cyclopedia online as being in the same category as Thomas Paine's essay, titled The Rights of Man ]

[See also, Part 2 at www.billstclair.com/ferran ] [this page is a mirror of this original]

Copyright 1999 Mark Ferran . Rev. 3/25/99. Feel Free to forward, post and archive this essay online; and to print and distribute up to 1000 complete copies, free of charge.

Lincoln said "Let [Law] be preached from the pulpit, proclaimed in legislatures, and enforced in courts of justice."

1. The Law Clauses of the Constitution of the United States were adopted by the People to promote enduring Peace, and to Secure Life, Liberty and Property against unlawful deprivations by public agents exceeding the limits of lawful authority. The primary Law Clauses of the Constitution are found in the Fifth Amendment (in the Bill of Rights), and in the Fourteenth Amendment:

"No person shall be deprived of life, liberty or property without Due Process of Law."

U.S. Constitution, Amendment 5, Law Clause. "No State ... shall deprive any person of Life, Liberty, or Property, without Due Process of Law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the Equal Protection of the Laws. ... Congress shall have the Power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article."

U.S. Constitution, Amendment 14 (Sections 1 & 5).

Express guarantees of Law are also found in the State Constitutions of every State in the Union. For example, in the Constitution of the state of New York, express guarantees of Lawful government are found in at least four provisions of the New York State Bill of Rights. All of these Law Guarantees have a common origin.

"Magna Charta ... is the origin of the provision, embodied in the Fifth Amendment of the Constitution of the United States, that no man shall be deprived of life, liberty, or property without due process of law."

United States v. Lee, 106 U.S. 196, 228 (1882) (dissenting opinion); Accord Twinning v. New Jersey, 211 U.S. 78, 102, 29 S. Ct. 14 (1908).

"The Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment, later incorporated into the Fourteenth Amendment, was intended to give Americans at least the protection against governmental power that they had enjoyed as Englishmen against the power of the Crown."

Ingraham v. Write, 430 U.S. 651, 672-3 (1976).

"The safeguards of 'due process of law' and 'the equal protection of the laws' summarize the history of the English-speaking peoples running back to Magna Charta and reflected in the constitutional development of our people."

Malinski v. New York, 324 U.S. 401, 413-14 (1945) (separate opinion of Frankfurter, J.). "Fairly construed [the Fourteenth Amendment] may be said to rise to the dignity of a new Magna Charta. .... Every word employed has an established signification. ...."Due process of law" is the application of the Law as it exists, in the fair and regular course of administrative procedure. "The equal protection of the laws" places all upon a footing of legal equality and gives the same protection to all for the preservation of life, liberty, and property, and the pursuit of happiness."

Supreme Court Justice Swayne J, The Slaughter-House Cases, 83 U.S. 36, 125-27 (1872) (Swayne J., Dissenting).

2. The U.S. Constitution prescribes a Rule of Conduct for all government agents. The Constitution absolutely forbids any government agent from committing any deprivation "of life, liberty, or property without due process of law." By the Constitution, no "power is given, but is absolutely prohibited, both to the executive and the legislative, to deprive anyone of life, liberty, or property without due process of law...." United States v. Lee, 106 U.S. 196, 220 (1882); Tindale v. Wesley, 167 U.S. 204, 217 (1897). The word "without," as used in the Process of Law Clauses, means "Outside; beyond; in excess of." Black's Law Dictionary. "Without" is the logical opposite of "within." The Constitution literally forbids all governmental deprivations of life, liberty or property committed outside the Law and the processes which law prescribes. Chicago, Burlington &c. R'd v. Chicago, 166 U.S. 226, 241 (1896) (quoting 2 Story Const. § 1956 (Cooley ed.)). The Constitution forbids any governmental deviation from the prescribed process of law which shall, or may, deprive any person of his life, liberty, or property. In short, the US Constitution established "a Government of Laws, not of Men." Marbury v. Madison, 5 US (1 Cranch) 137 (1803); Yick Wo v. Hopkins, 118 US 356 (1886). "Constitutional government is a government by law. The office of the state is to establish and maintain laws." Henry Campbell Black, American Constitutional Law §70 (4th ed., West Pub. 1927).

3. The Due Process of Law Clauses, of the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments, protect a "person's right to enjoy what is his, free of governmental interference." Fuentes v. Shevin, 407 U.S. 67, 82 (1972). The Due Process of Law Clauses are designed to protect persons from deprivations by "public agents transcending the limits of lawful authority." Hurtado v. California, 110 U.S. 516, 535-36 (1884).

4. The Supreme Court has explained that the Equal Protection of the Laws Clause

"is often associated in the [Fourteenth] amendment with the due process [of law] clause and it is customary to consider them together. It may be that they overlap, that a violation of one may at times involve the violation of the other.... The due process clause requires that every man shall have ... the benefit of the general law, ... so that every citizen shall hold his life, liberty and property and immunities under the protection of the general rules which govern society. It of course tends to secure equality.... Our whole system of law is predicated on the general fundamental principle of equality of application of the law. `All men are equal before the law,' `this is a government of laws and not of men.' `No man is above the law,' were all maxims showing the spirit in which legislatures, executives, and courts are expected to make, execute and apply laws. But the framers and adopters of the [fourteenth] amendment were not content to depend on a mere minimum secured by the due process clause, or upon the spirit of equality which might not be insisted on by local [government]. Therefore they embodied that spirit in a specific guaranty. The guaranty [of equal protection of the laws] was aimed at undue favor and individual or class privilege, on the one hand, and at hostile discrimination or the oppression of inequality on the other. It sought equality of treatment of all persons ... similarly situated. .... It means that no person or class of persons shall be denied the same protection of the laws which is enjoyed by other persons or other classes in the same place and under like circumstances."

Truax v. Corrigan, 257 US 312, 331, 338 (1921).

5. The Equal Protection of the Laws Clause "prohibits any State to deny to any individual the equal protection of the laws." Cotting v. Kansas City Stock Yards Co Etc. 183 US 79, 110 (1902). "Equal protection of the laws requires equal operation of the laws upon all persons in like circumstances." Maxwell v. Bugbee, 250 US 525, 541 (1919). It "means that the rights of all persons must rest upon the same rule under similar circumstances ... so that all persons similarly circumstanced shall be treated alike." Louisville Gas Co. v. Coleman, 227 US 32, 37, 38 (1928).

