Attorneys involved in prosecuting people under the misused motor vehicle law are violating their ethics regulations, and a district attorney in Lawrence County faces a burning issue in allegedly ignoring notices sent to the grand jury regarding limits in the law.
By David Tulis / NoogaRadio 92.7 FM
Tennessee Rule 8 controls the ethics of attorneys, and district attorneys such as Neal Pinkston in Hamilton County and Brent Cooper in Lawrence County have a duty to deal with the law correctly and accurately, and to act in good faith in representing the law to grand juries, judges and other lawyers, according to these rules.
Abuse of law by DAs and cops widespread in Tennessee.
The motor vehicle laws are intended to reduce danger on the roads and keep men, women, families and other members of the traveling public out of harm’s way. The laws don’t always work.
On May 15 early in the morning in Chattanooga, a tractor trailer rig bearing explosive material caught fire. The effort to put out the blaze blocked Interstate 24 near Lookout Mountain in both directions for hours, sending rivers of cars and trucks up the steep slopes of the mountain to get past the snarl. When the fire was out, a blackened twisted metal frame was all that remained of the trailer.
Commercial trucking is dangerous. Big rigs weighing as much as 40 tons are subject to police regulation in the interest of protecting the general public and other commercial users of the highways and roads across the state of 6.8 million people. The two bodies of law that enforce commerce into the state’s jurisdiction apply to shipping, freight, trucking, busing, carrier lines of business.
They are Tenn. Code Ann. § Title 55, motor and other vehicles, and Title 65, chapter 15, carriers. The highway patrol at law has exclusive jurisdiction enforcing the safety and revenue laws upon transportation, according to the state’s filings of agreement with the government in Washington.
DAs play games with law
However district attorneys such as Mr. Pinkston in Chattanooga and Brent Cooper in Lawrenceburg prosecute noncommercial users routinely as part of the operation of Jim Crow in Tennessee. Jim Crow, a holdover from slave days, operates first against the poor, second against blacks, third against immigrants and finally against everybody else — including you and me.
“Traffic enforcement” is peremptory police power, approved by judicial policy confirmed as recently as October 2017, that reduces the probable cause standard for arrest and functions as a bill of attainder (creation of an arrestable class). Arrest “probable cause” under Title 55 can be an infraction such as having a tag light out or “tinted windows” or failure to use an indicator light.
By such practice, approved by the NAACP in Hamilton County and the churches, African-Americans are routinely harassed, keeping the police-judicial growth industry in good inventory.
Fed up traveler files complaint
In Lawrence County, private businessman Arthur J. Hirsch is filing complaints against Mr. Cooper, alleging violations of standard rules.
Mr. Cooper, he says in a motion before circuit court judge Christopher Sockwell, ignored “true facts and law in favor of the accused, but deceitfully misapplied the law and misrepresented and/or suppressed said facts from the grand jury, thereby maliciously and fraudulently abusing process.” What’s more, Mr. Hirsch says, Mr. Cooper “knowingly, intentionally and in bad faith concealed verified exculpatory evidence from the grand jury in order to get an indictment in retaliation for being sued by accused in federal court in 2014.”
The documents include a notice of fraud and a criminal complaint Nov. 12, 2019, a verified criminal complaint shared with the FBI Nov. 12, 2019, a request for mandatory judicial notice Nov. 15, 2019, Jan. 26 and Feb.7; a motion to dismiss for speedy trial violation and a motion to dismiss; a demand for evidentiary facts against Mr. Hirsch March 4, and other documents.
DA says unaware of filings
“I haven’t seen that,” Mr. Cooper says. “I haven’t seen what the most recent thing is. But, uh. Mr. Hirsch is known for this type of thing, yeah.” Mr. Cooper says he is not sure if he has an active case going against Mr. Hirsch. “If I am prosecuting him, it’s because I’m upholding my constitutional duty, uh, to enforce the laws of the state of Tennessee.”
Mr. Cooper dismisses suggestions that he is not ethically able to handle a Hirsch prosecution.
“I don’t know. Like I said. I haven’t seen any documents or any pleadings that he’s talking about at this time. So I don’t know what he is claiming exactly, because I was named in an earlier lawsuit, but, I mean — again, that would be a frivolous claim, because as we talk right now I don’t even know personally if we have an open case against him. So, if I was biased against him, you would think I’d be aware of any case we had against him.”
