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WHAT IS A CITIZENS RIGHTS AS AN EXCON?
Bootleg
Member Posts: 21 ✭✭
What's the difference in "Rights" between a citizen who is an excon and a citizen who is not? What law gives the government the right to
permanently take away certain rights from an excon without a judge proscribing the rights be taken away? When has an excon ever been taken to court to have his civil rights stripped away permanently?
When has an excon ever been arrested and prosecuted on any law that
specifically says since they are excons they must now go to trial to
fight for their right to keep all their civil rights?
In American law, ONLY a JUDGE can proscribe penalties against a citizen and only after being allowed a trial by his peers and only for
specific charges brought against him. How then can an excons rights be stripped away if he has never been in front of a judge for a charge of possessing civil rights illegally? What law exists that states certain civil rights exist only for certain people?
I've been convicted of several felonies and not once during sentencing has any judge ever said I was to loose any of my civil rights as part of my sentence! If no judge has ever stripped my rights as part of any criminal sentence they gave me, how then can I not still have them?
Furthermore...why does my wife and children also loose some of their civil rights simply because they are part of my family even though they have never committed any crime????
Are excons having their civil rights taken WITHOUT due process and without equal protection the true intent of the Bill of Rights and the Constitution? Or should all rights be restored after an excon pays his debt to society like they have always been throughout our history? Since an excon is still a citizen, then what kind of citizen is he under our Constitution that states all citizens have equal rights? If the government can arbitrarily take most of an excons rights away without due process, can they then take one or more rights away from other groups of citizens as they see fit thus making
a layered level of citizenship with only certain groups enjoying full
rights? Either they can do this or they can't according to the Constitution. If they do it to even one group of citizens...excons, then are they not violating the Constitution? Are all American citizens "EQUAL" the Constitution and is that not the intent of those
that wrote the constitution as evidenced by their adding the "Bill of Rights" guaranteeing "Equality" for ALL citizens?
Just as "blacks" were slaves and had no rights even as freemen in the past, even as women couldn't vote till the 20th century, even as the aged and disabled were denied equal rights till recently, so now does one more group of millions of citizens exist that are being uncoonstitutionally denied their birthright as American citizens. This group is the millions of American citizens that are exconvicts and their families! ARE THEY CITIZENS OR NOT? The law says they still are citizens even if they are excons. If this is the case, then under our Constitution, are not ALL citizens equal having equal rights?
If so, then exconvicts are illegally being persecuted and discriminated against along with their families. How would you rectify this?
Nuff Said-
Bootleg
permanently take away certain rights from an excon without a judge proscribing the rights be taken away? When has an excon ever been taken to court to have his civil rights stripped away permanently?
When has an excon ever been arrested and prosecuted on any law that
specifically says since they are excons they must now go to trial to
fight for their right to keep all their civil rights?
In American law, ONLY a JUDGE can proscribe penalties against a citizen and only after being allowed a trial by his peers and only for
specific charges brought against him. How then can an excons rights be stripped away if he has never been in front of a judge for a charge of possessing civil rights illegally? What law exists that states certain civil rights exist only for certain people?
I've been convicted of several felonies and not once during sentencing has any judge ever said I was to loose any of my civil rights as part of my sentence! If no judge has ever stripped my rights as part of any criminal sentence they gave me, how then can I not still have them?
Furthermore...why does my wife and children also loose some of their civil rights simply because they are part of my family even though they have never committed any crime????
Are excons having their civil rights taken WITHOUT due process and without equal protection the true intent of the Bill of Rights and the Constitution? Or should all rights be restored after an excon pays his debt to society like they have always been throughout our history? Since an excon is still a citizen, then what kind of citizen is he under our Constitution that states all citizens have equal rights? If the government can arbitrarily take most of an excons rights away without due process, can they then take one or more rights away from other groups of citizens as they see fit thus making
a layered level of citizenship with only certain groups enjoying full
rights? Either they can do this or they can't according to the Constitution. If they do it to even one group of citizens...excons, then are they not violating the Constitution? Are all American citizens "EQUAL" the Constitution and is that not the intent of those
that wrote the constitution as evidenced by their adding the "Bill of Rights" guaranteeing "Equality" for ALL citizens?
