I've been thinking about this for the past few days.

For each day our nation comes closer to a Fascist Police State America, what if [said servicemember] were to be called up to lock the American people into the FEMA camps... maybe because they spoke out on the street corner, maybe they owned a gun, maybe they refused a National ID card, maybe they refused mercury filled vaccines, maybe because they chose to homeschool their children?

From my understanding, the Constitution of the United States of America, is the supreme law of the land. [said servicemember] swore to protect and defend it, from all enemies, foreign and domestic.

[said servicemember] also understands, in the Military, Active Duty, Reserve, National Guard... Members are required to obey to Lawful Orders.

Now, here is where things may get confusing.. What if, [said servicemember] were instructed to kick down doors in American cities, seize firearms, force mercury filled vaccines (etc).... and [said servicemember] REFUSED?

[said servicemember] refusal to do such things would be legal, because the orders [said servicemember] would have been given would of been Unconstitutional, therefore illegal, and UNLAWFUL?

How would a scenario like this play out?

This message has been edited. Last edited by: MannyTheFresh,

rent The Siege

Congratulations on your recent acceptance into the secret FBI watch list.

quote:

My refusal to do such things would be legal, because the orders I would have been given would of been Unconstitutional, therefore illegal, and UNLAWFUL?

How would a scenario like this play out?

It would ONLY be "illegal" if the courts decided it was. As a human, with decision making abilities, you are always free to "decide" what you will do. However, "you will be held accountable", if your court-martial doesn't agree. You pays your money and you takes your chances. Many have said the Iraq war is "illegal" and are now guests at Leavenworth.

How successful do you think you'd be? My hunch is you would be visiting Levanworth.

quote:

Originally posted by ipscone:

quote:

My refusal to do such things would be legal, because the orders I would have been given would of been Unconstitutional, therefore illegal, and UNLAWFUL?

How would a scenario like this play out?

It would ONLY be "illegal" if the courts decided it was. As a human, with decision making abilities, you are always free to "decide" what you will do. However, "you will be held accountable", if your court-martial doesn't agree. You pays your money and you takes your chances. Many have said the Iraq war is "illegal" and are now guests at Leavenworth.

How successful do you think you'd be? My hunch is you would be visiting Levanworth.

I'm not really talking about Iraq, as our Constitutional rights don't apply to Iraq/Iraqis. Whether the war is constitutional or not, that's probably for a different discussion.

My argument is the Bill of Rights vs. a theoretical situation in our homeland as stated above. I'm sitting here thinking about the Constitution/Lawful orders... seeing as how our constitution IS the supreme law of the land, common sense tells me the supreme law of the land would have something to do with a Lawful order. After all, we all did swear to protect it. But, I'm not a lawyer.

Hey I live 15 minute from the Military Discipline Barracks at Fort Leavenworth, aka Jail. I can come and visit you.... Oh by the way the Federal Pen is next door to the Fort I can visit you there also.

quote:

Originally posted by TomHansen:
Hey I live 15 minute from the Military Discipline Barracks at Fort Leavenworth, aka Jail. I can come and visit you.... Oh by the way the Federal Pen is next door to the Fort I can visit you there also.

You're ignorant.

I'm here talking about the constitution, and you're response is "Well I'll see you in Jail LOL"

If you believe that crap, go lock yourself up for swearing to protect and defend it. Then, you can laugh with all the neocons and globalists and you can just have one big funny party! HA HA.

No. It's not funny. I'm sorry.. I just care about this country. On a serious not-so-funny note.. when is it treasonous to speak of *gasp* the constitution, and the bill of rights?



Mods, Maybe we can't handle this discussion, It'll probably be better off deleted.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: MannyTheFresh,

quote:

Originally posted by MannyTheFresh:
You're ignorant.

Well maybe you are being a little bit ignorant.

People are saying things that you just do not agree with. You want people to give you some "atta-boys" for sticking up for your "principles" and agree with everything you have to say.

The sad truth is just the opposite. You most likely WILL go to jail. Wake up call, nobody gives a sh*t about the constitution anymore or what your perceptions are towards it. You WILL be strung up and burned because you are not being the good little Marine/Puppet that follows orders like every every Congressmen/Senator/Officer/Media Whore wants you to be. That is what can/will/and would happen.

Ok... I realy live 20 minutes from there, not 15. Sorry for the error.....

quote:

But, I'm not a lawyer.

Clearly!

quote:

I'm not really talking about Iraq, as our Constitutional rights don't apply to Iraq/Iraqis. Whether the war is constitutional or not, that's probably for a different discussion.

My argument is the Bill of Rights vs. a theoretical situation in our homeland as stated above.

Yes, and that's what I replied to. You pays your money and you takes your chances. It does not matter what "you" think is "illegal". It ONLY matters what the courts say is illegal. Many have tried to refuse orders because of something "they" said was illegal and all have lost that argument.

quote:

If you believe that crap, go lock yourself up for swearing to protect and defend it.