Mr. Cooper says Mr. Hirsch is “mentally ill” and that his arguments about the distinction between travel and transportation are frivolous. “I would say that’s a frivolous distinction that Mr. Hirsch or someone has come up with that is not based on any valid legal premise.”
Hirsch, Tulis notice are parallel
Says Mr. Hirsch: “He dishonestly concealed the fact that there were no evidentiary facts of record proving that Accused was engaged in a privileged interstate or intrastate commerce activity transporting people or goods for hire on the public highways by motor carrier/motor vehicle on July 29, 2017, which required him to pay a privilege tax and obtain a driver license, register his pickup truck, or purchase insurance. Had he done so, there would be no case or indictment.”
The Hirsch motion runs closely in the same direction as my police powers reform project in Chattanooga and Hamilton County. That project is to bring a bottom-up revolution to end abuse of the transportation law upon people not involved in transportation.
What follows is from Mr. Hirsch’s review of the limits of Tennessee’s transportation statute. It is the argument implied in Tennessee transportation notice, under which Chattanooga has running its police department the past 827 days. I put Sheriff Jim Hammond under the notice March 1, 2018, or 818 days ago. I put local DA Neal Pinkston under notice March 26, 2018, or 793 days ago.
The Tulis project is a racial reconciliation project in favor of much-abused and harassed blacks, Latinos and the poor, and accounts for the fact that an activist Tennessee judiciary upholds the practice by operation of a crucial legal fiction and is unwilling to hear proper appeal. I propose to end the practice locally, despite the hegemony of the bar, the judiciary, a complicit general assembly and yippy police.
Below is a sum of my 2-year-old effort to restore justice and righteousness to Tennessee. It encompasses the legal realities that will allow lococentric bottom-up reform of “traffic stops” of noncommercial users and ultra vires arrests by departments lacking delegated authority to enforce the regulatory and revenue laws.
Traffic enforcement must obey federal law
1. FACT. COMMERCE ACTIVITY. Interstate and intrastate activity in commerce on the public highways (i.e., “channels of commerce”) transporting people or goods for hire by commercial motor carrier/motor vehicle (i.e., “self-propelled instrumentalities of commerce”) are under the complete dominant power of congress to regulate and control pursuant to the Commerce Clause, Art. 1, Sec. 8, Cl 3, of the U.S. Constitution.
➤ “The [commerce] power vested in Congress . . . is the power to prescribe the rule by which that commerce is to be governed. . .” Gibbons v.Ogden, 22 U.S. 1, Wheat. 1, p. 301-302 (1824); Brown v. Maryland, 12 Wheat. 419) Leisy v.Hardin, 135 U.S. 100, 108
➤ United States v. Lopez, 514 U.S. 549 (1995) “The commerce power “is the power to regulate; that is, to prescribe the rule by which commerce is to be governed. This power, like all others vested in congress, is complete in itself, may be exercised to its utmost extent, and acknowledges no limitations, other than are prescribed in the constitution.” (Quoting from Gibbons v. Ogden , 9 Wheat. 1, 189-190, 196 (1824) (Emphasis added)
➤ United States v. Darby, 312 U. S. 100, 118 (1941) “The power of Congress over interstate commerce is not confined to the regulation of commerce among the states. It extends to those activities intrastate which so affect interstate commerce or the exercise of the power of Congress over it as to make regulation of them appropriate means to the attainment of a legitimate end, the exercise of the granted power of Congress to regulate interstate commerce.” (Emphasis added)
U.S. law controls TN law
2. FACT — TCA TITLE 55 IS UNDER FEDERAL CONTROL. The scope of TCA Title 55 is solely commerce in nature, and is therefore subject to and must be in compliance with all federal commercial motor carrier/motor vehicle (“instrumentalities of commerce”) regulations, including licensing matters, etc.
Examples –
➤ TCA 55-50-504. Driving while license cancelled, suspended or revoked — Minors — Forfeiture —Notice.
“. . . the department shall abide by all federal rules and regulations relative to the issuance, suspension, and revocation of driver licenses and qualification of drivers.” (Emphasis added)
➤ 49 CFR Subpart B – Minimum Standards for Substantial Compliance by States
The rules in this part apply to all States.
§ 384.301 Substantial compliance-general requirements.
