On April 19, 1775, the Battles of Lexington and Concord marked the outbreak of open armed conflict between the Kingdom of Great Britain and its thirteen colonies in the mainland of British North America. They were fought in Middlesex County, Province of Massachusetts Bay, within the towns of Lexington, Concord, Lincoln, Menotomy (present-day Arlington), and Cambridge, near Boston.
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National CP Meeting, Harrisburg, PA April 29 & 30
The National Committee meeting will start Friday morning, April 29, 2011 at 8:30am at the Harrisburg East Holiday Inn. After lunch there will be a short tour of the Pennsylvania Capitol. The Eastern States Regional meeting will convene Friday at 5pm.
The banquet will be at 7pm. Confirmed speakers for the meeting include Sheriff Richard Mack – former sheriff of Graham County, Arizona, and long-time crusader for freedom and individual rights; John McManus – President of the John Birch Society; Dr. Taylor Haynes – Recipient of an unprecedented Wyoming write-in vote; Robert Owens – Chairman Constitution Party of Ohio; and Congressman Virgil Goode – (R-VA 1997-2009)
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Ballot Access Bill in WV House Judiciary
On Monday, January 21, 2011, Taylor County Delegate Mike Manypenny introduced HB 3248 to expand ballot access to any political party which garners at least 1% of the vote for any of their statewide candidates for Governor, Secretary of State, Treasurer, Auditor, Agriculture Commissioner, Attorney General, Supreme Court Justice, President, or U.S. Senator. This would give us NINE (9) CHANCES to qualify the Constitution Party and end all of time and money spent (wasted) on petitioning.
LINK TO BILL: http://www.legis.state.wv.us/Bill_Status/bills_text.cfm?billdoc=hb3248%20intr.htm&yr=2011&sesstype=RS&i=3248
Unlike the Senate version, SB417, this bill does not have any provision to allow party voter registration to qualify the party. Neither bill would extend qualification opportunities to off-year special elections for state-wide candidates.
Both of these bills are in their respective Judiciary Committees. Phone calls are needed to the state legislators listed below to move these bills out of committee. In particular, this house bill would go directly to the floor for a full vote where the Senate version would be sent to the Finance Committee. Please call the following State Legislators and urge them to move HB3248 and SB417 out of the Judiciary Committees:
HOUSE JUDICIARY COMMITTEE (RE HB3248):
Delegate Tim Miley [HARRISON county, 41st Dist.] – Chair, (304) 340-3252
Delegate Mark Hunt [KANAWHA county, 30th Dist.] – Vice-Chair, (304) 340-3392
Delegate John Ellem [WOOD county, 10th Dist.] – Minority Chair, (304) 340-3394
Delegate Patrick Lane [KANAWHA county, 32nd Dist.] – Minority Vice-Chair, (304) 340-3275
Delegate Troy Andes [PUTNAM county, 14th Dist.], (304) 340-3121
Delegate Larry Barker [BOONE county, 18th Dist.], (304) 340-3149
Delegate Bonnie Brown [KANAWHA county, 30th Dist.], (304) 340-3106
Delegate Mike Caputo [MARION county, 43rd Dist.], (304) 340-3249
Delegate Michael Ferro [MARSHALL county, 4th Dist.], (304) 340-3111
Delegate Barbara Evans Fleischauer [MONONGALIA county, 44th Dist.], (304) 340-3169
Delegate John Frazier [MERCER county, 25th Dist.], (304) 340-3396
Delegate Bill Hamilton [UPSHUR county, 39th Dist.], (304) 340-3167
Delegate Woody Ireland [RITCHIE county, 7th Dist.], (304) 340-3195
Delegate Linda Longstreth [MARION county, 43rd Dist.], (304) 340-3124