Lock one's self up for what? YOU are the one conjecturing on "disobeying orders". All we are saying is "you pays your money and you take your chances, if you choose to disobey an order, because YOU think it's illegal". Because, you see, you do not get to make that call. The courts do, and if you are wrong, you'll be visiting beautiful Leavenworth. And I don't mean the one in WA.

I'm not sure what you are even confused about. Everyone here understands very well that servicemen and women have to follow all "legal" orders. Which implies they don't have to follow "illegal" ones. What's to dispute about that? YOU act like we don't understand that.

But we DO. What we are saying is one better know the law and be 100% sure whether or not an order is legal or not, or they will be finding a stay at Leavenworth in their future.

Let's look at one of your examples. Say you are ordered to knock down my door and take my firearms. My hunch is, without much thought on your part, you might say was illegal. But are you sure? These kind of issues are trickly legal issues. You don't know what kind of law the person who gave the order was relying on. We see cases all the time where we think something is illegal, only to later find out it was legal. The opposite is true also. We see cases where someone follows orders only to find out later that the order was illegal.

So, here is the bottomline

• If you refuse to follow a "legal" order, you might be visiting Leavenworth
  
• If you follow an "illegal" order, you might be visiting Leavenworth
  
• If you refuse to follow an "illegal" order, you might be court-martialed, and exonorated or you might get caught in a catch-22 and still be in Leavenworth
  
• If you follow a "legal" order, you should be good to go

What's not likely going to happen is you being given an "illegal order" and you "refuse" and everyone says, "it's ok, he was just refusing our illegal order".

If you are given an "illegal" order, you are likely going to be up sh**creek for a period of time, regardless of what you do.

Anymore questions?

quote:

So, here is the bottomline

• If you refuse to follow a "legal" order, you might be visiting Leavenworth
  
• If you follow an "illegal" order, you might be visiting Leavenworth
  
• If you refuse to follow an "illegal" order, you might be court-martialed, and exonorated or you might get caught in a catch-22 and still be in Leavenworth
  
• If you follow a "legal" order, you should be good to go

What's not likely going to happen is you being given an "illegal order" and you "refuse" and everyone says, "it's ok, he was just refusing our illegal order".

If you are given an "illegal" order, you are likely going to be up sh**creek for a period of time, regardless of what you do.

Anymore questions?

Ha. Sounds good to me,

With the exception that I'm only a former jarhead, and not subject to the UCMJ anymore. (hence theoretical) So, instead of Leavenworth, could I request a vacation in the Bahamas?

(Please note, the point of this thread was not to announce to everybody that I am a treasonous Marine rebel with malicious intent... but to talk about something that you see in the movies, something that may or may not be in our future)

OK, call me whatever but, you kick my door in and try to drag me somewhere or inject me with something and you better be ready to meet your maker.

Ken

Something that you see in the movies...tell that to the citizens of New Orleans that had there guns seized following Katrina.

quote:

Oh by the way the Federal Pen is next door to the Fort I can visit you there also.

I'll still come and Vist ya.....

There are some good points made related to your scenario. If I recall correctly many things take place before an order is given to do what you wrote about.
First there is a "Warning Order" issued by the person that is going to direct your scenario. He/she was given the order to conduct the mission by the next rung higher up in the chain of command.
Lets say that I am your Platoon Commander, I gathered the Squad Leaders and gave them a warning order and every thing else that takes place up until we fall in as a platoon to do the mission.

The Platoon Sgt, Guide, Squad Leaders, Fireteam Leaders, any one else in the platoon, all had the opportunity to ask questions regarding every aspect of the mission.

As far as I know, from my experience in every leadership position above as well as XO, CO in a "Line Company", there was never a time that we voted as to whether or not the order was legal or illegal.

I will say that you, in whatever position you were in in my Platoon, did not bring up the issue, then I am going to assume that all of us are going to complete the mission as assigned.


Then we will say that during the mission, as someone stated in their post, that you better come to my door prepared to get shot. All of a sudden you have to make the decision, as per you scenario, to obey or disobey.

Now you need to help me out here. What are you going to do? I will tell you what I am going to do, in any of the above leadership positions, if you refuse to carry out your orders.

I am going to shoot the person that displays a danger to any of my troops, including a danger to you.

Then we complete our mission, return to our base camp, then me, you, your leader, are going to have some words of endearment.


But if you obeyed your last order first on the mission you are home free. Who knows maybe the platoon did not allow you to make it back to base camp because the bad guy killed the Marine next to you. The ball is in your court. What do you say now? Semper Fidelis. Blackcoat. BTW, your question was a very good one.

If you are acting under the authority of a government entity - a military service branch or a civilian agency - and are doing so in accordance with official policy and within the scope of your duties/authority, it is highly-unlikely that you will be held accountable criminally for the "illegality" of whatever act you committed. The command/agency would generally be on the chopping block before you would.

The flip side is that it's normally not up to the individual in this scenario to decide if his or her actions are "legal", and if they decide to act based on a personal assessment of the situation, they have to deal with the repurcussions from their chain of command, be it prosecution under the UCMJ, getting fired, whatever.