6. The "Fourteenth Amendment was a new Magna Charta." (18 Fed. 385, 429). The Supreme Court has said:

"Providing equal justice for poor and rich, weak and powerful alike, is an age old problem. (Citing Leviticus c. 19 v. 15) People have never ceased to hope and strive to move closer to that goal. This hope, at least in part, brought about in 1215 the royal concessions of Magna Charta. "No free man shall be taken, nor imprisoned, nor dispossessed of his property, nor put out of the protection of the laws, nor exiled, nor anywise destroyed, ... but by ... the law of the land.' In this tradition, our own constitutional guaranties of due process and equal protection ... allow no invidious discriminations between persons and different groups of persons."

Griffin v. Illinois, 351 US 12, 16, 17 (1956).

7. The Constitution forbids all deprivations of property which occur "without due process of Law." The word "without," as used in this 18th and 19th Century Constitutional documents, means "Outside; beyond; in excess of." Black's Law Dictionary. Literally, the Constitution forbids all governmental deprivations of life, liberty or property outside of Due Process of Law. The United States Supreme Court has explained this right as follows:

"Due process of law requires, first, the legislative act authorizing the [depriv]ation, pointing out how it may be made....; and, second that the parties or officers proceeding to make the [depriv]ation shall keep within the authority conferred, and observe every regulation which the act makes for the protection or in the interest of the [citizen], except as he may see fit voluntarily to waive them."

Chicago, Burlington &c. R'd v. Chicago, 166 U.S. 226, 241 (1896) (quoting 2 Story Const. § 1956 (Cooley ed.)). "The absence of proper prior statutory authority for the [deprivation] constitutes a denial of the substantive element of due process."

Nichols, On Eminent Domain, § 4.9.

8. The Court has also explicitly identified the "Law" and authority which State officials must "keep within" as being the statutes and organic Laws established by the People in each state:

"Due process of law is process due according to the law of the land. This process in the States is regulated by the law of the State."

Walker v. Sauvinet, 92 U.S. (2 Otto) 90, 93 (1875). "[T]he words [Due Process of Law] refer to that law of the land in each State, which derives its authority from the inherent and reserved powers of the State, exerted within the limits of those fundamental principles of liberty and justice which lie at the base of all our civil and political institutions."

Twinning v. New Jersey, 211 U.S. 78, 102, 29 S. Ct. 14 (1908).

9. According to the plain text and meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment's Due Process of Law Clause, only deprivations which occur within a "Process of Law" established by the People are constitutional. Governmental deprivations and invasions of private property which occur outside any "Process of Law" established by People of the State are absolutely prohibited by the Federal Constitution. By the Constitution, no "power is given, but is absolutely prohibited, both to the executive and the legislative, to deprive anyone of life, liberty, or property without due process of law...." United States v. Lee, 106 U.S. 196, 220 (1882); Tindale v. Wesley, 167 U.S. 204, 217 (1897).

"These principles grow out of the proposition universally accepted by American courts on the authority of Coke, that the words `due process of law' are equivalent in meaning to the words `law of the land,' contained in that chapter of Magna Charta, which provides that 'no freeman shall be taken, or imprisoned, or disseised [of his property], or outlawed, or exiled, or anywise destroyed, ... but by ... the law of the land.'"

Twinning v. New Jersey, 211 U.S. 78 (1908).

10. Lord Coke instructed that "[e]very oppression against law, by colour of any usurped authority is a kinde of destruction [prohibited by Magna Charta], for quando prohibetur, prohibetur et omne per quod devenitur ad illud." (2 Coke, Institutes 53). The American Colonists established this principle in their earliest Constitutions, such as the Massachusetts Bay Colony's 1641 Body of Liberties which paraphrased this provision of Magna Charta as follows:

"No man's life shall be taken away, ... no man's goods or estaite shall be taken away from him nor in any way indamaged under Color of law, or Countenance of Authoritie, unlesse it be by vertue of equitie or some express law of the Country warranting the same, established by the [People's Legislature] and sufficiently published...."

Massachusetts Body of Liberties (1641), as quoted in Mott, Due Process of Law at § 4, pp. 9-10, n.31.

While "Law" is created only by the assertion of legislative power, not every conceivable Legislative Act or assertion of power is "Law," within the meaning of the Law Clauses of the Constitution. To be "Law," it must be a "general law" establishing a "general rule" because the definition or "Law" requires that "the rights of all persons must rest upon the same rule under similar circumstances." Louisville Gas Co. v. Coleman, 227 US 32, 37, 38 (1928). "[A]ny legislative act which takes away the life, liberty or property of a particular named or easily ascertainable person or group of persons" is not a "general law," and therefore is not "Law" within the meaning of the Law Clauses. Cummings v. Missouri 71 U.S. (4 Wall.) 277 (1867); Hurtado v. California, 110 U.S. 516, 535-36 (1884). A Legislative Act or statute which is "vague" or "uncertain" is not an "express law" establishing a "rule" capable of being "known" and uniformly applied to all persons similarly situated, and is therefore not "Law." See, e.g, Jordan v. DeGeorge, 341 U.S. 223 (1951); Cramp v. Board of Public Instruction, 368 U.S. 278 (1961). The Courts have established many other doctrines purporting to limit the exercise of legislative power, such as the so-called "incorporation doctrine," and doctrines of so-called "Substantive Due Process" and "Procedural Due Process." These and other judicially developed limitations on the exercise of legislative power were developed to supplement the ancient and fundamental right of citizens to enjoy the protection of the laws as written by the People's representatives in the legislative branch. Congress has enacted a statute to enable citizens to demand the Federal and State courts to enforce all these constitutional rights against State officials. 42 U.S.C. Sections 1983, 1985, and 1986.

11. The American prohibition and the remedy against undue deprivations and interference with private rights by State officials acting under color of law is contained in the first section of the Fourteenth Amendment and in 42 U.S.C. § 1983 (which enacted as the first section of "An Act to Enforce the Provisions of the Fourteenth Amendment" approved April 20, 1871):

42 U.S.C. Section 1983. Civil action for deprivation of rights: "Every person who, under color of any statute, ordinance, regulation, custom, or usage, of any State or Territory or the District of Columbia, subjects, or causes to be subjected, any citizen of the United States or other person within the jurisdiction thereof to the deprivation of any rights, privileges, or immunities secured by the Constitution and laws, shall be liable to the party injured in an action at law, suit in equity, or other proper proceeding for redress."