(a) To be in substantial compliance with 49 U.S.C. 31311(a), a State must meet each and every standard of subpart B of this part by means of the demonstrable combined effect of its statutes, regulations, administrative procedures and practices, organizational structures, internal control mechanisms, resource assignments (facilities, equipment, and personnel), and enforcement practices.
➤ “[C]ommerce, in the constitutional sense *** embraces shipment *** and *** to carriers engaged in interstate commerce, certainly insofar as so engaged, and the instrumentalities by which such commerce is carried on — *** which has been apparent ever since the decision in Gibbons v. Ogden, 22 U.S. 1, 9 Wheat. 1 (Emphasis added)
DA ‘knew’ transportation a category of travel
3. FACT — TRAVEL vs. TRANSPORTATION PRIVILEGE. COOPER knew but did not disclose to the grand jury that both state and federal supreme courts have recognized two separate and distinct classes of users of the public highways, namely, those exercising a free unregulated right to travel, and those operating by taxable, state granted permissive privilege for which a license, registration and insurance is required, to wit:
➤ Class One (primary users)- those traveling freely unregulated by common law right in the ordinary course of life, business and pleasure in the usual and ordinary conveyance of the day; and
➤ Class Two (secondary users) – drivers, operators and chauffeurs engaged in regulated
interstate commerce activity under taxable permissive privilege statutes (e.g. TCA Titles 55 & 65), transporting people or goods for hire on the roadways by means of a “self-propelled instrumentality of commerce” (i.e., commercial motor carrier/motor vehicle).
➤ “When the privilege ends, the power of regulation ceases.” Munn v.Illinois, 94 U.S. 113, 147 (1876) (Emphasis added)
➤ A public highway is such a passageway as any and all members of the public have an absolute right to use as distinguished from a permissive privilege of using same. Standard Life Ins. Co. v. Hughes, 203 Tenn. 636, 315 S.W.2d 239, 243, 1958 Tenn. LEXIS 229 (1958). (Emphasis added)
Roads belong to people, who have ‘absolute right’ to use
➤ “The business of using the public highways for profit, earned by transporting persons and property for hire, has been definitely excluded from the category of private or personal rights . . . . . .that the primary use of the state highways is the use for private purposes.” State v. Harris, 76 S.W.2d 324, 168 Tenn. 159 (1934) (Emphasis added)
➤ “The right of the Citizen to travel upon the highway and to transport his property thereon in the ordinary course of life and business, differs radically and obviously from that of one who makes the highway his place of business and uses it for private gain in the running of a stagecoach or omnibus. The former is the usual and ordinary right of the Citizen, a right common to all, while the latter is special, unusual, and extraordinary.” Ex Parte Dickey, (Dickey vs. Davis), 85 SE 781. (Also see Hoover Motor Express Co. v. Fort, 167 Tenn. 628 *; 72 S.W.2d 1052 **; 1933 Tenn. LEXIS 71; Thompson v. Smith, 155 Va. 367, 377 (1930)) (Emphasis added)
➤ “The streets belong to the public, and are primarily for the use of the public in the ordinary way.” Packard v. Banton, 264 U.S. 140, 144 (1924) No. 126 (Emphasis added)
➤ “The right to travel is an ‘unconditional personal right,’ a right whose exercise may not be conditioned.” Shapiro v. Thompson, 394 U.S. 618, 643; Dunn V. Blumstein, 405 U.S. 330, 342 (1972) No. 70-13; State v. Stroud, 52 S.W. 697, 698 (Emphasis added)
➤ “The right to travel is a part of the “liberty” of which the citizen cannot be deprived without due process of law under the Fifth Amendment.” Kent v. Dulles, 357 U.S. 116 (1958) No. 481. (Emphasis added)
Heart of police activity: Privilege taxation
4. FACT. PRIVILEGE TAXATION. COOPER knew but did not disclose to the grand jury that only those in Class Two above (i.e., drivers, operators and chauffeurs) engaged in commerce activity on the “channels of commerce” (i.e., public highways) transporting people or property for hire, using “self-propelled instrumentalities of commerce” (i.e., commercial motor carrier/motor vehicle), are required by TCA Title 55 to pay a privilege tax to obtain the state granted privilege to do so, by (1) applying for and obtaining a Tennessee driver license and paying a license fee/tax, (2) registering their self-propelled instrumentality of commerce (comprehensively defined as “motor vehicle”) and paying a registration privilege tax, and (3) purchasing insurance.
