The powerful case against lawless government has uncovered a sly effort by a judge and government lawyers to wreck a powerful legal remedy used to keep state actors in line and make them obey the law.
By David Tulis / NoogaRadio 96.9 FM
The remedy is called “writ of mandamus” and is a spoiler of mis-government and maladministration. I am seeking a mandamus writ to compel Gov. Bill Lee to obey the Tennessee health law and end the abuse of emergency powers under the Covid-19 fraud. Gov. Lee violated the state law in creating an emergency that lasted 615 days and effectively overthrew the constitutional, republican form of government in a state of 6.8 million people.
In a case sandbagged by chancery court 201 days in Chattanooga and now before the court of appeals at 505 Main St. in Knoxville, I argue that the writ must issue to compel obedience to Tenn. Code Ann. § 68-5-104, the six rules in which require the governor and his agents to make a “determination” as to the cause or source of the CV-19 contagion — that of the complex of symptoms called or SARS-CoV-2.
I am suing Gov. Lee and the local health administrator, Becky Barnes, who retired during the proceedings, seeking relief from a chief executive who says he “will consider temporarily reinstating this tool [emergency rule]” in the face of “any future surges” in cases.
The scam by attorneys for the respondents and Judge Pamela Fleenor in chancery court is to pretend that members of the public cannot apply for the writ of mandamus unless they show personal harm arising from the alleged violation.
All round, in chancery’s view, I am in court on a fool’s, having no injury, no facts, not alleging an injury, unable to meet chancery’s stated requirement that I “prove” facts of injury. Fleenor says relator “failed to allege that he suffered a particularized concrete injury in fact” as to Gov. Lee and “only alleges generalized grievances *** not justiciable” as to Mrs. Barnes, a longtime nurse in Hamilton County. The private prosecutor “can prove no set of facts in support of his claim that would entitle him to relief” as to Lee has no “extraordinary damage beyond the rest of the community” as to Mrs. Barnes — and since I “failed to allege he suffered a personal, concrete injury, then Relator has no act of the Governor to challenge, nor is there any injury for this Court to address” as to Lee.
I fought that claim in chancery court, creating a record of 584 pages covering four hearings — and I fought it as if it were true. The judge and lawyers raised a high test I had to prove — personal harm, and I argued I had proven it. Chief among my five claims to harm were two near-arrests, one in the county courthouse as I was covering a case and I was thrown out for having a bare face.
The test was a false one, wholly imaginary and not rooted in any of the Tennessee mandamus jurisprudence.
The court is being invited by respondents into a con job against the people of Tennessee and their rights, and the relator is here to put a stop to this misadventure by insisting that his petition for equity and writ of mandamus (p. 8 ff) be properly and justly considered. The jurisprudence of the writ is clear: Standing in a mandamus case does not come from evidence of relator’s harm, but by (1) his signature on the duly sworn affidavit of support and (2) the affirmative legal duty imposed on the public official by positive law.
It is not outcome determinative that I as the relator have personal injury to sue. Personal concrete harm and particularized injury to relator — or alleged lack thereof — are not available to respondents as a defense in a mandamus suit. Judge Fleenor upheld and put forth a perversion of the mandamus doctrine and appears to intend that the court of appeals set precedent on a novel argument.
That theory is that mandamus is not available to the people of Tennessee for crime, malfeasance, misfeasance, official misconduct and breach of oath unless the relator shows and proves concrete particularized harm.
Judges don’t change laws
In a reply brief to the court of appeals, I suggest that the lower court is trying to get the judges to redefine mandamus doctrine downwards. That is, to weaken the powerful writ so that it becomes nearly impossible to use by others. The court’s orders are effectively an attempt to rewrite the mandamus law judicially.
Laws are changed in Tennessee by the people in general assembly, not by judges such as the Hon. Fleenor.
The lower court proffers the court a draft piece of judicial legislation to reduce the power of mandamus as a remedy for official misconduct and abuse.
The theory published by the lower court is a fraud on the court.
It has no basis in law.
It appears to be a concerted effort among the parties in this case to knowingly use a false issue to reduce the public’s mandamus rights and due process via an appellate court ruling declaring relator’s cause fails on grounds of no subject matter jurisdiction because no concrete, specific particular injury is perceived to give him standing.
Petition has all the essential elements for the writ of mandamus. The lower court has subject matter jurisdiction over respondents.
The lower court refuses to rule on the merits of the case. It repeats the respondents’ frivolous counterattack upon the relator by the distraction over standing. It takes advantage of relator’s non-lawyer background and imperfect expression to mislead the court and him. It forgets the main point in a mandamus case.
And that is, injury to the law itself.
Injury to the law
It’s a relief to know that your standing in this super powerful remedy is not whether you, the citizen, have been personally harmed.
Your standing is your notarized signature on a petition, or in a separate affidavit, the latter required in Tennessee. Your standing is in your right to have the official you are suing to obey the law. You have a right to honest government services. In Lee’s duty reside my rights as your personal and private prosecutor.
