injunction beforehand).
2. Loopholes are being explored.
3. Lawsuits have been filed.
4. Mass defiance by bars can be expected.
5. Talk of civil disobedience by smokers is rampant.
6. Referendum (a vote by the people) to repeal may eventually find a place on the ballot on election day.
Read our statement made at the protest rally at City Hall
on August 26th
"We must put aside anything that divides us. This is NY and it's going to be for all New Yorkers."..."...Except for those 'stupid' and 'crazy' smokers."
(By the way, someone unrelated to NYC C.L.A.S.H. has started a lawsuit campaign over those remarks.
See Sue Bloomberg for details.)MAYOR BLOOMBERG WAS ELECTED TO REPRESENT ALL THE PEOPLE IN NYC. THE CITY DOES NOT REPRESENT MAYOR BLOOMBERG.
Smokers have been the only ones burdened in this city to sustain it financially with an exorbitant tax increase meant to fill the coffers and punish us at the same time. Only sadists kick people some more once they've already been knocked down.
If we can't smoke in public why should we pay the public's taxes?! It is smokers' money that nows pays for the upkeep of public places and continuing services. Where else do you pay for something and are denied access at the same time?
And don't hand us that line about how the smokers wouldn't be banned. In relation, in 1969 when gays were told they couldn't assemble in places where the owners were happy to serve them, gays weren't banned either. What was forbidden was acting gay, so this is really the same abuse.
Who owns the restaurants and bars anyway?? It is certainly not city-owned or public property. It is PRIVATE PROPERTY where the owner ALLOWS the public to enter.
Whether you smoke or not, we call on all defenders of democracy to join us in denouncing such government infringement on private property rights. It is NOT a health issue, it's a freedom of choice issue.
Allow them to discriminate against one segment of society and they will come for you next.
When the health-Nazis came for the smokers,
I was not a smoker,
therefore, I was not concerned.And when the health-Nazis attacked the obese,
I was not obese,
therefore, I was not concerned.And when the health-Nazis attacked the drinkers and the alcohol industry,
I was not a drinker,
therefore I was not concerned.Then, the health-Nazis attacked me and the freedom loving Americans who remained,
and there was nobody left to be concerned.
We adopt the following commentary with the permission of the author, Robert A. Levy, Cato's senior fellow in constitutional studies and an expert on tobacco litigation:
"Smoking bans represent meddling, snooping, busybody government at its worst. Bans are dismissive of the rights of an unpopular minority -- namely smokers -- without any basis in the Constitution, science or logic.
"Ordinarily, we rely on common courtesy and mutual respect when individuals relate to one another. But nosy, intrusive government has polarized the dispute between smokers and nonsmokers. As a result, venom has replaced respect and obstinate behavior has replaced common courtesy. It is government, not secondhand smoke, that has poisoned the atmosphere."
Under Bloomberg's law, smokers who break the law may be fined $100 or be jailed up to 30 days.MAYOR BLOOMBERG WILL HAVE YOU ARRESTED FOR.... SMOKING!!
WHO CONTROLS YOUR LIFE?
And speaking of the act of smoking, it's been blatantly stated by the health zealots that the smoking ban is intended to force people to quit smoking by outlawing it in as many places as they can. NYC even sprung for 35,000 patches for all the smokers they thought they were going to "help" with their punitive taxes and intolerant law. And as usual, it's being proved that sanctimonious interference into one's private life and choices will backfire:
Pharmacy data reveals impact of smoking ban
Nature News; October 28, 2003Tax hikes and a ban on public smoking prompted New Yorkers to try quitting the habit, public-health officials revealed last week. The finding is part of intelligence churned out by the health-surveillance systems springing up across the United States.
The New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, for example, receives daily streams of data about hospital diagnoses and drugstore purchases. Health official Kristi Metzger and colleagues examined how sales of nicotine patches and pills from more than 100 outlets in New York changed over the past two years.
A July 2002 hike in the New York [City] state tax on cigarettes, from 8 cents to $1.50 per pack, also sent sales of nicotine therapies soaring. So too did the Smoke-Free Air Act, which came into force on 30 March this year and bans smoking in all indoor New York [City] workplaces, including bars and restaurants. But people's resolve rapidly crumbled: the sales boosts lasted only a week or two.