Just as "blacks" were slaves and had no rights even as freemen in the past, even as women couldn't vote till the 20th century, even as the aged and disabled were denied equal rights till recently, so now does one more group of millions of citizens exist that are being uncoonstitutionally denied their birthright as American citizens. This group is the millions of American citizens that are exconvicts and their families! ARE THEY CITIZENS OR NOT? The law says they still are citizens even if they are excons. If this is the case, then under our Constitution, are not ALL citizens equal having equal rights?
If so, then exconvicts are illegally being persecuted and discriminated against along with their families. How would you rectify this?
Nuff Said-
Bootleg
Comments
So there you have it. But I know, not being a felon, myself, I would feel a lot better if prisons were not nearly as inviting as they are, and if a violent sex offense or murder conviction, regardless of any circumstances, was an automatic death sentence with one, read that ....ONE appeal granted. But then, some of what I just printed could only go hand in hand with justice not turning against the citizens like it has. Right Ronnie????
Death to Tyrants!!!
Those who would offer any interpretation that would relegate Amendment II to "relic" status of a bygone era are blatantly stating that the remainder of the Bill of Rights isn't worth a damn, either.
Luke 22:36.
"Is this the kind of protection we receive in return for the "Rights" we give up? Besides, the Sprit of the Times may alter; Will alter. Our Rulers will become corrupt, our people careless. A single Zealot may commence persecuter, and better men be his victims. It can never be too often repeated, that the time for fixing every essential right on a legal basis is while our rulers are honest, and ourselves United."
"It is error alone which needs the support of Government. Truth can stand by itself. Subject opinion to coercion; whom will you make your inquisitors? Fallible Men; Men governed by Bad Passions as well as Public Reasons?"
"Sometimes it is said that man cannot be trusted with government of himself. Can he then, be trusted with the government of others? Or have we found angels in the form of Kings to govern him? Let History answer this question."
From the Declaration of Independence and Jefferson's First Inaugural Address (1801)
(Thomas Jefferson ~ Not - William Jefferson) anyone believing the Founding Fathers were not "God Inspired Sages" would merely testify to the epitome of arrogance as well as Ignorance. Noble men, Wise and Couragous; Feinstein, Franks, Slick Willy, Schmuer, have little or no concept of "The Great Experiment". Wise; They are not, but I will conceed their 'Self serving'.
Have we lost the "Sprit of 76"? I doubt it not. The Founding Fathers put it all on the Line, (they have my undying respect and gratitude). Hypocrites cannot sustain this country of ours, (and the World will eventually hate us for our Hypocracy as we will eventually hate ourselves). "A HOUSE DIVIDED, CANNOT STAND".
Ronnie G. Perkins
Death to Tyrants!!!
Those who would offer any interpretation that would relegate Amendment II to "relic" status of a bygone era are blatantly stating that the remainder of the Bill of Rights isn't worth a damn, either.
Luke 22:36.
quote:I've been convicted of several felonies and not once during sentencing has any judge ever said I was to loose any of my civil rights as part of my sentence!
It is neither the duty nor the obligation of a magistrate to
"instruct" his customers on the vagaries of criminal/civil procedure.
Most public libraries, the internet, etc. have sufficient amounts of
elemental law precepts for most individuals to make an informed judgement....before their command performance in front of the judge.
The reallly sad part of the plight you note is the fact
millions of youth graduate High School without the benefit of even a basic course in the laws by which they must conform
upon receipt of their precious diploma.
Now, that would be a novel lawsuit!
Seems it worked with the tobacco industry.
One aside.
Recently, a convict received a very expensive medical procedure
he would never have been able to afford outside his prison
confines.
Had he been a "free" man, he would also, in all probability, be
rather dead.
Seems the applicable laws require prisoners to be afforded MORE rights in this issue.
Comments?
Ronnie G. Perkins
No.
Kindly explain how knowledge of the CFR you cite would
enrich my existence.
Or how the lack thereof would adversely impact
my overall well being.
Hello Bootleg:
quote:I've been convicted of several felonies and not once during sentencing has any judge ever said I was to loose any of my civil rights as part of my sentence!
It is neither the duty nor the obligation of a magistrate to
"instruct" his customers on the vagaries of criminal/civil procedure.
Most public libraries, the internet, etc. have sufficient amounts of
elemental law precepts for most individuals to make an informed judgement....before their command performance in front of the judge.
The reallly sad part of the plight you note is the fact
millions of youth graduate High School without the benefit of even a basic course in the laws by which they must conform
upon receipt of their precious diploma.
Now, that would be a novel lawsuit!
Seems it worked with the tobacco industry.
One aside.