As far as the citizens of N.O. having their guns taken away - this was not the typical NRA scare scenario where Big Government decides to disarm the citizenry of an entire nation, simply to render them useless in the fight against dictatorial power. This was at the point where virtually the only people LEFT in N.O. with firearms were those using them illegally - looters, gang bangers, etc. It was like Christmas for criminals. Not only were they shooting at cops - even cops who were simply engaged in search and rescue operations and NOT anti-looting activities - but they were also shooting at rescue helicopters, boats, and anything they could conceivably shoot at and get away with. So yes, the government confiscated firearms, but there were definately some extenuating circumstances (i.e. 99.9% of the people having their guns "taken away" were not law-abiding at the time).

I was reading this from the original Message:

quote:

From my understanding, the Constitution of the United States of America, is the supreme law of the land. [said servicemember] swore to protect and defend it, from all enemies, foreign and domestic.

'All enemies Foreign and Domestic'

At the very least, we all think we know what this phrase means. But, during the Cold War, when we were fighting the Ideology of Communism, there was the American Communist Party and the Socialist Workers Party right here in the USA. I did not see us shooting Commies in the streets even as we were shooting them in Korea, in Vietnam, or any place else while Our people were dieing at their hands. Perhaps that is because they were never declared an 'enemy' in the USA, and that is the problem with your whole scenario here. There is no enemy unless the GOVERNMENT declares something or someone an Enemy of the People of the United States.

After all, John Kerry was, and is, an Enemy of the United States, but he has not been declared so by the Office of the President, or an Act of Congress, or any other Governmental Body.

Therefore your whole argument falls apart on just that one line.

During WWII, the War Department declared that certain Japanese Citizens of the United States and American Citizens were enemies of the United States 'if they were living in certain areas of the United States', and the people were rounded up and they were put into camps. And that was the way it was.

No one threw down his rifle, and no one revolted, and the declared 'Enemy Agents' of Japanese origin and of the United States were placed behind barbed wire with Solders manning the gun towers and the gates.

Yes! It was a terrible thing to do, but it was war, and they were DECLARED Enemy Agents.

So, what is your point? It is not like we have not done this before? We did it to the American Indians as well! And we have taken land and possessions away from people as part of the Eminant Domain doctrine by a lawful order of the powers that be in the interest of the public.

Should I be given an order to take people into custody, and to place them into camps, that is my social contract with the US Military to do so. I may protest the orders, but I would most correctly have to carry out the order in the manner it was given to the letter of the order.

By the same reasoning, I would make sure that every 't' was crossed, and every 'i' was dotted, and I would continue to ask for clarification of anything outside my orders that was not written into them.

quote:

As far as the citizens of N.O. having their guns taken away - this was not the typical NRA scare scenario where Big Government decides to disarm the citizenry of an entire nation, simply to render them useless in the fight against dictatorial power. This was at the point where virtually the only people LEFT in N.O. with firearms were those using them illegally - looters, gang bangers, etc. It was like Christmas for criminals. Not only were they shooting at cops - even cops who were simply engaged in search and rescue operations and NOT anti-looting activities - but they were also shooting at rescue helicopters, boats, and anything they could conceivably shoot at and get away with. So yes, the government confiscated firearms, but there were definately some extenuating circumstances (i.e. 99.9% of the people having their guns "taken away" were not law-abiding at the time).

Absolute BULLSH/T!!!!! Most of the guns confiscated were from law-abiding people...


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-taU9d26wT4

quote:

After all, John Kerry was, and is, an Enemy of the United States, but he has not been declared so by the Office of the President, or an Act of Congress, or any other Governmental Body.

That is laughable.

Some of you guys crack me up with your cries of "treason" and "enemy of the U.S." talk all based simply on whether someone has a "D" or an "R" after their name.

Are there any Republicans who are "enemies of the United States"? What exactly is your criteria? Let me guess, you are going to say he gave "aid and comfort to the enemy". What about those involved in Iran-Contra? I'm pretty sure many members of the Republican administration were aware that Iran was an avowed enemy of our country at the time we were selling weapons to them. Is Ollie North an enemy of the U.S.? Should Reagan be considered an enemy of the U.S.?

Politicians are politicians. They do what they do to further their own agendas.

quote:

Some of you guys crack me up with your cries of "treason" and "enemy of the U.S." talk all based simply on whether someone has a "D" or an "R" after their name.

A lot of truth to that. However, one major difference is that the examples one uses for the "R"s, actually are for trying to make the U.S. safer and better, while those same examples one cites for the "D"s are about tearing down (apart) the U.S..

It is one of the reasons that conservatives are often called ultra-patriotic while that distinction is never considered as being applicable to liberals.

But you are correct... one's view does depend on whether you are an R or a D.

PS: I really don't think there is such a thing as an I. An I is just an R or D that doesn't like the current R or D that other R and Ds support.