YOU CONTROL YOUR LIFE AND DON'T LET THE INTOLERANTS FORGET IT
Smoking out 10 reasons
Written for Canada. Might as well be NYC.October 27, 2002
Smoking out 10 reasons
By Kerry Diotte -- Edmonton SunBy now, most people will know that a majority of city council members are determined to ban smoking in restaurants, bars, casinos and bingo halls.
The biggest push toward that came this past week following a one-day public hearing to get feedback on the city's current smoking bylaw.
After that hearing, Coun. Jane Batty successfully sponsored a motion asking bureaucrats to come up with "recommendations and a time frame" for the prohibition of smoking "in indoor public spaces." Such "spaces" include restaurants, bars, lounges, bingo halls and casinos.
It's thought that as early as January city council could pass what would be one of Canada's toughest anti-smoking laws. I think this is wrong - terribly wrong. In fact I'll give city council 10 good reasons why it should not change the current bylaw:
1) The way democracy is supposed to work is politicians stand up before elections, make a promise to do something, then carry it out if elected. (OK, politicians don't often keep election promises, but that's a whole other issue.)
Virtually none of the council members campaigned in the last election on a platform of banning public smoking everywhere. Batty, the councillor who proposes the ban, did not campaign on this. Voters have a right to know where politicians stand on such major issues before elections. But these politicians hid their secret agendas.
2) There has been no public outcry for a further toughening of our smoking bylaw. Indeed, a poll in April by the independent company Criterion Research found that about 60% of Albertans believe hospitality establishment operators should decide themselves whether or not to allow smoking in their businesses.
NYC FIX: Has anyone in NYC done a poll that asked specifically "Do you believe hospitality establishment operators should decide themselves whether or not to allow smoking in their businesses?"
3) A wide-scale smoking ban does hurt business. There is no denying that when you look at the endless statistics supplied by the hospitality industry. And logically speaking, why would hospitality reps bother to fight so hard to stop smoking bans if those laws did not hurt business?
4) Smoking bans are an unreasonable intrusion into private enterprise. Restaurants, bars and the like are not truly public spaces. They are private property where the public is invited by the owner. If you don't like smoky places, patronize businesses that are smoke-free.
5) Tobacco is still a legal product in Canada from which the federal government earns billions of dollars in taxation. How hypocritical is it when one level of government sells a product to the public and another level of government bans its use?
6) Adults in Canada are supposedly guaranteed freedom of choice under our laws and Constitution. Smoking is unhealthy and all adults know this but still partake in the vice. It is their choice just as it is the choice of overeaters to wolf down unhealthy amounts of greasy fast food, thus risking heart disease.
A city council should not undermine such a basic, sacred right such as a person's freedom to choose.
7) City council has numerous better things to do other than waste months on bylaws that ban things in our society.
Obviously, they should have better things to do such as finding ways to cut taxes, delivering good core services and pushing to see the city run efficiently.
They have lost sight of their primary duties.
8) Passing a tougher smoking bylaw will actually increase city hall's already sizable bureaucracy.
It is inevitable that, if a total smoking ban passes, we will need more bylaw control officers to be hired, more support staff and more managers to supervise.
Is that what we want? A fatter civic bureaucracy?
9) We should not pass a total public smoking ban because the public has not been suitably consulted.
Sure, a day of council public hearings was conducted this past week on the general topic of giving feedback on Edmonton's current smoking law.
After those hearings Coun. Batty sneakily introduced a motion calling for administration to give a time frame for a total ban.
Had more members of the public known this was the direction city council was headed, we likely would have had people scrambling in far bigger numbers to address the hearing. To me, the way our politicians have gone about this total ban was plainly sneaky.
NYC FIX: Granted, we had more time. But let's not forget that our Mayor used taxpayer dollars to run up over $1 million in ads to influence legislation. There's something criminal about that.
10) City council's own administration has concluded our present smoking bylaw is working.
That bylaw sees restaurants allowed to offer some seats for smokers so long as they ban anyone under age 18.
To me, that is still a needless intrusion into the free market, but it is far better than what is now being proposed.
NYC FIX: NYC has different compromises at the moment. What is similar is that in 1995 that administration promised that that would be it (the current smoking ban law). The new administration is reneging on the good will of those involved in the 1995 process.
So what can
be done to stop city council from this meddlesome madness?
Two words: Public pressure. Politicians are inherently big chickens when faced with an angry public. If the majority of New Yorkers believe entrepreneurs should be able to set their own smoking rules - especially in restaurants, bars, bingo halls and casinos, these people have to speak up. If we believe in democracy each and every one of us has to speak up.