Delegate Mike Manypenny [TAYLOR county, 42nd Dist.], (304) 340-3139
Delegate Harold Michael [HARDY county, 47th Dist.], (304) 340-3340
Delegate Carol Miller [CABELL county, 15th Dist.], (304) 340-3176
Delegate Jonathan Miller [BERKELEY county, 53rd Dist.], (304) 340-3147
Delegate Clif Moore [McDOWELL county, 23rd Dist.], (304) 340-3189
Delegate John Overington [BERKELEY county, 55th Dist.], (304) 340-3148
Delegate John Pino [FAYETTE county, 29th Dist.], (304) 340-3170
Delegate Meshea Poore [KANAWHA county, 30th Dist.], (304) 340-3248
Delegate Doug Skaff [KANAWHA county, 8th Dist.], (304) 340-3362
Delegate Kelli Sobonya [CABELL county, 16th Dist.], (304) 340-3175
Delegate Danny Wells [KANAWHA county, 30th Dist.], (304) 340-3287
SENATE JUDICIARY COMMITTEE (RE SB417):
Senator Corey Palumbo [KANAWHA county, 8th Dist.] – Chairman, (304) 357-7880
Senator Mark Wills [MERCER county, 10th Dist.] – Vice-Chair, (304) 357-7843
Senator Robert Beach [MONONGALIA county, 13th Dist.], (304) 357-7919
Senator Richard Browning [WYOMING county, 9th Dist.], (304) 357-7807
Senator Karen Facemyer [JACKSON county, 4th Dist.], (304) 357-7855
Senator John Pat Fanning [McDOWELL county, 6th Dist.], (304) 357-7867
Senator Dan Foster [KANAWHA county, 17th Dist.], (304) 357-7866
Senator Evan Jenkins [CABELL county, 5th Dist.], (304) 357-7956
Senator Orphy Klempa [OHIO county, 1st Dist.], (304) 357-7918
Senator Brooks McCabe [KANAWHA county, 17th Dist.], (304) 357-7990
Senator Joseph Minard [HARRISON county, 12th Dist.], (304) 357-7904
Senator David Nohe [WOOD county, 3rd Dist.], (304) 357-7970
Senator Herb Snyder [JEFFERSON county, 16th Dist.], (304) 357-7957
Senator Gregory Tucker [NICHOLAS county, 11th Dist.], (304) 357-7906
Senator John Unger [BERKELEY county, 16th Dist.], (304) 357-7933
Senator Bob Williams [TAYLOR county, 14th Dist.], (304) 357-7995
PHONE CALLS NEEDED – Support S.B.417 & H.B.3248
On Monday, February 14, 2011, three CPWV officers spent Valentine’s Day at the State Capitol Complex in Charleston lobbying for support of Senate Bill 417. Our efforts PAID OFF as House companion bill HB 3248 has just been introduced. See the Featured Articles at left for more details. YOUR TELEPHONE CALLS ARE URGENTLY NEEDED NOW to move these bills out of their respective judiciary committees.
WE NEED YOUR HELP!! PLEASE TELEPHONE THE HOUSE AND SENATE JUDICIARY COMMITTEES
Please call the following state Senators and state Delegates (9am-4pm, at least ask secretary to relay your message) and urge them to support this legislation and put SB 417 and HB 3248 on the agenda and vote them out of committee. A KEY ADDITIONAL BENEFIT OF THIS BILL is that it will increase voter registration and voter turnout by providing more choices for voters. <-SELLING POINT
CPWV Lobbies for Party Qualification Bill
On Monday, February 14, 2011, three CPWV officers gave some Valentine’s Day love to our state legislators by spending the day at the Capitol Complex in Charleston and lobbying for Senate Bill 417. S.B. 417 (LINK: http://www.legis.state.wv.us/Bill_Status/bills_text.cfm?billdoc=sb417%20intr.htm&yr=2011&sesstype=RS&i=417) was introduced earlier in the month by Senator Clark Barnes and would expand political party qualification nine-fold to any statewide office candidate who garnered at least 1% of the vote. Currently an organization of voters only has one (1) chance every four years with one (1) candidate for governor. Additionally, this bill provides a tenth way to qualify the party via voter registration numbers.
