The Jail and the Law | Eastern North Carolina Now

    Publisher's Note: Jim Bispo's weekly column appears in the Beaufort Observer.

    We keep hearing that things being done by the Anointed One and his administration are "not legal". Of course in our litigious society we hear that about that a lot things. A homeowner's Association enacts a change to their by-laws and it is declared "illegal" by folks who don't like it, and likely have no real idea what they are talking about. Our town council votes to implement some proposal or other and a lot of folks declare the new "law" illegal.. It is generally non-attorney folks who make these assertions. I have never been convinced that they are uniformly correct, and I have always avoided making such assertions. Until now.

    Our County commissioners' ( well, at least the "Feckless Four") vote to build a new jail and their plan is to borrow money to pay for it without first subjecting the notion to the taxpayers scrutiny and approval through a referendum. I rather suspect that anyone who can read (attorney or not) would understand that with the exception of undertakings that are expected to generate enough income to "pay for themselves" state law requires an affirmative vote by the taxpayers before the funds can be borrowed to pay for projects. But not the "Feckless Four".. (That would be the three Dems and the so called Rep who seems to have fallen under their spell). It also represents a majority of the same group that hands out taxpayer money to every charity that shows up at the doorstep but has consistently refused to show us Schedule A of their personal tax return to prove their real commitment to these groups.)

    Taking a page from the Anointed One's play book, they seem perfectly willing to plunge ahead (surely not in an effort to leave a legacy for themselves) with the project - likely because they are very concerned (probably rightly so) that the long suffering taxpayers of Beaufort County would not agree to such a large expenditure to "solve" a problem that has not been shown to exist..

    It would appear that the "Feckless Four" are already spending money on the"jail" project before it is funded. Studies, preliminary designs and the like. Soon they will be able to make the argument that we have so much money already invested in this project that it would be folly to abandon it. That would be the "throw good money after bad" theory of problem solving (without ever acknowledging that problems are of their own making). It is as though that is in the genes of liberals.

    Frequently, out of control politicians (like we seem to have in Beaufort county) will proceed with something in the belief that those who are not happy with their shenanigans will not have "standing" to get them into court for a trial - or will not prevail even if they do have standing. Of course if they are dragged into court, they will be reaching in the taxpayers' pockets to pay for the County to defend their seemingly illegal action.

    A few years ago the Congress enacted a law which gave the Prez. line item veto authority. A lot of the populace supported the legislation. Not included in that group was Senator Robert Byrd (D-WVA: RIP). He spearheaded an effort to have the law declared unconstitutional. For all these years, I have believed that he and his small group of dissenters were successful. They prevailed in the DC District Court but the Supreme Court decided that the Senators lacked "standing" and that took care of that. Their suit was "booted". It wasn't until later that the law was declared unconstitutional.

    The following is from a Wikipedia Article entitled "Line Item Veto Act of 1996".

    "Main article: Line Item Veto Act of 1996"

    Presidents of the United States have repeatedly asked the Congress to give them a line item veto power.[citation needed] According to Louis Fisher in The Politics of Shared Power, Ronald Reagan said to Congress in his 1986 State of the Union address, "Tonight I ask you to give me what forty three governors have: Give me a line item veto this year. Give me the authority to veto waste, and I'll take the responsibility, I'll make the cuts, I'll take the heat." Bill Clinton echoed the request in his State of the Union address in 1995.[9] Congress attempted to grant this power to the president by the Line Item Veto Act of 1996 to control "pork barrel spending", but in 1998 the US Supreme Court ruled the act to be unconstitutional in a 6 3 decision in Clinton v. City of New York. The court found that exercise of the line item veto is tantamount to a unilateral amendment or repeal of only parts of statutes authorizing federal spending, and therefore violated the Presentment Clause of the United States Constitution. As a result, it appears that a federal line item veto will only be possible through amendment of the US Constitution. Prior to that ruling, President Clinton applied the line item veto to the federal budget 82 times.[10][11]" (emphasis added)

    As an aside we can only wonder whether the unilateral changes the Anointed One makes to his signature legislation (and others) every time he senses a political advantage from the change fit into the general parameters of the Supreme Court decision on the line item veto issue...(i.e. unilateral amendment or repeal of only parts of statutes..)

    Hopefully, someone (or a group) in Beaufort County will have "standing" to bring suit against the County in order to rein in the "Feckless Four". If a majority of the folks want a new jail and indicate in a referendum that they are willing to pay for it (presumably through higher taxes) then we should have a new jail. Otherwise perhaps we should make do with what we have - which reportedly meets the state standards for such a facility.

    When inmates (and "sob sisters") complain about the quality of the accommodations in a jail, I am always reminded of what the Arizona Sheriff Joe Arpaio says. It goes something like: If you don't like it here, don't do anything that will cause you to have to come back.

    Sounds like good advice to me..

    D'ya think??