In the case State ex rel. David Jonathan Tulis vs. Bill Lee, governor, et al, no argument should EVER have been made that I had to have standing.
in a filing, I cite other cases, where no test is argued over relator’s personal harm as qualifying him to sue.
➤ One files petition for writ of mandamus as a “resident citizen and taxpayer of the city of Memphis” demanding right to inspect the city’s books, State v. Williams, 110 Tenn. 549, 75 S.W. 948, 950 (1903). No duty on part of relator to show personal harm or injury.
➤ In a mandamus case to obtain a license, the duty of the licensor is the controlling issue, and relator is not obligated to show how denial injured or harmed him if he fulfilled requirements of the application. “It must be shown that a clear legal duty to issue the license, not involving discretion, is enjoined by law” on the official, “that there is statutory authority for the performance of the act, and that the performance of the duty has been refused.” AmJur 2d. Mandamus § 196 — Legal duty to issue license.
➤ A relator who sought mandamus under the Acts of 1921 for a county to pay the premium on his official bond does not prevail because “[h]e does not show in his petition that he has kept an account of fees or made a statement to the Chairman of the county court, or made a semiannual settlement in which he paid to the county fees derived from the excess above the maximum salary allowed by the act.” Absent completion of duties, he lacks standing for a writ to compel performance because “[i]t was incumbent upon petitioner to affirmatively show a clear and not a doubtful right to the writ of mandamus” Jellicorse v. Russell, 3 Smith (TN) 411, 156 Tenn. 411, 1 S.W.2d 1011. The relator’s right is premised in the Acts of 1921, and each party’s obedience thereto.
➤ “The question, who shall be the relator, in an application for a mandamus, depends upon the object to be attained by the writ,” says James L. High in A Treatise on Extraordinary Legal Remedies (1874).
Where the remedy is resorted to for the purpose of enforcing a private right, the person interested in having the right enforced must become the relator. He is considered as the real party, and his right to the relief demanded must clearly appear. The stranger is not permitted officiously to interfere, and sue out a mandamus in a matter of private concern. But where the object is the enforcement of a public right, the people are regarded as the real party, and the relator need not show that he has any legal interest in the result. It is enough that he is interested , as a citizen, in having the laws executed, and the right in question enforced. *** The object of the suit is not a matter of individual interest, but of public concern. Any citizen of the county, especially of the locality interested in having the improvements prosecuted, could become the relator, and obtain the mandamus.
P. 305, footnote, citing Judge C.J. Treat, Pike Cty. Comm’rs v. People ex rel. Metz, 11 Ill. 202, 207–08 (1849) (emphasis added)
‘Bad faith’ piles up in Tennessee fraud
My reply brief, reaching the judges’s hands in Knoxville on Dec. 1, says Judge Fleenor and the respondents have participated in a joint venture.
That is, a fraud against the people.
Upon the facts in the petition, respondents’ answers are deceitful, evasive and admit the case set forth therein. The court accepts evidence of fraud and holds that equity allows fraud to subsist before the court of equity.
The record shows no fact harmful to relator, no defect or lack in relator. No law stands in the way of the issuance of a peremptory or alternate writ or order to show cause forthwith.
Respondent arguments, and the court’s agreement with them, are frivolous and in bad faith.
The petition is evidence of the facts of this case, and the affidavit under the signature rule is presumed proper. No claim is made of it being vexatious, fraudulent or harassing, or that relator is an “officious intermeddler.”
Mass judicial fraud
My lawsuit against the fraud of coronavirus-inspired overthrow of government is the only mandamus on the table in the U.S., I believe.
The case is significant because of its biting honesty. I am doing my own legal work, and am not required to show any reverence to judges as might a lawyer. Lawyers are officers of the court, and are not free to tell the truth about judicial complicity in fraud.
One of my filings includes a notice of judicial department mass fraud. An attorney would never have filed such a report, one that highlights the true state of the law in the U.S. The courts, indeed, are not recognizeable as courts at all, but a sort of legal cartel monopolizing the law and its functions.
Nor would an attorney, while under Judge Fleenor’s bar, have appealed to the supreme court to complain of maladministration and due process violations.
I am an investigative reporter in Chattanooga, at NoogaRadio 96.9 FM, who does his own legal work, and whose daily three-hour report about liberty is full of information about his case and the use of our rights to defend our property and secure the future for ourselves and our posterity.
I don’t have to worry about “practicing law” in front of Judge Fleenor, a Republican up for re-election in 2022.
Judges deny grievance vs. local jurist
My first grievance against Judge Fleenor was by letter and personal visit to the supreme court building in Nashville in which I submitted copies of the court record. The administrative petition was construed as judicial, and denied. Two more filings followed: A detailed analysis of judicial misconduct and a petition as to why the justices should not close the matter by issuing a “mandate.”
If we have any God-given rights, we have to defend them. The mandamus case in Tennessee indicates how that task is to be done. We members of the citizenry learn by doing, and enhance liberty by being belligerent claimants in person.