Recently, a convict received a very expensive medical procedure
he would never have been able to afford outside his prison
confines.
Had he been a "free" man, he would also, in all probability, be
rather dead.
Seems the applicable laws require prisoners to be afforded MORE rights in this issue.
Comments?
I agree with you on many things. The magistrate has no need of instructing the prisoner on the law. I KNEW what I did was illegal and I KNEW the penalty, to which debt to society I have paid in full! But I was 38 years old at that time when I got a 12 year sentence in 87. What I didn't know was as a 18 year old kid raised in the streetgangs of Chicago, that when 4 of us got busted for simple "joyriding" and got convicted of a felony, even though the judge only gave us a years probation as our first offense, that my life would be forevermore affected drastically by that 1st felony conviction. What kid today knows the effect that the loss of civil rights REALLY MEANS? I doubt anyone here except excons knows all the ramifications we live with and how even our innocent spouse and children are also deprived of many of their rights just because we are related! WHAT LAWS DID THEY BREAK to warrent taking their rights? My law abiding close friends also will loose many rights if during their application for a backround clearance, the fact comes out that we are friends. They will then FOREVER be denied a clearance because our friendship will have been recorded in a deep secret FBI file that they can never see, never refute any inaccuracies, never change! So now their rights and those of their families have been secretly stolen also without any "due process", without any "equal protection", without any chance to face their accusers in front of a "jury of their peers" for they had broken NO law of the land by being my spouse, my child or my friend, yet in secret, the government has arbitrarily taken many of their civil rights forever with no opportunity to ever get them back! Tell me.....WHAT OF THEIR STOLEN RIGHTS?
NOW....only within the past few decades have we citizens decided that after an ex con had PAID his debt to society in full, that we would persecute him for life. Before these past few decades, once a felon paid his debt in full, he was allowed the FULL benefits of citizenship and equality again, for he HAD paid society in FULL for his transgressions and his FULL punishment was decided by a Judge in a court of law according to the Constitution. How many American heroes, patriots, politicians and honored citizens from the beginning of our countries history had been convicted of a felony at least once in the past few hundred years? How many Presidents? Generals? Industrialists? Entertainers? Soldiers? Writers? Our Countrys history is RICH with legendary excons in high places for once they had paid their debt to society, society accepted them back with open arms again as equals and they went on to become a great legend and leader in American history.
Let me take you back even furthur in American history, lest you had forgotten, America was once considered a "Penal" dump for all of Englands and Europes criminals and undesireables! A place where felons were exiled to as punishment. Lest YOU FORGET, it was excons that "Discovered America". (read up on ole Chris Columbus' and crews criminal record.) It was ALL FELONS that wrote the Constitution, the bill of Rights, the Declaration of Independence and every patriot that fought in the Revolutionary War of Independence for America WAS A FELON....THAT'S RIGHT!...EVERY SINGLE ONE WAS A FELON! For before that time they were all "SUBJECTS" of "Crazy" King George III of England and he had PROCLAIMED them ALL OUTLAWS, guilty of TREASON and to be HUNG till DEAD when caught!
REMEMBER why John Handcock signed his name so large on the Declaration of Independence???? It was so when King George III seen it he would have no problem reading his name as he pronounced him a traitor and decreed he be hung by the neck till dead! Now King George III WAS the LEGAL Soveriegn and Ruler of the land and had absolute legal authority over all the people in Americas Colonies. Few of todays felons have committed a crime so grievious as did Americas founders....that of HIGH TREASON! That of ARMED INSURRECTION! That unspeakable, worst of the worst of crimes of that era....not obeying the commands of their King! DO YOU NOW REMEMBER THAT AMERICA WAS SET FREE BY CONVICTED FELONS? The very same felons that had damn good reasons to write The Bill of Rights as a document that was meant to forevermore PROTECT the MINORITY against the MAJORITY in future generations. To Guarantee "EQUALITY", "EQUAL PROTECTION", "DUE PROCESS", "PRIVACY", "THE PERSUIT OF HAPPINESS", "RIGHT TO FACE YOUR ACCUSERS IN A TRIAL BY YOUR PEERS", "RIGHT TO BEAR ARMS", "RIGHT TO SPEAK FREELY", etc. etc....
Did YOU forget so quickly that it was the Convicted Felons of that era that fought against all odds and WON your freedom and then wrote the words they hoped would keep America Free for ALL its Citizens?
Lest you need to be reminded again by an event a hundred years later, look at the broken chains around the feet of "The Statue of Liberty"! WHAT DO THEY MEAN? Read some of the WORDS......
``Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she
With silent lips. ``Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me.
I lift my lamp beside the golden door."
Does this sound like it was meant for the Nobles and Lords of the Time
or the Felons, the poor, the exiled, the "REFUSE" of the world?
LOOK BACK IN HISTORY AGAIN....to a time when half our country fought the other half, brother against brother, father against son....
WHY did America tear itself apart down to it's very foundations and almost destroy itself?
LEST YOU FORGET AGAIN.....here's some WORDS....
"That on the 1st day of January, A.D. 1863, all persons held as
slaves within any State or designated part of a State the people
whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States shall
be then, thenceforward, and forever free; and the executive
government of the United States, including the military and naval
authority thereof, will recognize and maintain the freedom of such
persons and will do no act or acts to repress such persons, or any
of them, in any efforts they may make for their actual freedom.
and MORE WORDS....from the "Magna Carta"....
No Freeman shall be taken, or imprisoned, or be disseised 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. We will sell to no man, we will not deny or defer to any man either Justice or Right.
AND FINALLY....THESE WORDS......
"Fourscore and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.
Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation or any nation so conceived and so dedicated can long endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field as a final resting-place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.
But in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate, we cannot consecrate, we cannot hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead who struggled here have consecrated it far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living rather to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us--that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion--that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain, that this nation under God shall have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people, by the people, for the people shall not perish from the earth."
YOU wonder why there's so much crime nowadays? You wonder why half the world hates America nowadays? You wonder why your church allows its clergy to molest your children? You wonder why Corporate executives from Enron can steal billions with impunity? You wonder why
everything you do and say is being surveiled by your government? You wonder why tax breaks go mostly to the rich? You wonder why the government makes you record your gun purchases? You wonder why we cut
medical aid to our seniors and give away 100 billion to countries that despise us? You wonder why you can't believe anything any politician promises? You wonder why you go to jail for spanking a misbehaving child? You wonder why the USA has the highest incarceration rate in the WORLD? You wonder why you should buy 2 more guns you will never use to defend America as our forefathers did from tyrants within?
YOU HAVE NOT LOOKED IN A MIRROR IN DECADES TO SEE THE UGLY AMERICAN YOU HAVE BECOME! It is for this reason that you wonder about all these things for YOU are not Honorable enough to change them as your forefathers had, time after time in Americas History.
You judge me as not fit to be an equal citizen, yet I have paid my debt to society. You allow a fellow citizen and American and his family and friends to be persecuted and denied equality and the American Dream, yet you say you are Christian church going folk that believe in God, mercy, forgiveness, brotherly love? You don't allow me to get a decent job, education, nor have any HOPE of living a normal life for you say I don't deserve to be treated as a human being, nor as a citizen, nor with equality, for you are BETTER than me, ABOVE me, and you will never be proud to call me a friend!
And though as a person that has felt the chains of prison and forced servitude, it is I that must tell you that I am the one that truly knows how valuable freedom is, how much of our freedom and rights we have lost these past few decades and that perhaps if you'll simply shake my hand, I'll stand side by side with you to fight for the America our forefathers believed in, just as convicts have always done in our history, asking no reward other than that of "Liberty and Justice For All!"
BUT-T-T.....Beware! should any man or government try to make me bend my knee as their subject!
For with stick and stone and broken chains,
I will face a thousand rifles!
Nuff Said-
BOOTLEG
All this over the rights of an ex-con?
As far as I'm concerned, ex-cons are no longer in the same class as the average citizen.
If they lose their rights, so what?
"LET THEM EAT CAKE!"
Louis the 14th once said about a similiar situation.
Nuff Said-
Bootleg
The "ONLY" bad thing about owning "A GUN" is...not owning two or more!
I got lost somewhere during that post.I do not believe that your gonna find much sympathy here.While I may understand the theoratical context of what you are saying,wake up ! its not real.You could pettion your govener for amnesty if your record since then is good enough for that.Gov's do this fairly often I guess IF the subjects situation warrents it.You screwed up,thats it pure and simple and all the others in your situation did the same.You gave up a lot it seems...and it sounds as the realization that it just ain't or wasn't worth it has sunk in.Like a naughty child society requires that YOU prove that You are reliable enough and trustworthy enough to warrent our and the goveners trust.You see even if you r a felon there are still steps you can take to change things.Its up tp you to find them and pursue them,not us.