Title 42, United States Code, Sec. 1983 (History: R.S. Sec. 1979 derived from act Apr. 20, 1871, ch. 22, Sec. 1, 17 Stat. 13. "An Act to Enforce the Provisions of the Fourteenth Amendment." 42 U.S.C. Section 1985. Conspiracy to interfere with civil rights: (1) Preventing officer performing duties If two or more persons in any State or Territory conspire to prevent, by force, intimidation, or threat, any person from accepting or holding any office, trust, or place of confidence under the United States, or from discharging any duties thereof; or to induce by like means any officer of the United States to leave any State, district, or place, where his duties as an officer are required to be performed, or to injure him in his person or property on account of his lawful discharge of the duties of his office, or while engaged in the lawful discharge thereof, or to injure his property so as to molest, interrupt, hinder, or impede him in the discharge of his official duties; (2) Obstructing justice; intimidating party, witness, or juror If two or more persons in any State or Territory conspire to deter, by force, intimidation, or threat, any party or witness in any court of the United States from attending such court, or from testifying to any matter pending therein, freely, fully, and truthfully, or to injure such party or witness in his person or property on account of his having so attended or testified, or to influence the verdict, presentment, or indictment of any grand or petit juror in any such court, or to injure such juror in his person or property on account of any verdict, presentment, or indictment lawfully assented to by him, or of his being or having been such juror; or if two or more persons conspire for the purpose of impeding, hindering, obstructing, or defeating, in any manner, the due course of justice in any State or Territory, with intent to deny to any citizen the equal protection of the laws, or to injure him or his property for lawfully enforcing, or attempting to enforce, the right of any person, or class of persons, to the equal protection of the laws; (3) Depriving persons of rights or privileges If two or more persons in any State or Territory conspire or go in disguise on the highway or on the premises of another, for the purpose of depriving, either directly or indirectly, any person or class of persons of the equal protection of the laws, or of equal privileges and immunities under the laws; or for the purpose of preventing or hindering the constituted authorities of any State or Territory from giving or securing to all persons within such State or Territory the equal protection of the laws; or if two or more persons conspire to prevent by force, intimidation, or threat, any citizen who is lawfully entitled to vote, from giving his support or advocacy in a legal manner, toward or in favor of the election of any lawfully qualified person as an elector for President or Vice President, or as a Member of Congress of the United States; or to injure any citizen in person or property on account of such support or advocacy; in any case of conspiracy set forth in this section, if one or more persons engaged therein do, or cause to be done, any act in furtherance of the object of such conspiracy, whereby another is injured in his person or property, or deprived of having and exercising any right or privilege of a citizen of the United States, the party so injured or deprived may have an action for the recovery of damages occasioned by such injury or deprivation, against any one or more of the conspirators. Title 42, United States Code, Sec. 1985. [History: R.S. Sec. 1980 derived from acts July 31, 1861, ch. 33, 12 Stat. 284; Apr. 20, 1871, ch. 22, Sec. 2, 17 Stat. 13 "An Act to Enforce the Provisions of the Fourteenth Amendment." Section was formerly classified to section 47 of Title 8, Aliens and Nationality.] This statute, enacted to aid in "'the preservation of human liberty and human rights'" Owen v. City of Independence, 445 US 622, 636 (1980), reflects a congressional judgment that a "damages remedy against the offending party is a vital component of any scheme for vindicating cherished constitutional guarantees." As remedial legislation, [the Act to Enforce the Provisions of the Fourteenth Amendment] is to be construed generously to further its primary purpose.

Gomez v. Toledo, 446 US 635 (1980).

Another "vital component of any scheme for vindicating cherished constitutional guarantees" is the imposition of criminal punishment, which Congress has prescribed, for the "willful" violation of "rights ... protected by the Constitution or laws of the United States" by deviant government officials:

"Whoever, under color of any law, ... willfully subjects any person ... to the deprivation of any rights ... protected by the Constitution or laws of the United States ... shall be fined ... or imprisoned ... or both."

18 U.S.C. Sec. 24__

This Federal criminal statute provides that "if bodily injury results from the acts committed," the penalty increases to as much as 10 years in prison, plus a fine. It adds that "if death results from the acts committed ... or if such acts include kidnapping or an attempt to kidnap, aggravated sexual abuse, or an attempt to commit aggravated sexual abuse, or an attempt to kill," the maximum penalty is life in prison or death. This statute, on its face, would be useful to deter or punish unlawful deprivations of life, liberty or property by wilfully deviant governmental agents. However, a statute is only useful if it is enforced. Currently, this statute is not well enforced by the agencies under the control of the President of the United States.

The Associated Press analyzed computer records of all 1.4 million cases considered by the [US] Justice Department between 1992 and 1996, and reviewed department reports and case memos obtained through the Freedom of Information Act. Civil rights crimes are the department's lowest prosecutorial priority, the record shows. ... Harvard constitutional law scholar Laurence Tribe said ... "it seems outrageous, since the gravest abuses of power -- and the gravest threats to personal liberty and security -- are those in which the very individuals to whom we look for the preservation of law and of order turn out to be the predators." ... Fred Isler at the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights in Washington, D.C., [who] is a contact point for civil rights complaints of all kinds, said: "Here's what happens,... We get a form letter back saying that [The Department of] Justice basically does not feel that the complaint is in their jurisdiction and encouraging the person to get a private attorney." ... Deputy Assistant Attorney General Thomas Perez, [of the Department of Justice] who oversees criminal civil rights, said his attorneys review every case the FBI brings them. He could not explain why complaints sometimes are ignored for more than a year. "I suggest you go there," he said, pointing across the street at the FBI. The bureau had pointed to [the Department of] Justice to get the answer.

The chief complaint heard from the Justice Department's civil rights staff is that it can't do more without more funding. This year they received a raise, to $6.7 million from $4.9 million last year for the civil rights division criminal unit. Some say that's still inadequate. "The Civil Rights Division of Justice is so small it's sort of the dance band of the Titanic," said Stephen Bright, director of the Southern Center for Human Rights in Atlanta. "We're always referring things up there, and they just don't have the staff to deal with them."

Civil Rights Cases Rarely Tried, Report of The Associated Press, by Martha Mendoza, AP-NY-03-20-99 1123EST.

By Contrast, the Department of Justice vigorously enforces an "Asset Forfeiture Program" against citizens who ingest or traffic certain substances and "ensure[s] its integrity" in order to "maximize its full law enforcement potential." USDOJ, Legal Activities 1995-1996.