Personal Liberty Platform Position Adopted
When America proclaimed that all men are created equal and endowed with unalienable rights, it was a repudiation of the European system of a self-righteous royalty. The people were to assume “the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them.” However, people cannot enjoy life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness unless they are sovereign and government is their servant. Sovereignty is being “the king of one’s castle,” constrained only by righteous laws harmonious with the directives of the Creator. That is why the Ten Commandments were etched in stone in numerous places including the edifice of the U.S. Supreme Court. The prime directive of all government bodies must be the protection of our ordained unalienable rights where the word unalienable is understood to mean incapable of being subject to the stipulations or modifications of a lien – a manmade statute. Thus, the CPWV espouses that personal liberty encompasses but is not limited to the following ten areas:
1) Freedom to express our opinions: Other than reckless endangerment of the physical well being of others such as falsely yelling fire or inciting a riot, and within the standards of community decency, we are at liberty to espouse our views even if others find them objectionable. And, public officials have no authority to limit this speech to some arbitrary zone.
2) Worshiping without interference: The First Amendment espouses freedom “of religion,” and “the free exercise thereof,” not freedom from religion, and specifically applies only to religious establishments which are churches. Reading or use of words such as “God,” “Lord,” “Creator,” or scripture, which is literature, is not a church to be separated from the state.
3) Political freedoms and freedom of assembly: Our freedom of speech, thought, and civil and private action should be unrestricted as to group size. As long as there is no impediment to normal public traffic, no permits shall be required of us to gather anywhere we please. Voter disenfranchisement is to be vigorously combated through the proper application of election laws, and our government servants are obligated to respond to our petitions in a timely fashion.
4) Keeping and bearing arms without infringement: The founders crafted the Bill of Rights, and in particular the Second Amendment, to protect people from the tyranny of oppressive government. It is ludicrous for that same government to reinterpret the wording of these basic rights so as to limit or change their original meaning as they see fit. “Well regulated” simply means trained, not government controlled. “We the people” are the militia.
5) Private property ownership without annual tax: Recurring taxation of an asset is feudal ownership of it and repugnant to “the pursuit of happiness” (originally worded as “the pursuit of property”). In the past, limited government has functioned just fine with revenues from only tariffs, duties, imposts, and one-time sales taxes on voluntary purchases.
6) Being secure in our affects and not monitored, tracked or traced in our daily movements, communications, and associations: We seek a halt to Homeland Security’s unconstitutional intrusions into citizen’s lives without court order. The Real ID Act has created a defacto national ID and must be rescinded. The Fourth Amendment must be respected and upheld in its entirety.
7) Control over our own bodies: People should decide for themselves what nutrients, medical protocols, vaccinations, and medications are in their best interest. Prosecutions of victimless crimes must stop. It is not the government’s job to protect citizens from themselves.
8) Freedom to exercise the sacrament of matrimony as ordained by God without state intervention. We seek a simple return to publicly recorded engagements and marriages, by churches or county clerks, with common law witnesses to satisfy the requirements of basic legal recognition. As Noah Webster’s 1828 dictionary rightfully states, “Marriage was instituted by God himself for the purpose of preventing the promiscuous intercourse of the sexes, for promoting domestic felicity, and for securing the maintenance and education of children.” We seek an end to the perversion of marriage into a commercial system of state-issued privileges through the so-called government third party “marriage license” whereby incorporated “courts” presume the “right” to trespass on families and render control over their children.
9) Raising our children as parents or guardians see fit. It is an awesome responsibility of the family, the foundational unit of society, to decide what is in their own best interest. Only when there is clear criminal behavior resulting in physical injury should a local elected sheriff become involved after sworn affidavit and a judge-issued warrant. The government shall not be involved in a family’s agreed-upon medical protocols for any family members, whether they be adults or children, nor shall it interfere with the family’s responsibility for all educational decisions. The people possess divine rights of nativity irrespective of any State birth certificate ownership claim or the CPS.