If you believe a total smoking ban is wrong, let the politicians know.
Call them. E-mail them. Fax them. If that doesn't work, vote them out of office.
If you are in the hospitality industry let council members know you will not contribute to their next election campaign.
Let council members know you will contribute to the campaigns of those who run against them in the next election.
Club ticketed for ashtrays sues to kill N.Y. smoke ban
- Tuesday, December 23, 2003, Associated Press
The Players Club is a place of red-leather couches and Scotch and waters, a private world where white-haired men savor midday drinks, heavy buffet lunches and cigars in the billiards room.
Health inspectors enforcing the city’s recent smoking ban invaded this Gramercy Park sanctum in November, when they ticketed the club for keeping ashtrays behind an office desk, the club said.
Now, the players are striking back. The 115-year-old club filed a lawsuit on Tuesday, seeking to overturn the city and state smoking bans with claims that they violate members’ First Amendment rights to “expressive association.”
The Players Club claims... that scientific evidence of second-hand smoke’s health effects is bogus and the ban violates its rights to due process and equal protection.
Secondhand Smoke a Second-Rate Risk?
- Monday, August 4, 2003, Gallup News Service
Americans resist severe public smoking restrictionsGallup data suggest that most Americans do not embrace the campaign to make public establishments completely smoke free. When given the alternative of establishing special smoking areas in each location, less than a majority would ban smoking altogether in restaurants, the workplace, hotels, or bars.
Support for stiff limits is highest for smoking in restaurants (45% favor a total ban and 52% favor areas that are set aside for smoking) and workplaces (36% favor a total ban). Only 25% favor a total ban in hotels, while two-thirds believe these should have special smoking areas.
The lowest support is seen for restrictions on smoking in bars; only 23% believe there should be a total ban in these establishments and just 44% favor special smoking areas. Nearly a third of the public, 31%, says there should be no restrictions on smoking in bars.
About half of smokers (52%) favor no restrictions in bars, but 24% of nonsmokers also favor this.
In spite of Americans' recognition that there is a health risk associated with secondhand smoke -- or perhaps because barely half consider it a very serious risk -- only 31% of the public favors making smoking in all public places totally illegal. Two-thirds (68%) oppose this.
SMOKERS' RIGHTS GROUP SUES NYC, NY STATE OVER SMOKE BAN
- Wednesday, July 23, 2003
On behalf of its members, the 2 million smokers in New York City, and the 4 million smokers in New York State, NYC CLASH, the state's largest smokers' rights organization, has today filed suit in the federal Southern District Court of NY against both City and State, contending that the sweeping bans against smoking recently enacted in Albany and Manhattan are arbitrary, discriminatory and unconstitutional.
Read Press Release
Read News Reports
Citing Vagueness, Judge Blocks Nassau County Smoking Ban
- Wednesday, June 4, 2003, New York Times
A federal judge today temporarily blocked Nassau County from enforcing its three-month-old ban on smoking in bars and restaurants, a law that helped inspire similar rules in other suburbs, New York City and the rest of the state.
With contradictory provisions on the books, the judge said that the bar and restaurant owners had a strong case to have the new law struck down as unconstitutionally vague. They also made a plausible argument that they are losing money because of the ban, he said, so they are entitled to have it blocked until the whole case is decided.
Although Nassau officials could theoretically fix the legislation by formally repealing the old smoking rules, that may not be politically possible.
The new ban was adopted on a narrow party-line vote, with 10 Democrats in favor and 9 Republicans against. But after complaints from some bar and restaurant owners who say they are losing money, some Democratic legislators have expressed misgivings and indicated that they would not support the law if it came up for a new vote or that they would insist on changes.
"The majority no longer has a majority on this," said the Nassau Legislature's Republican minority leader, Peter J. Schmitt. Ms. Jacobs, the Democratic presiding officer, has declined to bring the issue up for another vote.
New York City smoking ban to be challenged
- Friday, May 9, 2003, Mid-Hudson News
A group opposed to the smoking ban in New York City has hired a Rockland County attorney to represent it in a lawsuit to be filed against the Big Apple.
Mulhearn is the same attorney who is representing the tavern and restaurant associations against the counties of Dutchess and Orange, which also have no smoking laws in place.