The poison of lawlessness in government is far more dangerous than any controlled substance. Perhaps Congress, pursuant to its power under section 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment, should legislate a civil and administrative Forfeiture statute which is enforcible against governments and officials who "under color of any law, ... subjects any person ... to the deprivation of any rights ... protected by the Constitution or laws of the United States." Let deviant public officials forfeit their salaries, weapons, benefits, honors and offices. Perhaps that potential revenue source would motivate the Department of Justice to "maximize [the] full law enforcement potential" of the Civil Rights Acts. Also, Congress should expand the statutory "jurisdiction" of all agencies capable of investigating or prosecuting unlawful acts and deprivations committed by governmental agents.

The consequence of the failure of the President, or the Courts, to enforce the fundamental Constitutional rights of citizens to life, liberty and property, is that our most fundamental principle, that "governments are instituted among men" to "secure" their rights to "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness [e.g., property]" is more frequently disregarded, and it may seem to many that our local, state and federal governments have instead "become[] destructive of these ends." Cf. Declaration of Independence. History teaches that the ultimate consequence of the failure of our government agents to abide by the Law of the Land and to obey and compel obedience to our Constitution, may include the destruction of the Government and The People of the United States. Like Abraham Lincoln warned decades before the first American Civil War, Mr. Justice Brandeis, of the US Supreme Court, repeated for the People and Judges of this generation, that:

In a government of laws, the existence of the government will be imperilled if it fails to observe the law scrupulously. Our government is the potent, the omnipresent teacher. For good or for ill, it teaches the whole people by its example. Crime is contagious. If the government becomes a lawbreaker, it breeds contempt for law; it invites every man to become a law unto himself; it invites anarchy.

Olmstead v. United States, 277 U.S. 438, 469-471, 48 S.Ct. 564, 569-570. (Dissenting opinion.)

Lawlessness in government today poses the same grave threat to "Government of the People, By the People, For the People," that it did at the time of the adoption of the Law Clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment following the Civil War (1868).

One of the most serious threats to the Peace and Security of this Nation and a barrier to the proper observance of Law and the proper enforcement of these Constitutional rights, is the failure of many lawyers, law professors, and Judges to understand and teach that the Constitution forbids the agents of the government to intentionally deprive a person of Life, Liberty or Property without authority of Law. Many of our judges incompetently suppose that an undue (illegal) and intentional deprivation of liberty or property is nevertheless constitutionally permissible if "compensation," such as by a subsequent civil "damages" remedy, may somehow be available to the victim, or his heirs. This supposition does great violence to the original and express principles of the Constitution, and essentially nullifies the Constitutional right declared therein, and relieves the Executive and Administrative officers of our government from the obligations solomnly undertaken by their "Oath or Affirmation, to support this Constitution." (US Constitution Article VI) Officers support the Constitution by "keeping within" their lawful authority, and by refraining from depriving persons of Life, Liberty or Property without authority of Law. Conversely, officers violate the Constitution, and their Oath or Affirmation, by depriving persons of Life, Liberty, or Property without authority of Law. The Constitution prescribes Rules of Conduct for the governmental agents of the People. The Constitution established a Government of Laws, and forbids the establishment of a Government of Men, let alone of Thieves and Murderers and Tyrants. The existence of a remedy for a deviation from the prescribed Rule of Conduct does not negate an officer's continuing duty to abide by that rule. The Constitution commands to the official: "Thou shalt not steal" a person's property under color of law or pretense of authority. The fact that a person might have some lawsuit or civil remedy for damages, if his property is stolen or withheld, does not warrant that theft, nor should the existence on paper of one remedy give the governmental thief immunity from other remedies, such as criminal prosecution, or the citizen's remedies of self-defense, or civil disobedience or even revolution. See also, Declaration of Independence. The fact that a judicial remedy may exist on paper for an officer's violation of his legal duty, does not dispense with the officer's own continuing obligation to comply with that known legal duty. Marbury v. Madison, 5 US (1 Cranch) 137 (1803); At least, not in "a Government of Law." Yick Wo v. Hopkins, 118 US 356 (1886).

The widespread repudiation of the right of citizens to hold their "property" free of undue (unlawful) deprivation might be caused in part by an incompetent confusion of the "Law Clause" with the "Takings/Just Compensation Clause," both found in close proximity in the text of the Fifth Amendment. Examples of such confusion of these two distinct provisions may be found in reversed decisions, and other decisions, by a Constitutionally illiterate Federal District Court Judge named Scullin.

But more than a few of our Judges also suppose that not ONLY illegal intentional deprivations of PROPERTY, but also illegal intentional deprivations Liberty and perhaps Life, are consistent with our form of government (Constitution) if a civil "damages" remedy may be available on paper to the victim or his heirs. This pernicious doctrine confuses the Right, with one of the Remedies provided for its violation. In the original expression of the Due Process of Law - Law of the Land, guarantee in Magna Charta, the substantive right is first declared, then its observance secured further by assurances of law abiding officials, and then remedies for its enforcement "if" violated or " are separately stated as including both judicial remedies and the right of revolution. In our Constitution, particularly the Fourteenth Amendment, the right is declared, but a judicial remedy for its violation is left to be inferred, but it is expressly declared to be the duty of Congress "to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article", which Congress initially attempted by do by enacting "An Act to Enforce the Provisions of the Fourteenth Amendment" in 1871.

The prohibitions against undue deprivations of Life, Liberty, and Property must not be confused with the distinct and additional guarantee of the Fifth Amendment that Just Compensation shall be paid where private property shall have been lawfully Taken, pursuant to Due Process of Law, for "public use."

"No person shall be deprived of life, liberty or property without Due Process of Law; nor shall private property be taken for public use without just compensation."

U.S. Constitution, Amendment V.

"[T]he prohibition against the deprivation of property without due process of law reflects the high value, embedded in our constitutional and political history, that we place on a person's right to enjoy what is his, free of governmental interference." Fuentes v. Shevin, 407 U.S. 67, 82 (1972) (citing Lynch v. Household Finance Corp., 405 U.S. 538). By the Due Process of Law Clauses of the Constitution, State and Federal Officials are "absolutely prohibited ... to deprive anyone of life, liberty, or property without due process of law." United States v. Lee, 106 U.S. 196, 220 (1882); Tindale v. Wesley, 167 U.S. 204, 217 (1897). "The enforcement of these limitations by judicial process is the device of self-governing communities to protect the rights of individuals ... as against the violence of public agents transcending the limits of lawful authority, even when acting in the name and wielding the force of the government." Hurtado v. California, 110 U.S. 516, 535-36 (1884). Unlike the Due Process of Law Clauses, which absolutely prohibit all arbitrary and unlawful deprivations of life, liberty, and property, it is said that the Takings/Just Compensation Clause of the Fifth Amendment "is designed not to limit the governmental interference with property rights per se, but rather to secure compensation in the event of otherwise proper interference amounting to a taking." First English Evangelical Lutheran Church of Glendale, v. County of Los Angeles, 482 U.S. 304, 107 S.Ct. 2378 (1987).

