A teenager who lives down the road from you does a great job mowing your lawn. You engaged him last summer for the second year to chop and trim your yard.
Once last year you lent him your car to go for fuel after his mom dropped him and his mower off, and he’d come with too little gasoline.
By David Tulis / NoogaRadio 92.7 FM
But now something’s happened that makes you question your high view of him.
An hour ago he took your car out on the road and was gone — with a friend who had stopped by on a bicycle — for an hour. He’d taken the key for the car, hanging on a peg by your garage door, and absconded.
Your calling 911 may lead to someone being killed by an officer. But you’re upset enough to think that Eddie has taken your car without your permission and is presumably on a joyride with his chum.
What office might Eddie be charged with having committed?
Not taking another person’s motor vehicle. But taking another person’s automobile.
Physical object vs. legal conclusion
Every motor vehicle is a car or truck. But not every automobile ;or truck is a motor vehicle.
So, what’s the big deal about trivial distinctions? Motor vehicle? Car? Automobile? All the same — right?
No. And the distinction is the basis upon which I have put city and county under Transportation Administrative Notice Tennessee — to halt abusive police practices against members of the public, especially those people looked out for by Dr. Elenora Woods and the Hamilton County NAACP.
Eddie violated a common law protection inscripturated into the Tennessee code that states the following:
39-14-106. Unauthorized use of automobiles and other vehicles — Joyriding.
A person commits a Class A misdemeanor who takes another’s automobile, airplane, motorcycle, bicycle, boat or other vehicle without the consent of the owner and the person does not have the intent to deprive the owner thereof. [Emphasis added]
In the effort to reign in Jim Crow in Chattanooga and across Tennessee, we are honing in on the difference between objects and legal concepts.
A car is an object. An automobile is a Legal conclusion, a statutory fiction collar a kind of corporation..
A motor vehicle is a conclusion of law. A motor vehicle is a car or truck or other mode of travel that has been converted by the process of registration into an instrumentality of commerce, either intrastate or interstate commerce. A motor vehicle, at law, is a commercial motor vehicle. Same thing.
The continuing drag against the people of Tennessee — and across each of the 50 American states — is the gateway of abuse. That is the transportation code in each state. From use of such laws, police and sheriff’s deputies gain their way against the people, whether in a “war on drunk driving” or the “war on drugs” or the “war on unsafe driving.”
Cars and autos are used by a free people. Motor vehicles asre used by people under privilege, in commerce, for private profit and gain on the people’s roads.
Sue cop as oppressor, defend self in traffic court: Transportation Administrative Notice
