Demanding Accountability

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Breaching The Public Trust,
A Question of Honor

By Keith Allison, D.Dn.

I find it interesting that Oran’s Dictionary of The Law holds no definition of “the public trust,” but I’m not surprised, I’m really not certain there is such a thing where politics and the law are concerned. The closest I could come to a definition of public trust was in Webster’s Dictionary where it was described as, “To believe in the honesty, integrity, justice, etc. of; have confidence in, to rely or depend on, to allow to do something without fear of the outcome.” I believe that’s what we’re supposed to be able to expect from our public employees, but it’s certainly not what they deliver. Breach is defined as, “Breaking a law or failing to perform a duty.” Therefore, I assume that breaching the public trust amounts to breaking a law or failing to perform a duty with honesty and integrity, while the public believes that justice will be served because that’s what our public servants are hired to do.

Having had prior experience with government entities, and being involved in the law for more than 30 years now, corruption and bald-faced violations of citizen’s constitutional rights by public employees no longer surprises me. Experience has shown me that government workers care little about those they purportedly work for, and they will breach the public trust for no better reason than they can generally get away with it. Corrupt judges often protect them from prosecution by accepting their claim that whatever they did, they did in good faith. Or, politicians place provisions in a law that exempts all government employees from prosecution if they purportedly enacted and/or enforced a law in good faith. In reality though, their only goal is to win, to come out on top in any confrontation with an irate citizen.

Many times, I’ve watched in amazement as assistant district attorney’s and assistant attorney’s general stand in open court, openly lying to juries and judges alike, just so they can add someone’s scalp to their belt. In short, they’ve turned the law into a contest to see who can win more often, all while watching as the truth is sucked from the court with the stale and rancid air expelled from their lungs. These public employees disobey or ignore the precept of the public trust, and throw honor and integrity to the four winds. Because of this moral lapse, they are, without doubt, some of the lowest, most disreputable and contemptible life forms known to man, because they’ve lost sight of the fact that for one to win without honor, is to have won nothing at all!

It matters not what or whom they’re attempting to defeat, any such breach of the public trust on the part of judges, prosecutors, bureaucrats, or politicians is beneath contempt, and should never be tolerated by the public. There should be some mechanism to enable the public to instantly remove them from their positions of power and authority. The public should not have to tolerate any further potential misfeasance/malfeasance in office from such individuals. They should be removed from public service, and denied any “retirement benefits” they may have accumulated during their time in public service.

Recent news from Spokane, Washington tells how a federal lawsuit has been filed against the Spokane County Jail, because jail officials have been charging anyone booked into their facility a “booking fee” before they had even appeared before a judge, or been convicted of anything. Jailers were keeping up to $89.00 from each suspect’s wallet in order to “recoup rising jail costs.” The lawsuit was filed on the basis that it’s unconstitutional to take anyone’s money without them first having had the benefit of a hearing to establish their innocence or guilt. There is no doubt in my mind that such an act is unconstitutional, as it well should be in anyone’s mind, but it makes me wonder what else these government employees will do if they think they can get away with it.

For anyone who doesn’t believe such activity on the part of government officials is illegal or unconstitutional, I want them to consider the case of City of Memphis v. Winfield (1848), when Justice Turley of the Tennessee Supreme Court struck down an ordinance making it “the duty of the watchmen (police) to arrest any free Negro or slave that he or they may find out after ten o’clock, and lodge them in the calaboose, there to remain till next morning, unless they have a special pass from their master or mistress, if they be slaves, at which time, he, she, or they, if they be slaves, shall receive ten lashes on their naked backs, and a fine of two dollars be imposed on the owner of such slave. If a free person of color, he, she, or they shall be fined the sum of ten dollars, for the use of the city.” Justice Turley held, “This new curfew law is high handed and oppressive, and an attempt to impair the liberty of a free person unnecessarily, to restrain him from the exercise of his lawful pursuits, and to make an innocent act a crime, and to exact a penalty therefore both by fine and imprisonment without trial before any tribunal.” There’s more to the justice’s decision, but in the interest of brevity, I believe I’ve cited enough of his opinion. I see little difference between this case and what the City of Spokane was doing sans the appearance of a defendant before a tribunal.

Another invalid use of a state’s authority, are the numerous times states have deprived individuals of their God given right to practice their chosen craft, profession or calling, when their activity represents little, if any, potential for harm to the public or government. In the 1855 case of Wade v. Halligan, the Illinois Supreme Court held, “there are lawful trades, which are, nevertheless, treated as nuisances in particular places and localities. There is a compatibility and harmony in certain occupations, and the contrary in certain others, and so it is of human actions and conduct. We must exercise common sense, prudence, and a sound and impartial judgment, in passing upon such transactions, and with an anxious view to protect all parties in their just rights, and the profitable and quiet pursuit of their interests. And as held in the Charles River Bridge v. Warren Bridge case, “the exercise of the corporate franchise being restrictive of individual rights cannot be extended beyond the letter and spirit of the act of incorporation.” In other words, “long before the adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment, British and American courts protected many facets of the individual’s right to pursue a gainful occupation against encroachment by the government.”

By 1870, Circuit Justice Bradley wrote, “it is one of the privileges of every American citizen to adopt and follow such lawful industrial pursuit – not injurious to the community – as he may see fit, without unreasonable regulation or molestation, and without being restricted by any of those unjust, oppressive, and odious monopolies or exclusive privileges which have been condemned by all free governments. It is also his privilege to have, with all other citizens, the equal protection of the laws. Indeed, the latter privileges are specified by the words of the Fourteenth Amendment. These privileges cannot be invaded without sapping the very foundations of republican government. A republican government is not merely a government of the people, but it is a free government. Without being free, it is republican only in name, and not republican in truth, and any government which deprives its citizens of the right to engage in any lawful pursuit, subject only to reasonable restrictions, or at least subject only to such restrictions as are reasonably within the power of government to impose – is tyrannical and un-republican. And if to enforce arbitrary restrictions made for the benefit of a favored few, it takes away and destroys the citizen’s property without trial or condemnation, it is guilty of violating all the fundamental privileges to which I have referred, and one of the fundamental principles of free government.”

As Thomas Jefferson stated, “Laws are made for men of ordinary understanding and should, therefore, be construed by the ordinary rules of common sense. Their meaning is not to be sought for in metaphysical subtleties which may make anything mean everything or nothing at pleasure.”

Ladies and gentlemen, these principles apply to each and every American citizen; our nation is, after all, a republic, not a democracy. It matters not whether a person is a farmer, rancher, manufacturer, doctor, lawyer or Indian chief; no non-government organization, tree hugger, government official, judge, politician, or business entity has the constitutional authority to deprive anyone of their right to earn a living if they are not harming others.

Knowledge is the key that unlocks the shackles of bondage.

© June 2005 – All Rights Reserved

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