12. The citizen's right to hold his life and property, "under the protection of the Law," is the most fundamental of all civil rights. The Supreme Court has recognized that

"the terms 'due process of law'... come to us from the law of England, from which country our jurisprudence is to a great extent derived, and their requirement was there designed to secure the subject against the arbitrary action of the crown and place him under the protection of the law."

Dent v. West Virginia, 430 U.S. 651,123 (1888).

13. The written documents of the English Constitution also instructed that precautions must be taken to protect free men from unreasonable risks of erroneous deprivation. In accordance with the government's duty to safeguard life, property and liberty from destruction by lawless rulers, Magna Charta commanded that:

"We will not make justiciaries, constables, magistrates, or sheriffs, except of such persons as are knowing in the laws of the realm, and disposed duly to observe them."

Magna Charta, Chapter 52 (King John, 1215).

14. This command, like the Law of the Land prohibition itself, was adopted by the draftsmen of Magna Charta from the Bible. Modern States attempt to meet this obligation of having only officials knowledgeable of the laws, by assigning Officers of the Court, such as Attorneys General, and Municipal Attorneys, to the various agencies of the State, to help them "keep within" their lawful authority. The Due Process of Law "vagueness doctrine" is an extension of this knowledge-of-law principle of Magna Charta and is designed to reduce the "risk of erroneous deprivations "caused by purported laws that are too vague and indefinite for public officials to "know" and to "keep within." Erroneous and unequal deprivations are just as likely to result from vague laws as from officials who lack knowledge of the clearly defined laws or who lack a disposition to keep within the authority conferred by them.

15. The idea that the citizen must be protected from unreasonable risks of erroneous deprivation gave Anglo-American jurists the authority to create the concept of "Procedural" rights (notice, meaningful opportunity to be heard) which protect the individual not only from actual deprivations contrary to the Law of the Land, but from arbitrary procedures likely to result in erroneous deprivations as well; hence the words "Due Process" of Law.

16. History teaches that disregard by the government of the citizen's legal "right to enjoy what is his," under the Laws is the surest path to the destruction of the government itself, at the hands of God, or at the hands of the governed. American History confirms this.

17. "The 'rights of Englishmen' in England were given to the [American] colonists in the earliest of the charters for colonization. ... Under this blanket provision the colonists claimed the protection of Magna Charta." ( Rodney L. Mott, colonial phrasing, in Due Process of Law §4, 8-9 (Da Cappo Press, New York, 1973)) The Colonists complained in the Declaration of Independence that a later King had plotted to establish "an Arbitrary government" here by "abolishing the free system of English Laws," and to introduce an "absolute rule into these Colonies" by "taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Government."

"In so far as the [colonists] gave [Magna Charta] a content, it was this meaning that they transferred with it to the American state constitutions and later to the Federal Constitution in the Fifth [and Fourteenth] Amendment[s]. It was the attempt of the English government to tear away these rights from the cornerstone of English liberty that led directly to the American Revolution."

Rodney L. Mott, The American Revolution, in Due Process of Law § 51, p. 136 (Da Cappo Press, New York, 1973).

Samuel Adams reputedly said: "Now what liberty is this when property can be taken without permission."

18. The Supreme Court of the United States was certainly correct to recognize that the

"Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment, later incorporated into the Fourteenth Amendment, was intended to give Americans at least the protection against governmental power that they had enjoyed as Englishmen against the power of the Crown."

Ingraham v. Write, 430 U.S. 651, 672-3 (1976).

19. When the American People began to frame a new government for the American Colonies, they equated the phrase "Due Process of Law" with "The Consent of the Governed" because they believed that all government and Law must be derived from authority conferred by consent of the governed. Government exists to secure life, property, and liberty, and must never deprive any member of the governed of any such right without the consent of the governed. The declaration of the First Continental Congress, in 1774, asserted the fundamental right of every American to hold his life, liberty and property unless deprived thereof by his own consent duly enacted in Law:

"That the inhabitants of the English colonies in North America, by the immutable laws of nature, the principles of the English Constitution, and their several charters or compacts, were entitled to life, liberty, and property; and that they had never ceded to any sovereign power whatever a right to dispose of either, without their consent; that their ancestors, who first settled the colonies, were, at the time of their emigration from the mother-country, entitled to all the rights, liberties, and immunities of free and natural born subjects."

Resolution of the First Continental Congress, as quoted in Stevens, Sources of the Constitution, pp. 210-11, as quoted in Mott, supra , at § 5, p. 13, n.42; See also , William R. Sanford and Carl R. Green, Basic Principles of American Government 43 (rev. ed., AMSCO Sch. Pub. 1980).

20. When this fundamental right was disregarded by the King who sent "swarms of officers to harass our people," they next declared, in the Declaration of Independence, that any ruler who claimed a right to deprive a person of his life, liberty or property without the consent of the governed as expressed in Laws duly enacted by their representatives, is a "Tyrant" that must be overthrown. The Right of Revolution which they claimed was foreshadowed in Magna Charta itself:

"If any one hath been dispossessed or deprived by us, without the legal [authority required], of his lands, castles, liberties, or right, we will forthwith restore them to him. As for all those things of which any person has, without the [authority required], been dispossessed or deprived, ... which we have in our hands, or are possessed by others, ... we will immediately cause full justice to be administered therein. ... [And] these [things] shall be immediately restored to them. ....

"So that if we, our justiciary, our bailiffs, or any of our officers, shall in any case fail in the performance of them towards any person, or shall break through any of these articles of peace and security, and the offense is notified ... to our justiciary, ... if it is not redressed by our justiciary, within forty days, reckoning from the time when it was notified to us, or to our justiciary if we should be out of the realm, the four barons aforesaid [holding swords to King John's head at the time] together with the community of the whole kingdom, shall distrain and distress us in all ways possible; namely, by seizing our castles, lands, possessions, and in any other manner they can, till the grievance is redressed to their pleasure, saving harmless our own person, and the persons of our queen and children; and when it is redressed, they shall obey us as before."

Magna Charta, Enforcement Provisions (King John, 1215).