NYC CLASH will argue that the anti-smoking law is unconstitutional, said attorney Kevin Mulhearn. “I have been retained by the organization to analyze the issues, to mount a constitutional challenge to the efficacy and enforcement of the law, which I am doing,” he said. “I hope to file a lawsuit in the next couple of months and our goal is to have the law invalidated.”
Clubs Preparing To Challenge City On Smoking Ban
- Thursday, Feb. 27th, 2003, The NY Sun
Players Board Votes To Fight the LawSome of the city’s most prestigious private clubs are banding together to fight the city’s tough new smoking ban, which takes effect March 30.
The board of the 635-member Players Club voted unanimously Tuesday night to authorize John Martello, the club’s executive director, to take action to fight the law — possibly suing to get an exemption.
Sidney Zion, a journalist and longtime member of the Players Club and the Yale Club, feels the smoking law represents a “return to prohibition…this is 1984, this is Big Brother deciding.”
Richard Farley, a partner at Cahill Gordon & Reindell, is advising the Players Club.
"If you're downstate, you're not going to be able to smoke anywhere but in your closet," said Legis. Roger Corbin (D-Westbury), chairman of the Nassau Legislature's health committee. "If we stop the places in which you can smoke, the smokers may not find it appealing to smoke."
- Friday, Aug. 23rd, 2002, NY Newsday:
Nassau Legis. Brian Muellers (D-Glen Cove), another health committee member, said he was optimistic officials would reach agreement on their proposals. He said the New York City and Nassau bills are very similar.
"You have people who travel across county lines to go to restaurants and bowling alleys," Muellers said. "It would be better if they didn't have to adjust practices as they travel from one jurisdiction to another."
LET THE REVOLUTION BEGIN! "IF WE CAN'T SMOKE ANYWHERE, WE'LL SMOKE EVERYWHERE."
NYC and the surrounding counties of Long Island have conspired to force smokers to quit. Our representatives, of the g*ddamn U.S. of A., are determined to socially engineer a group of people while taking away private property rights at the same time. That's all that can be said about what is going on. This is NOT about protecting the health of others! Read their statements! They'll make us quit by outlawing the act of smoking everywhere but our "closets" (!?!) while tobacco remains legal and they reap the profits of it.
Whether you smoke or not, government interference of this magnitude must be fiercely objected to. This is a form of punishment and imprisonment (our closets!?!) by intolerants who demand others abide by their code of behavior. This is a forceful takeover of property from the citizens. THIS is what the nazis did and don't you forget it.
THE CHOICE TO USE A LEGAL PRODUCT IS NORMAL.
TYRANNY IN AMERICA IS THE ABERRATION.WAR HAS BEEN DECLARED ON U.S. CITIZENS (NOT the tobacco industry anymore) FROM WITHIN. THIS IS CIVIL WAR. FIGHT FOR FREEDOM!
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(Restaurant Owners Click HERE for Additional Resources) |
| NYC COUNCIL
Joseph Addabbo Jr.
Tony Avella
Maria Baez
Charles Barron
Tracy Boyland
Gale Brewer
Yvette Clarke
Leroy Comrie
James Davis
Ruben Diaz
Erik Martin Dilan
Simcha Felder
Lewis Fidler
Helen Foster
Dennis Gallagher
James Gennaro
Alan Gerson
Eric Gioia
Martin Golden
Robert Jackson
Allan Jennings
Melinda Katz
G. Oliver Koppell
Andrew Lanza
John Liu
Margarita Lopez
|
All
phone numbers begin:
212-788-#### Miguel Martinez
Michael McMahon
A. Gifford Miller
Hiram Monserrate
Eva Moskowitz
Michael Nelson
James Oddo
William Perkins
Madeline Provenzano
Christine Quinn
Domenic Recchia
Philip Reed
Diana Reyna
Joel Rivera
Acting Council Member
James Sanders, Jr.
Larry Seabrook
Helen Sears
Jose Serrano
Kendall Stewart
Peter Vallone, Jr.