➤ “The use of public highways by private intrastate and interstate carriers of goods by motor vehicle may be conditioned by the state upon the carrier’s obtaining a license, complying with reasonable regulations, paying a reasonable license fee and a tax, for expenses of highway administration and maintenance and reconstruction of the highways covered by the license, and upon the filing of an insurance policy as security against injuries from the carrier’s negligent operations to persons and property other than the passengers and property he carries.” Continental Baking Co. v. Woodring, 286 U.S. 352, 365 (1932) (Emphasis added)
➤ Privilege tax. A tax on the privilege of carrying on a business or occupation for which a license or franchise is required. Gulf & Ship Island R. Co., v. Hewes, 183 U.S. 66. Black’s Law Dictionary, 6th Ed., p. 1198
➤ License. Streets and Highways. A permit to use street is a mere license revocable at pleasure. Lanham v. Forney, 196 Wash. 62, 81 P.2d. 777, 779. The privilege of using the streets and highways by the operation thereon of motor carriers for hire can be acquired only by permission or license from the state or its political subdivisions. Black’s Law Dictionary, 6th Ed., p. 920
➤ “The power to regulate commerce presupposes the existence of commercial activity to be regulated. The language of the Constitution reflects the natural understanding that the power to regulate assumes there is already something to be regulated……. As expansive as our cases construing the scope of the commerce power have been, they all have one thing in common: They uniformly describe the power as reaching “activity.”” National Federation Of Independent Business, et al., Petitioners (No. 11-393) v. Kathleen Sebelius, Secretary Of Health And Human Services, 132 S. Ct. 2566 (Emphasis added)
➤ “But we have never permitted Congress to anticipate that activity itself in order to regulate individuals not currently engaged in commerce……,] commerce…..prosecution of those…… not currently engaged in any commercial activity……. is fatal to the Government’s effort to “regulate…” National Federation Of Independent Business, et al., Petitioners (No. 11-393) v. Kathleen Sebelius, Secretary Of Health And Human Services, 132 S. Ct. 2566 (Emphasis added)
➤ “The granting of a license therefore must be regarded as nothing more than a mere form of imposing a tax, and of implying nothing except that the licensee shall be subject to no penalties under [….] law if he pays it.
They were regarded merely as a convenient mode of imposing taxes on several descriptions of business and of ascertaining the parties from whom such taxes were to be collected….Page 72 U. S. 472…But as we have already said, these licenses give no authority. They are mere receipts for taxes…” License Tax Cases, 72 U.S. 5 Wall. 462 (1866). (Emphasis added)
➤ Royall v. Virginia, 116 U.S. 572, 579: “The payment required as a preliminary to the license is in the nature and form of a tax. . .”
➤ ‘Privileges are special rights, belonging to the individual or class, and not to the mass; properly, an exemption from some general burden, obligation or duty; a right peculiar to some individual or body.’ Lonas v. State, 50 Tenn. 287, 307. 06/06/60 Jack Cole Company v. Alfred T. MacFarland, 337 S.W.2d 453, 206 Tenn. 694
➤ TCA 6-55-501. Privilege tax on vehicles prohibited.
The licensing as a privilege of the driving of any motor driven vehicle upon the roads, streets or other highways of the state is declared an exclusive state privilege and no tax for such privilege under any guise or shape shall hereafter be assessed, levied or collected by any municipality of the state.
➤ TCA 55-4-101 (a)(1)(2)
(1) As a condition precedent to the operation of any motor vehicle upon the streets or highways of this state, the motor vehicle shall be registered as provided in this chapter.
(2) The registration and the fees provided for registration shall constitute a privilege tax upon the operation of motor vehicles.
➤ TCA 67-4-101. Privileges taxable — License required. The occupations, businesses and business transactions deemed privileges are to be taxed, and not pursued without license.
➤ “No state may convert a secured liberty into a privilege, and issue a license and fee for it.” Murdock v. Pennsylvania, 319 U.S. 105
➤ Any occupation, business, employment or the like, affecting the public, may be classed and taxed as a privilege. K. & O. Railroad v. Harris, 99 Tennessee, 684. (Emphasis added).