21. These historic guarantees of life, property, and liberty secured by law, "enshrined in the history and the basic constitutional documents of the English speaking peoples," and secured further by National collective vigilance against lawless governmental action, was the model for the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States which ordains that:

"No State ... shall deprive any person of Life, Liberty, or Property, without Due Process of Law; nor deny to person within its jurisdiction the Equal Protection of the Laws. ... Congress shall have the Power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article."

U.S. Constitution, Fourteenth Amendment, Sec. 1, 5.

22. Congress initially fulfilled its duty to secure life, property and liberty against undue governmental interference and deprivation in the States by enacting the Act of Congress approved April 20, 1871, entitled "An Act to Enforce the Provisions of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, and for other purposes" and so much of the same Act as is now embodied and codified in Sections 1983, 1985, and 1986 of Title 42 of the UNITED STATES CODE. Despite this history, the teachings of many jurists and teachers of the law have seriously eroded the fundamental rights of free citizens to hold what is their own, but it remains the duty of the State and National Courts, and of Congress, and the President, to protect the citizens of this Country from deprivations not authorized by "the law of the land," and to restore citizens to the full enjoyment of those possessions when such are deprived or withheld by public officials "transcending the limits of their lawful authority." Hurtado v. California, 110 U.S. 516, 535-36 (1884).

23. American Citizens living at the end of the 20th Century should not have to live in fear that they will be deprived of their property, or life, or liberty by lawless public officials. Public officials have a duty to know the Law and to know the limits of their lawful authority and "keep within" that authority. This is the most basic duty of civilized government. This a duty which is too frequently violated by local, state, and Federal officials.

24. Absolute lawlessness prevails in this Land on a scale which would have justified the drafting of Magna Charta, and private property is being invaded at the mere whim of men who have no regard for Law, and therefore, no regard for the Consent of the Governed. Men in office who covet the property of others, and who attempt to make it available for their own private use and benefit, and who deliberately evade the requirements of Law, including its requirement for payment of Just Compensation for property to be taken for bona fide Public Use, go unrestrained by many of our Courts because law schools fail to provide proper education in Constitutional rights, and produce lawyers, law professors, and Judges who are not competent to defend our rights. All contrary to the fundamental promise of peace and security found in Magna Charta, the Bill of Rights, and in the Fourteenth Amendment. Enough is enough. This kind of lawlessness, involving disregard for written Laws, has overtaken every part of our government. Our Laws, established by the Consent of the Governed, are nullified by the mere Will of Men in power who, contrary to their Oaths, do not know them, or who are not disposed to abide by them. Life, Property and Liberty are no longer secure. A remedy worthy of Magna Charta and the Declaration of Independence must be prosecuted by the People, and by their representatives.

January 27, 1999. rev. April 4, 1999.

Respectfully Submitted

Mark Ferran, BSEE scl, JD mcl.

114 Morton Ave

Albany, New York 12202-1409

Counselier@aol.com

Current website: http://billstclair.com/ferran

The original edition of this essay may be found at the site: http://www.givemeliberty.org

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

P.S.

Notes about Lawless Officials in Rensselaer County, New York.

"YOU AND YOUR DUE PROCESS OF LAW!"

Actually said by: Town Supervisor, Richard Amadon, Town of Poestenkill, Rensselaer County, New York, United States. 1988.

Potentially said by: Any, Government Official, in Any Town, Any County, Any State, United States.

Lawless Officials in the Town of GRAFTON, Rensselaer County, NY

25. The author of this article first encountered shameless lawlessness and abuse of power in Rensselaer County, NY, when the Town of Grafton declared that my family's lands, about 300 acres, which had been assessed and taxed as my family's wholly private property for decades, were (suddenly) traversed by a public highway. Our private Lands and the impassible roadway on it were POSTED for decades. As State Supreme Court Cholakis later determined, it was wholly private property, and there is no public highway across it. In the 1970s after an officer of the Grafton Mountain Snowmobile Club became the Town Assessor, he called my father Rocco Ferran on behalf of the snowmobile club and asked for "permission" to snowmobile across this land for free, adding that my father should remember that he was the "assessor" and that he was in a position to abuse his powers as assessor unless my father allowed our property to be used gratuitously by scores of strangers on snowmobiles. My father (who originally coined the expression "Democracy is Not a Spectator Sport" during his campaign for Congress in the 1970s) knew the law, knew his rights, and refused, and informed the Town Board that this land was private property. As State Supreme Court Cholakis later determined, the Town had not maintained the ancient road across our lands for at least 80 years and it had been "impassable" to passenger cars for decades. Highway Law § 205 clearly states that any old public highway easement which is not significantly "used or traveled" for 6 years automatically ceases to be a public highway, without any official or declaratory action by the Town. It was well settled that Highway Law § 205 is self executing and does not require official action of the Town. It would have taken between fifteen seconds and fifteen minutes for the Town officials, or the Town Attorney, to read that rule of Law in McKinney's NY Statutes. My father knew the law in 1978, and knew his family was paying taxes on the land in that road,because the assessor knew it was private property, not a public highway. Yet, the Town attorney went ahead and expressly told the Grafton Mountain Snowmobile Club, and motorcyclists and lumber harvesters in the Town, that the road on our land was "open" for their use, on the false pretense that it had not been "abandoned" because the Town had never recorded a certificate certifying that it had been abandoned. The Town further declared that the road was "open to the public," meaning snowmobilers, motorcycles and lumber harvesters, despite the fact that it was impassable for use by the general public, and the Town has no honest intention to improve it. When my father and I could no longer enforce our legal rights in the local Justice Court, we enforced our legal property rights by self-help by excluding trespassers from that road. When the same officer of the Grafton Mountain Snowmobile Club became a member of the Town Board, the Town sued my father at the request of motorcyclists and snowmobilers, even while the Town continued to refuse to repair or maintain the supposedly public road. State Supreme Court Judge Cholakis read the Highway Law, and immediately declared the Town's claims to the road were "invalid" as a matter of law, and held that there was not even an arguable factual basis supporting the Town's claim to the road sufficient to warrant a trial. The Judge attempted to restore my family to our property rights by issuing an injunction restraining the Town, and "all persons claiming under" the Town from entering upon the Ferran's land. The Order further directed the Town to erect signs indicating the road is private. The Town disobeyed the terms of the Court's Order for many years. The Town Board still wanted this road to be open for snowmobilers and lumber harvesters and purported to appeal the Order and the Injunction, in order to automatically Stay its execution against the Town and "persons claiming under" the Town. Then my father was killed, by a heart attack shortly after the Town declared its intention to appeal the Supreme Court's Order. The Town Board later voted to continue the appeal for three years without ever intending to perfect its appeal. During that malicious appeal, we were deprived of the protection of our injunction, and a timber harvester entered onto the road on our land, claiming under the Town, and irreparably damaged the road and our land, bridges, and trees. It took over ten years to be free of patently lawless claims by that Town. Next, the Town attempted to landlock our property by depriving us of our right of access over the real public highways leading to our private lands. During a subsequent inquest, certain Grafton Town officials claimed they had have never read the Highway Law of the State, and others, who claimed they had read the law, demonstrated that they had no actual knowledge of the clearly established and relevant legal rules. A controversy which should have been over in 1978 within 15 minutes of picking up a law book, instead took years of painful litigation, which killed my father, during which persons unlawfully entered plaintiffs' land claiming under the Town, in violation of the terms of the Court's order. After my father died, I began to study law, at the age of 16, when my mother brought me to the New York State Library to read McKinney's statutes with her. Later, my family sought injunctions and damages against these Grafton Town officials in Federal Court, but there we were subjected to a Federal Judge who is so ignorant and unknowing of the Law of the Land, that he does not even know that there is a distinct Due Process of Law prohibition in the Federal Constitution.

