EMINENT DOMAIN

Chuck Klein

In wartime Germany, Martin Niemoller (1892-1984), issued a warning that most of us are familiar with. In it, Niemoller lamented that he failed to speak up when the Nazis came first for the trade unionist, then the Jews, Catholics, and others. And, finally, when they came for him there was no one left to speak up. A modern day parallel might read:

When they came to Waco, Wounded Knee, Ruby Ridge I didn't speak up because I wasn't one of them. Then they came for the gun owners, but I never spoke up because I don't own any Saturday-night Specials or assault rifles. Now they come, self empowered bureaucracies fronting for constitutionally blind judges - to take my property for another's profit - and I can't speak up because I have no castle from which to speak.

(Posted 24 June 2005)