➤ In Tennessee, from the beginning, privilege is a calling or trade, as laid forth in the 1870 case Phillips v. Lewis.
➤ PRIVILEGE. A particular and peculiar benefit or advantage enjoyed by a person, company, or class, beyond the common advantages of other citizens. An exceptional or extraordinary power or exemption. A right, power, franchise, or immunity held by a person or class, against or beyond the course of the law. Waterloo Water Co. v. Village of Waterloo, 193 N.Y.S. 360, 362, 200 App.Div. 718; Colonial Motor Coach Corporation v. City of Oswego, 215 N.Y.S. 159, 163, 126 Misc. 829; Cope v. Flanery, 234 P. 845, 849, 70 Cal.App. 738; Bank of Commerce & Trust Co. v. Senter, 260 S.W. 144, 147, 149 Tenn. 569; State v. Betts, 24 N.J.L. 557.
5 — FACT. PRIVILEGE TAX RECEIPTS. COOPER apparently did not explain to the grand jury that a driver license is a tax receipt to engage in the business or occupation designated, and a license plate/tag is also a tax receipt showing the payment of a privilege tax and permission to conduct a business or occupation in commerce affecting a public interest on the channels of commerce (i.e., public highways) using a self-propelled instrumentality of commerce (i.e., commercial motor carrier/motor vehicle).
➤ “But as we have already said, these licenses give no authority. They are mere receipts for taxes…” License Tax Cases, 72 U.S. 5 Wall. 462 (1866). (Emphasis added)
Can DAs be ignorant of law, misrepresent law?
*** 7. FACT. NO CAUSATION/CONNECTION TO CHARGING STATUTES. Accused’s verified declarations of record and three judicial notices informed COOPER that the TCA Title 55 charging statutes did NOT apply to him since he was traveling privately by right and not by permissive privilege in commerce. Yet, COOPER continued in bad faith to prosecute Accused and lied to the grand jury.
He dishonestly concealed the fact that there were no evidentiary facts of record proving that Accused was engaged in a privileged interstate or intrastate commerce activity transporting people or goods for hire on the public highways by motor carrier/motor vehicle on July 29, 2017, which required him to pay a privilege tax and obtain a driver license, register his pickup truck, or purchase insurance. Had he done so, there would be no case or indictment.
TN creates fictitious driver license
COOPER knew from documents listed in footnote 2 (e.g. verified FBI criminal complaint) that Accused’s alleged “suspended driver license” was fabricated fraudulently out of thin air by the department of safety and homeland security. A copy of the letter from the division of financial responsibility to Accused, received on 07/15/19, admitted that Accused had never applied for or obtained a Tennessee driver license; but nevertheless, the DHS had created a fictitious driver license out of thin air, given it a number and suspended it, making it a class B misdemeanor offense. Obviously, the grand jury never knew this material fact, and the false presumption that Accused was legally liable for a “suspended driver license”was fraudulently promoted.
The indictment fails to allege facts to the first essential element of standing, i.e., injury-in-fact, indicating that COOPER failed to provide facts to the grand jury that demonstrated the state had suffered an injury-in-fact which was “‘distinct and palpable,’…and not conjectural or hypothetical.”6 Further, COOPER pushed for an indictment without identifying and proving to the grand jury that the state had a specific legal right, nor showing a corresponding duty on the part of the Accused, nor giving evidence of an attendant breach of that duty by Accused with resultant injury to plaintiff state.
It would be nice if you could frame this as the constructive-fraud that it is.
Then People might be able to understand why it is conducted against them, as a form of war against them. Then folks might move to eliminate this particular criminal activity from the landscape of Tennessee.
Comment from James McKain:
Read this : https://traffic.findlaw.com/drivers-license-vehicle-info/what-is-the-right-to-travel.html.
The 10th amendment of the U.S. constitution says each state has the duty to create, establish and enforce all traffic laws, if a person operates on a public roadway, in whatever capacity, they are required to maintain possession of a valid drivers license, vehicle registration, and as state law requires it, proof of insurance.
You need to quit bullshitting these people thinking because they aren’t “in commerce” such as driving for hire, they are above the law. No one is. The state of Georgia has over 250 people incarcerated for these offenses, I believe the state of Tennessee might have higher numbers. You can make up whatever interpretation of your constitution or version thereof.
Quit lying to these people. You are wrong!