Say Anything Blog

The City Council of Canton, Ohio has decided its citizens should be fined, then jailed if they do not keep their lawns clean-cut.

Reminds me of getting jailed in East Grand Forks, MN for having a trashy car in your yard.

http://www.cantonrep.com/index.php?ID=413006&Category=9&subCategoryID=0

This is an Op-Ed I just recently wrote for the Grand Forks, ND Herald.

Wow, I never thought I’d see the day in America where its citizens are getting sent to the slammer simply based on the appearance of their own vehicle- which they rightly own as their own piece of private property. But today was that today; in the Wednesday, May 14th edition of the Grand Forks Herald comes the article titled, “EGF to Crack Down on Junk Cars - City to threaten offenders with fines, jail time, and confiscation.” Basically, what is going on is that any law-abiding citizen (aka an offender) with a junk car in East Grand Forks - meaning rusty cars, beaten-up old ones, flat-tired cars, pickups and trailers used as dumpsters as displayed on a EGF Police Dept. Slideshow (according to the article)- is subject to a crackdown that includes fines, confiscation and even time in jail. This is ALL because it is an inconvenience for other people to lay their eyes upon such ugly ducklings. This whole crackdown is similar to something called Eminent Domain, a recent federal law that allows any American city to bulldoze over their citizens’ homes in favor of economic development.

If you still don’t see it and you’re still asking what the problem is, it is this- this is one of the most un-American things I ever heard of and a clear violation of the 5th Amendment of the Bill of Rights, which states: 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. Besides the fact that there simply is no law in East Grand Forks against owning an ugly-looking car (nor should there be), it is not remiscent of a free society. I don’t care if every single lawn in that entire town hosts an ugly vehicle that’s missing a tire or two, it is NOT an excuse to threaten the liberty and property of its citizens simply out of mere inconvenience. Finally, I conclude with this, in all things American: What is America? I’ll remind you: it is more than just a piece of land. It is solidly built upon an IDEA. We are everything with this idea and nothing without it. This revolutionary idea is the U.S. Constitution. Don’t forget it; stand up for it.