Lawless Officials in the Town of POESTENKILL, Rensselaer County, NY

Similarly, in the rural Town of Poestenkill, (in the same County) the Town Highway Superintendent went onto a parcel of private land owned by my late father in the Town, and suddenly declared unlawfully that the dead-end private single-lane driveway on the edge of that parcel was a "public highway" based upon the absurd and false premise that it had "been used by the public as a highway." At all times previously, this land and driveway had only been used by one resident as a private deed easement, for ingress and egress to the garage it terminated at, and had been taxed by this Town and assessed to my father as wholly private property. Despite the obvious private nature of this roadway, the Highway Superintendent proceeded to unlawfully pave and WIDEN this narrow private driveway, consuming a portion of our adjacent private lands without consent of the owner. Many years later, the Town purported to name this private driveway "Henderson Lane." My mother and I sued this Highway Superintendent and other Town Officials in Federal Court, claiming that they had in this manner deprived us of family property without due process of Law. On March 18, 1999, the Federal District Court decided: "Notwithstanding defendant's claim that [this driveway on the edge of plaintiffs' land] is a public user highway, this Court finds that the road, running adjacent to Plaintiff's property, is the private property of Plaintiffs Mark and Nadia Ferran. Defendants to the present day, however, claim that ... Henderson Way is a public user highway. At some time in 1985, without Plaintiffs' approval, Henderson Way was ... paved by the Town. During the 1985 []paving, the Town paved some additional fifteen feet of Plaintiffs' land beyond the previously paved road. ... The alleged act of depriving the Plaintiffs of their property without due process accrued as of that time."

Our case against the Town of Poestenkill proceeded upon the sound legal theory that:

[T]o appropriate land not actually in use as roads without the consent of the owner thereof or by due process of law compensating the owners therefor ... would be taking real property without due process of law in violation of the Federal and State Constitutions.

Van Allen v. Town of Kinderhook, 47 Misc.2d 955, 263 N.Y.S.2d 491 (1965) (quoting Jones v. Cederquist, 1 Misc.2d 1020, 150 N.Y.S.2d 121 (1956))

The Town and its Highway Superintendent physically violated and interfered with our private property rights under color and pretense of Highway Law § 189, which states in pertinent part that "All lands which shall have been used by the public as a highway for the period of ten years or more, shall be a highway." Their claims to and entries upon our narrow dead-end private driveway, not shown on any map, made under pretense of this statute, deviated from the clearly established meaning and limits of the statute.

It is clear that the legislative intent in enacting § 189 of the Highway Law was not to authorize the Town Superintendent to appropriate land not actually in use as roads without the consent of the owner thereof or by due process of [Highway] law [§ 173].

Van Allen v. Town of Kinderhook, 47 Misc.2d 955, 263 N.Y.S.2d 491 (1965) (quoting Jones v. Cederquist, 1 Misc.2d 1020, 150 N.Y.S.2d 121 (1956)).

The Federal District Court determined that Town of Poestenkill's claims that our dead-end private driveway was a "public highway" was invalid and contrary to Law, and that its entries and its summary appropriation of additional adjacent lands were not authorized by the Law of the Land. Thus, we were in fact deprived of our property, by government agents acting outside of due process of law. Before deciding to sue these officials, my mother complained of this obvious illegality to the Town Supervisor, and asked him to make the Town leave her property alone. She said to him: "You are not supposed to take my property without due process of law." His response to her objection is typical of the mentality of virtually every government official in the County of Rensselaer, N Y, and other places. He replied:

"YOU AND YOUR DUE PROCESS OF LAW!"

Town Supervisor, Richard Amadon, Town of Poestenkill, Rensselaer County, New York, United States. 1988.

Because of this lawless attitude, with an actual contempt for our most basic Constitutional rights, the Town defendants refused to withdraw from our property, even though they knew or should have known that they had no lawful authority to enter or remain there, and therefore we were forced to commence a lawsuit to try to be rid of them.

Similarly, in 1990, this same Poestenkill Town Highway Superintendent ordered his highwaymen to secretly enter plaintiff's other private lands abutting on an old two-lane public highway, named Cropsey Road, with heavy machinery to unlawfully divert a stream onto and across my mother's adjacent land. Her land was enclosed by an ancient stone wall fence, and contained a cottage where my parents lived, and my mother gardened, before I was born. The Town's highwaymen came with heavy machinery, without our knowledge, and unlawfully tore open and destroyed a ten foot section of the stone wall fence with heavy machinery, and then dug a 40 foot long trench three feet deep and over three feet wide across our yard until they reached the other side of the property, where they tore an even larger hole into the tall stone wall fence on that side. They also installed a culvert under the old roadway to divert water from a stream on the other side of the road onto and across our land. Then, when my mother demanded in writing that the Town must pay damages for this permanent physical appropriation of her property (Highway Law § 148) they acted like common thieves, and denied having anything to do with the culvert, excavations and damage of her land and fences. Under the Law of the Land in the State of New York, the Highway Superintendent had no lawful authority to enter of do these things without first obtaining the consent of the owners, or having a specific authorization from the Town Board accompanied by their commitment to pay all damages sustained by the entry. (Highway Law Sec. 148). This highway superintendent and his highwaymen had neither permission, warrant, nor authority to enter and damage this land as they did. The Federal District Court decided: "As far as Plaintiff Nadia Ferran's second parcel of land at issue, the Cropsey Road property, it is apparent that during the summer of 1990 a culvert running underneath the public highway adjacent to plaintiff's land was in fact constructed ... which ... resulted in damage to a section of the stone fence located on one side of the Cropsey Road Property. In addition, Plaintiffs have further produced evidence that a three foot wide, approximately three feet deep, and thirtyseven feet long channel or trench was constructed through Plaintiff Nadia Ferran's land from the end of the culvert at issue to the beginning of another stone fence on Plaintiff's land. At the location where the channel or trench ends, a ten feet by four feet section of a second stone fence has been displayed and damaged. Defendants deny responsibility for the Cropsey Road property culvert, channel or trench, and damage to both stone fences. ... This Court finds that Defendants were in fact responsible ...." The Town defendants made no attempt to prove that they had obtained lawful authority by complying with the conditions and regulations prescribed by Highway Law sections 147 and 148 before entering and destroying and depriving her of her property. Instead they acted stealthily, and unlawfully, like common thieves. Therefore, these government agents clearly deviated from or acted outside of Due Process of Law because they failed or refused to "keep within the authority conferred, and observe every regulation which the act makes for the protection or in the interest of the property owner." Chicago, Burlington &c. R'd v. Chicago, 166 U.S. 226, 241 (1896). These defendants certainly did not keep within any "process due according to the law of the land."

