The illegal immigration debate could not be any hotter. While JW was protecting the rights of Maryland citizens to stop tuition breaks for illegal aliens in Maryland, on October 14, a federal court blocked provisions of Alabama’s new tough illegal immigration enforcement law from taking effect — at the urging of the Obama Department of Justice (DOJ) — while allowing other provisions to be enforced. At the same time, Arizona’s illegal immigration enforcement law, SB 1070, is expected to go before the U.S. Supreme Court soon (Judicial Watch currently represents the Arizona State Legislature in court and recently filed an amicus curiae brief with the High Court, which began its current term on October 3).

In the midst of this firestorm, Judicial Watch took aggressive action, launching a national television advertising campaign to combat illegal immigration. The purpose of the campaign is to collect petitions from the American people to send to the governors of all 50 states, urging them to obey and enforce all laws against illegal immigration. This campaign to encourage our nation’s governors to stand strong on illegal immigration law enforcement has become more urgent now that the Obama DOJ has decided to sue states for merely trying to protect their citizens from the scourge of illegal immigration.

But it’s not just the federal government that is to blame. Some states have decided to side with the illegal aliens, rolling out the welcome mat for illegal aliens through costly and unlawful sanctuary policies. That’s why we’re going national with this petition campaign. The petition campaign is being driven by a series of television advertisements that began broadcasting this week in California, New Mexico, Oklahoma, and Texas, as well as nationwide on Fox Business News (FBN) and the Military Channel.

In this new national campaign, Judicial Watch asks Americans take a stand on this illegal immigration crisis:

The cost of illegal immigration is a burden on every taxpaying citizen. That’s why Judicial Watch fights hard to hold politicians accountable when they violate and undermine immigration law. Take a stand. Sign this petition and tell your state governor to enforce our federal immigration laws.

The objective of our television campaign is to educate the public and encourage citizens to petition their government in support of the rule of law. Here’s what our petition states (If you’d like to sign off on these principles, then please click here and join our cause!):

(more…)

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

Download Podcast | iTunes | Podcast Feed

On today’s edition of Coffee and Markets, Brad Jackson and Ben Domenech are joined by Francis Cianfrocca to discuss the debt and Tim Geithner’s potential exit from Obama’s cabinet. Then Senator Tom Coburn joins us to talk about his plan to reform Medicare and gives us an inside look at the debt ceiling debate.

We’re brought to you as always by BigGovernment and Stephen Clouse and Associates. If you’d like to email us, you can do so at coffee[at]newledger.com. We hope you enjoy the show.

Related Links:

Tom Coburn and Joe Lieberman’s Impressive New Medicare Reform Proposal
Top Democrats reject new plan to cut Medicare spending
Finally: A pragmatic proposal for Medicare
Senator Tom Coburn, M.D.

Follow Brad on Twitter
Follow Ben on Twitter
Follow Francis on Twitter
Follow Senator Coburn on Twitter

(more…)

Today the Institute for Justice filed opening briefs in our fourth case to appear before the U.S. Supreme Court.

IJ’s first trip to the high court came in 2002 and resulted in a landmark victory for school choice.  We also won our second U.S. Supreme Court case, defending the American ideals of economic liberty and unfettered interstate commerce by striking down a ban on the direct shipment of wine.

Our third case changed America forever.  A local government in Connecticut decided to bulldoze an entire neighborhood and hand the land over to a politically connected private developer.  The law was stacked against the property owners in favor of the powerful special interests.  IJ, defending the property owners, lost in a controversial 5-4 ruling.

This was the infamous Kelo case, and it resulted in an explosion of outrage and grassroots activism all across the country.  Ed Morrissey recently wrote at Hot Air that it arguably set “the stage for the all-out eruption of Tea Party activism a few years later.” This epic battle to protect private property rights, ultimately vindicated by grassroots activists just like you, is one that will never be forgotten:

And now, as children nationwide get ready to begin a new school year, the Institute for Justice is defending Arizona’s innovative scholarship tax-credit program before the highest court in the land.

(more…)

If government is serious about job creation, it should get out of the way of the entrepreneurs who actually create them.

That is the message of a new campaign launched this week by the Institute for Justice—the nation’s leading legal advocate for economic liberty. A series of studies called The Power of One Entrepreneur highlight the tremendous impact that a single entrepreneur can have on their family, employees, community, other entrepreneurs and beyond.

Consider Melony Armstrong of Tupelo, Mississippi.

Melony is an African hairbraider and a mother of four.  She is the owner of Naturally Speaking, a hairbraiding salon that serves her community and has employed dozens of women.  In addition, Melony has taught more than 125 individuals how to braid.