Albert Vann
David Weprin
David Yassky
Bill deBlasio
|
EMAIL ALL WITH EASE
addabbo@council.nyc.ny.us, avella@council.nyc.ny.us, baez@council.nyc.ny.us,
barron@council.nyc.ny.us,
WE ALSO STRONGLY URGE
Visit CMAP, sponsored by the Public Interest Research Group (PIRG), to find which council member directly represents you. |
YOU'RE NOT GOOD
ENOUGH TO BE HOSPITABLE TO
Bars, Clubs
& Restaurants who are begging you not to visit
Whether you smoke or not, if you believe in choice, then you'll want to know who doesn't deserve your business. You might even want to call them and let them know nicely how unwelcome they've made you feel by taking advantage of the no smoking situation or choosing to serve only certain kinds of customers . You know, the ones who are allowed to enjoy a drink with their meal but not the ones who want to enjoy a cigarette with their meal OR drink. How about the drinkers taking their drinks outside to get their alcoholic "fix" and then coming back in to socialize with their company when they're done?
Webster Hall
125 E. 11th Street
New York NY 10003
Phone: 212-353-1600
According to very reliable
sources Webster Hall is charging $5 per patron to go out for a smoke and
to re-enter.
Paul & Jimmy's
123 East 18th St. (between Irving Pl.
and Park Avenue)
New York NY 10003
Phone: 212-475-9540
Fax: 212-529-1697
Proprietors: Louis and Linda Azzollini
"Out of all our employees, only one smokes by choice and the others are forced to smoke every day," said Linda Azzollini, who along with her husband owns and operates Paul & Jimmy's restaurant on E. 18th St, which has a small smoking section and bar. She said the smoke causes headaches, eye irritation and congestion for her and her employees. [Source: The Villager, Dec. 18, 2002]
(The small smoking section and bar consists of two smoking tables by the window, and a tiny bar (maybe 6 stools) behind those tables.)
Azzollini was one of 57 people who testified on Dec. 13 at a public hearing on the anti-smoking bill at City Hall.
Councilwoman Clarke was astounded
when Azzollini stated that she did not, as an owner free to choose to do
so, ban smoking in her restaurant even though she testified that it sickens
her. Astonishment turned to resentment when it was revealed by Azzollini
that she did not want to be the one to insult her good smoking customers
and was depending on the NYC Council to "be the heavy" (quote Clarke) and
do that for her.
RESTAURANT
OWNERS/MANAGERS
PERSONAL STORIES
HOW SMOKING BANS HAVE AFFECTED OWNERS SUBJECTED TO BANS
The health department’s stats on jobs and the smoking ban don’t add up.
Benjamin Disraeli once said famously, “There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.”
I couldn’t help thinking of Disraeli’s comment when I saw the report issued by the city’s Department of Health last week claiming that Mayor Bloomberg’s controversial new anti-smoking law is having no effect on employment in Gotham’s restaurant and bar industry, despite howls from owners that their business is slowing down.
I wouldn’t quite call the report a “damned lie,” but it is a case of using statistics in the service of blatant political propaganda. In its report, the health department employs unreliable preliminary data—heavily massaged and likely to be revised (several times, probably)—to jump to an extremely questionable conclusion about an exceedingly complex subject.
There are so many things wrong with this “report,” it’s difficult to know where to begin,...
...read
more
Also see:
Smoke-free Calif. pubs still waiting for 'hordes'
The Coachman - "This is my Story about how the smoking ban killed The
Coachman Restaurant and Bar."
LA
is WARM - Why would their business plunge when smoking outdoors in
warm weather has been turned into an art? Not exactly what NY will experience.
| Smoking Ban will Send Profits "Up in Smoke" - This letter to the editor by Dave Pickrell, the founder of Smokers Fighting Discrimination, outlines the manipulation used in studies that claim restaurants are not financially harmed. It is an eye-opener. |
|
By Matthew T. Hall, Union-Tribune, February 24, 2001 |
"The Level Playing Field"
It never hurts to tweak the Antis as well with the fact that when they
seek
to "level the playing field" by forcing an entire region to go smokebanned
that they're blatantly admitting that such banning is so unpopular
that even
a small town can't hope to draw enough customers from all the smoky
bars
around it if they enforce the ban: the level playing field argument
is a
tacit admission that "the people" do NOT want these bans!
PRIVATE PROPERTY RIGHTS: HOW IMPORTANT ARE THEY?...
Alexander Hamilton: "A power over a man's subsistence amounts to a power over his will. Property must be sacred or liberty cannot exist."
James Madison: "Where an excess of power prevails, property of no sort is duly respected. No man is safe in his opinions, his person, his faculties, or his possessions", and:
"Government is instituted to protect property
of every sort. . . This being the end of government, that alone is a just
government, which impartially secures to every
man, whatever is his own."
