The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

‘Subject to the Jurisdiction Thereof’

When did states begin issuing birth certificates? And why are these documents now required in various legal contexts? I was born in Atlanta, Georgia — the exact hour and minute were recorded, along with my birth weight — but my grandparents had no such documentation when they were born in the late 1800s and early […]

Historical Analogies and the Current Crisis

Here’s a question most people have never pondered: Why did the North fight the Civil War? The way history is taught, the focus is on slavery and the South, and the motives of the Confederacy are subjected to critical scrutiny in a way that the Union side of the controversy is not. If you start […]

Why Have Liberal Judges Suddenly Become Second Amendment Absolutists?

Judge Melissa Logan Bellows presides in Circuit Court of Jefferson County, Kentucky, which is to say, Louisville, a community torn by racial conflict ever since the Breonna Taylor shooting. During the 2020 election, Joe Biden won only two counties in Kentucky, and Jefferson was one of them. Although judicial elections in Kentucky are officially non-partisan, […]

Do Bananas Grow in Colorado?

Is it a crime to vote Republican? Is it illegal to disagree with liberals? Will all opposition to the Biden regime be banned? The Colorado Supreme Court ruled Tuesday in a 4-3 opinion that the Constitution’s “Insurrection Clause” prohibits former President Donald Trump from appearing on the ballot for the presidency in 2024. “The court […]

Magna Carta and Alvin Bragg

“The failure of our education system to teach America’s young people their own history,” I wrote nearly four years ago, “is perhaps best illustrated by the fact that almost no one under 40 today knows anything about Sam Adams except as a popular brand of beer.” And many have suspected that this historical ignorance is […]

Inheriting a Legacy of Liberty

In his monumental Reflections on the Revolution in France, Edmund Burke goes to some length to demonstrate how the principle of inheritance operated in English law. The young person to whom he addresses his lecture — which began as a correspondence — seemed to have been deceived by those who contended that the English constitution […]

Why Have Democrat-Controlled Schools Become Such Cesspits of Racism?

The headline phraseology is borrowed from Glenn Reynolds who, in a different but related context, calls attention to the concurring opinion of a judge on the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals: “I write separately to express my views on the topic of hate speech, disturbingly present in both the facts of the case before the […]

How to Get Yourself Shot

Say hello to Steven Joaquin “Zhoie” Perez (a/k/a “Furry Potato”), a transgender YouTuber who specializes in “First Amendment audits.” You may not have heard of this phenomenon: People who record videos in public places — post offices, municipal buildings, etc. — in order to test {“audit,” as they say) the police response. These self-declared “auditors” […]

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