But before she could even open her doors, she had to battle through mountains of red tape. The state forced her to spend 300 hours in cosmetology classes.  And to teach others how to braid, she had to obtain a special license that required over 3,000 hours of additional classes.  Here’s the kicker:  In all of this government-mandating training, she received no actual instruction in hairbraiding.

In August 2004, Melony teamed up with the Institute for Justice to challenge these needless barriers that had the effect of keeping grassroots entrepreneurs just like her from being able to open their own businesses. Less than a year later, her case resulted in a new law that lifted the restrictions, paving the way for hairbraiding entrepreneurship throughout the state.

(more…)

ACORN and its affiliates are content to impose crippling big-government laws, regulations, and taxes on Americans, but when called upon to obey those same rules, ACORN’s network of scofflaws and deadbeats simply refuses to comply.

ACORN and its affiliates currently owe more than $2.3 million in long overdue back taxes to all levels of government.

It's deathly quiet at the former funeral home at 1024 Elysian Fields Avenue, New Orleans. (photo: Kevin Kane)

As of Nov. 11 the exact figure was $2,328,596.95.

ACORN owes money to the IRS, Arkansas, California, Delaware, District of Columbia, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Michigan, Mississippi, New Mexico, New York, New Jersey, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Texas, Washington, Wisconsin, and to the cities of New York and Philadelphia.

(more…)

As Americans rise up all across the country to challenge a political elite that many believe does not listen to them, it is important to consider the tools that people in many states have employed to directly affect change: the petition.

In Missouri, our Constitution includes the following passage:

The people reserve power to propose and enact or reject laws and amendments to the constitution by the initiative, independent of the general assembly, and also reserve power to approve or reject by referendum any act of the general assembly, except as hereinafter provided.  (Article 3, Section 49)

The document  clearly states that the people possess the right to initiate laws and constitutional amendments, even though they grant those same powers to their representatives in the legislature.  This is an important since it permits the people to enact laws directly and without going through the standard legislative process.

Unfortunately, in Missouri and other states where the people enjoy this right, the initiative process is continually under assault from state legislatures—Republican and Democrat alike—even to the point of adopting unconstitutional limitations to them.  Such efforts have included the following:

• A 1969 law in Oklahoma required that petition circulators be state residents.  In December 2008, the Tenth Circuit Court unanimously struck down that law as unconstitutional.  The Court did the same to a similar law in Colorado in 2002.

• A 2005 law in Ohio that restricted petition gatherers from being paid per signature was struck down by the Sixth Circuit Court struck in March 2008.  Ohio appealed the decision but the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear it.  Similar pay-per-signature regulations have been overruled by federal district courts in Idaho, Maine, Mississippi and Washington.

• A Colorado law that required petitioners to wear badges with their name and whether they were a volunteer or paid circulator was struck down as unconstitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1999.

A common argument for limiting the petition process is that it puts too much money into politics or that it invites fraud.  Yet courts have found this not to be the case.  In the 2005 ruling against Ohio, the Court concluded that prohibiting payment per signature would increase the costs and the time necessary to obtain the required signatures. The Court also rejected the evidence that this particular form of payment resulted in fraud.

(more…)

The great OklahomaWatchdog.org is starting to crack open the documents ACORN left behind in the Sooner state:

The internal documents obtained by Oklahoma Watchdog show how focused ACORN was in Oklahoma in 2007 and 2008, leading up to the presidential election.

For instance, a “Power Plan” document begins: “Oklahoma ACORN has been virtually non-existent since its glory days in Tulsa, over 20 years ago. 2007 is Year Zero.”

The document continues, noting that Oklahoma ACORN, in 2007, was looking towards a five-year plan to obtain power and that is the key term – power – that is evident is this particular document.

Note: “Therefore, the route to power is twofold: First, build powerful city organizations in Oklahoma City and Tulsa that can control these municipalities. Second, become an influential organization by shaping a handful of strategic legislative districts that, by themselves, can change who controls the state legislature.”

(more…)

From The Oklahoman:

A Republican state legislator released documents Tuesday which he says show the community-organizing group ACORN focused on helping Democrats in three legislative races in the November 2008 election and had developed a game plan to “take power” in Oklahoma within five years.

The documents, which include legislative district maps and various forms, were recovered from computers abandoned by ACORN workers in Oklahoma City, said Rep. Mike Reynolds, R-Oklahoma City. Also found was a script apparently used in Houston to go door-to-door to encourage voters to vote for Barack Obama in November 2008.

“They say they’re not political, but one of the subdirectories was called political action plans,” Reynolds said. “It was their political plans to take over key targeted races in Oklahoma City to show how powerful they are.”

Read the whole thing here. Oh, and be sure to check Big Government often in the coming days for LOTS more on this story…