Despite the clear facts and the Court's incontrovertible findings that these defendants had deprived us of our property outside of any process of Law, and even though the District Court had determined that the Town's entries, appropriations, and claims to our private property were unlawful and outside of and beyond any law purporting to legalize deprivations, the District Court has failed and refused to vindicate and enforce our Constitutional Right to enjoy and possess our property without undue governmental interference. After the District Court determined that the defendants had deprived us of our property outside of any process of law, the Court absurdly purported to "dismiss" our case on the grossly erroneous grounds that our constitutional rights were not violated. The Trial Court's decision strangely failed to cite or take notice of the controlling precedent in Ferran v. Town of Nassau, 11 F.3d 21 (2d Cir. 1993). Instead, the District Court cites an unpublished opinion of the other local District Judge,Scullin, whose persistent confusion of the rights of "Due Process" with "Just Compensation" was condemned and repudiated by the Federal Court of Appeals in Ferran v. Town of Nassau, 11 F.3d 21 (2d Cir 1993). I am convinced that the busy Trial Court did not read the memorandum of law which I submitted at the close of the Trial in the Poestenkill case. The District Court concluded:

"Let this Court be clear. There is merit to Plaintiff's claim that Henderson Way is their private property and that the Town constructed the Cropsey Road culvert and accompanying trench at issue. Because, however, Plaintiffs have not availed themselves of State procedures to obtain Just Compensation for the Town's actions involving both the Henderson Way property and Cropsey Road property, their TAKINGS claims must fail.. . because their takings claims are premature and must ... be dismissed."

Federal District Court, Ferran v. Town of Poestenkill, (NDNY, No. 91-CV-1090, March 14, 1999) to be vacated, or reversed at ____ F.3d ____ (1999), upon the authority of Ferran v. Town of Nassau, 11 F.3d 21 (2d Cir 1993) and the principles explained herein.

The most obvious problem with this Trial Court's descision is that we did not assert any Fifth Amendment "Takings/Just Compensation" claim at trial- because it was clear that the defendants acted wholly without lawful authority, in violation of our distinct Constitutional right declared by the Due Process of Law Clause. We demanded, and proved our entitlement to an injunction restraining the Town defendants from continuing to enter, control, or claim any right in, our private property. We claimed, AND PROVED, two "Deprivations" of "Property" which occurred outside of the "due process of law" - not merely two lawful and proper "Takings" of our Property for Public Use for which just "Compensation" would be a sufficient remedy. The District Court's denial of such relief on such erroneous grounds is a reversible error of Law, if the Constitution will be enforced. We are now seeking to have the District Court reconsider its mistake of Law, or we will likely have to appeal for reversal on the same exact issues and matters of Law that we prevailed upon in Ferran v. Town of Nassau, 11 F.3d 21 (2d Cir 1993). The principle to be vindicated is that government agents who purport to carry out their functions by committing intentional and unlawful deprivations of property (or of life and liberty) are subject to punishment by Acts of Congress, and are subject to the jurisdiction and condemnation and injunctions of the Federal Courts, regardless of the existence of any "State procedures" which might be available theoretically for obtaining "damages" or mere "Compensation." If this is not the case, then the ancient rights declared in the Fourteenth Amendment, and in the Bill of Rights, are now reduced to a mere farce, Congress is impotent to protect us, and we are now subject to the absolute rule of lawless rulers, and we have no common defense other than the force of arms. The Town of Grafton and Town Poestenkill are not the only local governments who employ highway officers and other officials who are disposed to unlawfully and repeatedly violate the property rights of citizens. The Town of Nassau now has the dishonor of being internationally notorious for employing officials who violate the Constitutional rights of persons who own property abutting supposed public highways.

Lawless Officials in the Town of NASSAU, Rensselaer County, NY

26. In the Town of Nassau, Rensselaer County, NY, an individual living near the Ferrans' camp in a small subdivision on Burden Lake became Town Supervisor. At this Town Supervisor's request, the County Highway crew entered upon my family's land and put in a trench 75 feet long and cut down trees on our land without our consent and without any lawful authority and delivered this wood to the home of this Town Supervisor and his friends for their personal consumption! A friend of this Town Supervisor desired to use another parcel of plaintiff's property in wholly inappropriate ways, (for burning trash, storing firewood) and for cutting trees without plaintiffs' consent. My mother obtained an Order of Protection from the Nassau Town Justice against him restraining him from re-entering and committing these trespassory acts. Immediately thereafter, the Town Supervisor induced the Town Attorney to declare that the plaintiff's entire parcel including grass, and old trees, and the land under the woodpile and under the burning barrel was "Town Property" and "Public Domain" under the pretense that it had become a "public highway" by operation of Highway Law § 189. My mother protested that the land she claimed was being misused by her neighbor had never been "used by the public as a highway for ten years" (nor at any time) as is expressly required by Highway Law § 189. Then the Town decided to interlope into the wholly private matters concerning the source of our legal title to the land my family had been paying taxes on for over thirty years. The local Town Justice and local Police ignored the written (Highway) Law and applied the Town's "Town Property" Policy Declaration as if it were the Law of the Land. We were practically deprived of the Order of Protection, and of all other protection under of the Law. Consequently, when my mother discovered this friend of the Supervisor cutting down trees on land she is taxed and assessed as the owner of, and