10) Freedom to travel and use public spaces: End street assaults against the sovereign people for failing to exhibit a State-issued confession of subject-class citizenship. In place of these, substitute sovereign identification to facilitate safe and free passage throughout the land. Traffic control and roadblocks for revenue generation are detestable and are to be prohibited.
We must jealously guard our liberties. As William Pitt said, “Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human liberty; it is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves.” Likewise, we must heed Benjamin Franklin’s dire warning when he said, “Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both.” Our duty is to know what real liberty is, and to proclaim our resolve to guard, exercise, and if need be, re-establish it.
Community Decency Platform Updated
The voting membership of the CPWV has greatly expanded and updated their platform position on Community Decency at a duly called meeting at Beckley, Raleigh County, January 22, 2011.  This position was originally approved in an abbreviated form at the September 23, 2006 Executive meeting.
John Adams said âOur Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.â To which his cousin Sam added, âWhile the people are virtuous they cannot be subdued; but once they lose their virtue they will be ready to surrender their liberties to the first external or internal invader,â and âif we are universally vicious and debauched in our manners, though the form of our Constitution carries the face of the most exalted freedom, we shall in reality be the most abject slaves.â These sentiments echo those of over a century earlier when John Milton, in his classic novel, Paradise Lost, narrated manâs fall from Grace and subsequent need to be obedient to Gods laws of Holy Scripture. âSo many and so various laws are givân; So many laws argue so many sins,â said Milton.
What, then, is public virtue? It is clear from the writings of our founders that they intended temperance within the bounds of natural law in the establishment of a republican form of government rather than a theocracy. The most promising method of securing a virtuous and morally stable people is to elect virtuous leaders. As such, the CPWV maintains that the State and local governments have the right and legitimate authority to restrict and prohibit obscenity and obscene material in any format and local establishments in accordance with community standards of morality and decency. To wit, we specifically address community decency in the areas of pornography, homosexuality, and gambling.
Pornography and homosexuality are a distortion of the true nature of sex created by God for the procreative union between one man and one woman in the holy bonds of matrimony. They are destructive elements of socity resulting in significant and real emotional, physical, spiritual and financial costs to individuals, families and communities. Until 1973, the American Psychiatric Association correctly regarded homosexuality as a mental disorder, and thus schools and the military have every right to prohibit persons with this condition from their ranks. The same is true for the gender confused. It is abominable that homosexual radicals, aided and abetted by the corporate media, promote this sinful behavior as normal and harmless through the perversion of our language by calling it âgayâ and using the rainbow as their symbol. This is nothing more than deceptive trickery to corrupt the innocent. Homosexuals must be prohibited from adopting children.  Legal marriage is between one man and one woman.
While we fully respect the constitutionally protected right to privacy of consenting adults, all sexually suggestive material must be kept as far away and out of reach from children as possible. This includes the location of menâs clubs, library and store books, and the content of public airwaves. Likewise, while we fully respect the constitutionally protected right to freedom of speech, consideration must be given to undesired exposure to racy public advertising and offensive or suggestive attire and behavior. This includes the appearance of road signs, promiscuous clothing styles and slogans, vehicle decorations, profanity, graffiti, and general blight.
Gambling promotes an increase in crime, destruction of family values, and a decline in the moral fiber of our country. We are opposed to government sponsorship, involvement in, or promotion of gambling in the name of economic development or for any other purpose.
House Bill Says Special Governor's Elections In May and August
House Bill Says Election Days In May and August
ORIGINAL STORY AT: http://www.wvmetronews.com/index.cfm?func=displayfullstory&storyid=42643
01/19/2011
State Capitol
A bill introduced in the House of Delegates Wednesday sets the timeline for a primary and general election for governor this year.