"Government is instituted no less for protection of the property than of the persons of individuals."
John Adams: "[t]he moment that idea is admitted into society that property is not as sacred as the Laws of God, and that there is not a force of law and public justice to protect it, anarchy and tyranny commence.
Daniel Webster: "No other rights are safe where property is not safe."
An eighteenth century judicial opinion best
reflects this concept, wherein the Court noted that "the right of acquiring
and
possessing property, and having it protected,
is one of the natural, inherent and inalienable rights of men.... The preservation
of property, then, is a primary object of
the social compact." Vanhorne's Lessee v. Dorrance, 2 U.S. 310 (1795).
As we know, early American common law descended from English common law. What did the English think of private property?
Magna Carta: No Freeman shall be taken, or imprisoned, or be disseised [deprived wrongfully of real property] of his Freehold, or Liberties, or free Customs, or be outlawed, or exiled, or any otherwise destroyed; nor will we pass upon him, nor condemn him, but by lawful Judgment of his Peers, or by the Law of the Land. 1297
John Locke: "The great chief end therefore, of Mens uniting into
Commonwealths, and putting themselves under Government, is the Preservation
of their Property." He also said, "Whenever the legislators endeavor to
take away and destroy the property of the people, or to reduce them to
slavery under arbitrary power, they put themselves into a state of war
with the people, who are thereupon absolved from any further obedience..."
--2nd Treatise of Government, 1690 the principal absolute rights which
appertain to every Englishman,"
William Blackstone: The principal absolute rights which appertain
to every Englishman [are] personal security, personal liberty, and private
property.
Read: (Property
rights)-- The forgotten fundamental right
The Orange County Register | 4 August 2002 | Steven Greenhut
reprinted courtesy of Free Republic
(EXCERPTS)
...there is no more important right than the right to be safe and secure
within one's own property - provided a person wants to live as a free man
and not a slave.
...I buy a piece of land, build a house on it and live in it with my family - and the state can't bother me unless I'm harboring a fugitive or in some other rare instances. That's freedom. That's the basis for everything we as Americans are supposed to stand for.
And it's something that's continually under assault in America today. It's not just the politicians who view as arcane the traditional concept of property rights, but an increasing number of The People themselves - the very individuals whose lives are what they are because the founders understood the importance of property.
That's called freedom. Without it, we live in a tyranny, in which we answer to the decisions of dictators, petty or otherwise. That's how people lived in the Soviet Union, and how certain city council members and city managers expect us to live now. Property rights, not central planning, remain the foundation of prosperity, also.
...AND JUST IN GENERAL
Daniel Webster:
"Good intentions will alway be pleaded for every assumption of authority. It is hardly too strong to say that the Constitution was made to guard the people against the dangers of good intentions."
"There are men in all ages who mean to govern well, but they mean to
govern. They promise to be good master, but they mean to be masters."
London Telegraph - 8/16/98 - "PASSIVE SMOKERS INHALE SIX CIGARETTES A YEAR"
OSHA (Occupational Safety & Health Administration) - Letter -7/8/97 - "FIELD STUDIES OF ENVIRONMENTAL TOBACCO SMOKE INDICATE THAT, UNDER NORMAL CONDITIONS, THE COMPONENTS IN TOBACCO SMOKE ARE DILUTED BELOW EXISTING PERMISSIBLE EXPOSURE LIMITS."
ACSH (American Council on Science and Health) - 8/1/00 - "...THE ROLE OF ETS IN THE DEVELOPMENT OF CHRONIC DISEASES LIKE CANCER AND HEART DISEASE IS UNCERTAIN AND CONTROVERSIAL."
Dept. of Energy - 2/2/00 - "EXPOSURES TO ENVIRONMENTAL TOBACCO SMOKE MAY BE LOWER THAN EARLIER STUDIES INDICATED FOR BARTENDERS, WAITERS AND WAITRESSES."
| Dr. C. Everett Koop - 4/5/00
- "SCIENTISTS
AT THE AMERICAN INSTITUTE OF CANCER RESEARCH HAVE FOUND THAT COOKING RED
MEAT AT HIGH TEMPERATURES CREATES COMPOUNDS CALLED HETEROCYCLIC AMINES,
FOUND TO BE POWERFUL CANCER-CAUSING AGENTS IN ANIMALS."
Let's do away with restaurants completely if it's that dangerous to workers! |
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