Date: Sat, 20 Jul 1996 05:34:06 -0400
From: David Gonzalez <[g--za--z] at [mcs.net]>
To: Multiple recipients of list <[n--b--n] at [mainstream.net]>
Subject: BATF To Clean Up Chicago?

Fellow NOBANners---

Wrote this while Mistress Fran was dodging the whirly-girl, but couldn't 
post it because the list was on the fritz.  Here it be.  Apologies to 
those of you who received individual messages and are now having to sit 
through it a second time (Nothing's changed---hit the "delete" key!).


Permission granted to transmit, reproduce, or distribute as desired, 
providing that attribution is made to the below-named author.

************************************************************************

REPRESENTATIVE BOBBY RUSH CALLS FOR FEDERAL AGENTS TO CLEAN UP CHICAGO

Wheeling, Illinois, 18 July, 1996:

Yesterday (Wednesday, 17 July), Rep. Bobby Rush (D-IL), 1st District 
congresscritter and chronic deadbeat dad, appeared on WJJD's "Ty and Ed 
Show" (Ty Wansley and Ed "Fast Eddie" Vrdolyak) to confirm stories 
that he had been warned by Chicago police officials not to appear at a 
political function being held at an address on South State Street, in 
Representative Rush's own district.  The police, he was told, could not 
guarantee his safety because they had "lost control" of the crime-ridden 
area, where muggings, armed robberies, and gang-related shootouts seem to 
have become an accepted part of everyday life.

According to Rush, the police admitted to him that they can no longer 
control area gang violence, especially in and around the infamous Robert 
Taylor Homes. The Chicago Housing Authority's South Side high-rise 
buildings, which overlook Comisky Park, home of the Chicago White Sox, 
are routinely patrolled by CHA police---a separate law-enforcement agency 
which has jurisdiction in Chicago public-housing buildings and on their 
grounds.  

Representative Rush's response to these admissions was to call upon the 
Clinton Administration to deploy Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms 
(BATF) task forces to the area to "go into the buildings, into those 
apartments, seize those guns, and make the area safe for area residents 
once again!"

Two years ago, the Chicago Police Department was widely criticized for 
conducting "sweeps" of CHA residences to locate and seize weapons, which 
tenants are not permitted to keep on CHA property.  Critics charged that 
the sweeps constituted "unreasonable searches", violating tenant's Fourth 
Amendment rights, despite clauses in rental agreements barring tenants 
from keeping firearms of any type in their apartments.

Ironically, the CHA residents themselves had called for the sweeps and 
were disappointed when a court enjoined the police from continuing the 
searches, agreeing that they did, in fact, violate 4th Amendment freedoms.
Apparently, CHA tenants had become so fearful of gangs and gang-related 
violence that they were willing to forego their constitutional protections 
and subject themselves to police "fishing expeditions" in an effort to 
attain a modicum of safety, no matter how short-lived.

Now Representative Rush, citing those discredited sweeps, is seeking 
federal assistance in the enforcement of Illinois statutes prohibiting 
murder, mayhem, and armed violence, along with Chicago ordinances banning 
firearms in CHA residences.  He is asking that the Clinton administration 
send BATF agents into the area to arrest "gang-bangers", confiscate their
firearms, and search their apartments for additional weapons.

Now, I'm not a lawyer (neither do I play one on television), but my own 
reading of the Constitution, as amended, leads me to believe that John 
Magaw's BATF shock troops have no authority in CHA high-rise buildings, 
even if residents possess firearms in violation of local ordinances.  In 
order for the BATF to claim jurisdiction, there would have to be 
reasonable cause to believe that *federal* firearms laws have been 
violated.  To date, there is no compelling evidence that such a situation 
obtains.  All the murders, robberies, muggings--even though committed by 
people using firearms--are violations of Illinois state statutes. 

Such fine points of constitutional law, however, mean little to a 
committed statist such as Bobby Rush, whose record as a state legislator 
leaves little doubt that his default position is for more and bigger 
government.  His idea of welfare "reform" is more and better-funded 
programs to benefit his South-Side constituents, many of whom depend upon 
subsidies.  It is perfectly natural, then, for Representative Rush to 
expect federal shock troops to usurp state authority to enforce its own 
statutes, even though they lack jurisdiction.

Remember, though, that every time a rider or amendment prohibiting *this* 
type of sight or *that* type of magazine is attached to some obscure piece
of federal legislation addressing trade policy, we step that much closer 
to handing John Magaw's ninja-suited wannabes the authority to enter our 
homes and seize our guns---authority they currently lack, even though they
routinely attempt to arrogate it.  Right now, Bobby Rush is grasping at 
straw men---a few more such riders, however, could turn those straw men 
into the Rhodes Colossus. *Quo vadis?*


                                --30--


David M. Gonzalez
Wheeling, Illinois

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