The bill, HB2552, says the primary election will be held on May 14 and the general election August 6.
House Minority Leader Tim Armstead, one of the bill’s sponsors, says the bill would change state code that allows for party conventions to determine the nominees in a special election for governor.
Armstead said during a floor speech Wednesday he doesn’t believe conventions would be the proper way to choose nominees for governor.
“I think it’s so important today, as we move forward, that we determine what our direction will be and we move forward quickly in that direction and I believe that direction should be a primary election,” Armstead said.
Bill supporters say the cost of a primary election would not be prohibitive.
“A convention will not give the people of West Virginia adequate input into this process,” Armstead said.
The bill also sets out to change the current gubernatorial succession language and would require any future state Senate President acting as governor to give notice of a special election within 10 days of the vacancy occurring.
The state Supreme Court handed down an order Tuesday ( COURT DECISION CAN BE READ AT: http://www.state.wv.us/wvsca/docs/spring11/101494.pdf ) that said acting Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin would have to issue a proclamation to have a special election before Nov. 15.
Constitution Party urges special election
January 11, 2011 @ 12:00 AM
The Herald-Dispatch
CHARLESTON — The Constitution Party of West Virginia has issued a resolution urging a special election for governor, according to a release from the party.
Officers of the party voted on Sunday to pass the resolution, citing references to the state constitution. The resolution also “resolves that the acting governor (Tomblin) cannot perform legislative duties while serving as interim governor.”
Senate President Earl Ray Tomblin became governor late last year after Gov. Joe Manchin was elected to the U.S. Senate post vacated by the death of Robert C. Byrd. Tomblin will continue to serve as Senate president, but has said he will not conduct any legislative duties while serving as governor.
The West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals is considering a lawsuit requesting a special election and will hear arguments on Tuesday.
LINK TO ORIGINAL ARTICLE:
http://www.herald-dispatch.com/news/x5953812/Constitution-Party-urges-special-election
Party Calls for Special Election for Governor
By a majority vote of their duly elected officers, the Constitution Party of West Virginia adopted a resolution on Gubernatorial Succession today calling for a special election to replace acting Governor Earl Ray Tomblin. The resolution, shown below, is based on detailed analysis of the West Virginia State Constitution and also addresses the issue of Mr. Tomblin’s attempt to maintain dual legislative offices.
WHEREAS, Article V § 1: Division of Powers, of the West Virginia Constitution states; The legislative, executive and judicial departments shall be separate and distinct, so that neither shall exercise the powers properly belonging to either of the others; nor shall any person exercise the powers of more than one of them at the same time, except that justices of the peace shall be eligible to the Legislature, and
WHEREAS, Article VII, § 4: Eligibility, of the West Virginia Constitution states in part; none of the executive officers mentioned in this Article shall hold any other office during the term of his service…, and
WHEREAS, Article VII § 16: Vacancy in Governorship How Filled, of the West Virginia Constitution states in part; Whenever a vacancy shall occur in the office of governor Before the first three years of the term shall have expired, a new election for governor shall take place to fill the vacancy, and
WHEREAS, Article VII § 2: Election; of the West Virginia Constitution states; an election for governor, secretary of state, auditor, treasurer, commissioner of agriculture and attorney general, shall be held at such times and places as may be prescribed by law, and
WHEREAS, there seems to be controversy in the procedure of filling the vacancy of governor and the permitted duties of the person filling the vacancy, now therefore be it
RESOLVED, by the Constitution Party of West Virginia that an election should be held to fill the remainder of the term of governor because three years of the current term (of Gov. Manchin) have not passed (Article VII § 16). Such election shall be established by law pursuant to Article VII, § 2 by the Legislature, and be it further
RESOLVED that the acting governor cannot perform any legislative duties, while acting as governor (Article V § 1 and Article V § 4 of the Constitution of West Virginia).