Quiz: Obsolete Law - Civil Disobedience - Authoritarian Rule

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SUGGESTED BINGE WATCHING – FICTIONAL DRAMA ON THE EAST GERMAN STASI

One of Yours Truly’s character flaws is that he adores Whodunnits, especially the zillions of different TV series produced by MHz Choice set in various European cities and featuring English subtitles so that you can brush up on your foreign languages.

Second confession???

Binge watching for the first time ever!!!

The Weissensee Saga is a “Romeo and Juliet” series featuring two East German families 1980-1990, one of which is high-echelon Stasi (the East German counterpart to the Soviet Union’s KGB).

Though you wouldn’t believe the machinations and corruption as the 3 Stasi (father and 2 sons) both threaten, and cover up for, each other and the rest of their extended family, while they also both threaten, and cover up for, the two-member dissident family.

[Stasi, Sr., is the long-time lover of the dissident mother and Black-Sheep Stasi Son becomes the lover of dissident daughter without knowing about the senior relationship.]

Yours truly prides himself in being cynical (which he calls “realism”), but even he was shocked!!! Even though all of the shocking events are entirely believable!!! Especially the reactions of every ordinary citizen when suddenly confronted with evidence gathered while s/he was unexpectedly surveilled, usually vis-à-vis contact with an investigation target!!! Because, of course, s/he knows that s/he is about to be blackmailed with a long-term prison sentence unless s/he becomes a Stasi informer!!! Whether or not s/he knew anything about the objectionable activities of the target!!!

Direct TV is currently (4/28/2017) half-way through the existing 18 episodes (a fourth season is scheduled to begin soon).

But you can start at the beginning and binge-watch all 18 episodes for free!!!

In other words, do NOT order from Amazon.com the DVD’s for each of the first 3 seasons for $22 each.

INSTEAD, sign up for a 7-day free trial for MHz Choice on Amazon.com AND you can binge-watch all 18 episodes AND THEN CANCEL BEFORE the $7.99/month charge kicks in.

JSK - 4/28/2017
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johnkarls
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Joined: Fri Jun 29, 2007 8:43 pm

Quiz: Obsolete Law - Civil Disobedience - Authoritarian Rule

Post by johnkarls »

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FIRST SHORT QUIZ
Obsolete Law vs. Civil Disobedience vs. Authoritarian Rule


1. Was Yours Truly a “Guinea Pig” during his first year of law school?

2. Did the Civil Rights Movement prompt Harvard Law School for the first time to treat two of the four sections of the entering first-year class during the Fall of 1964 as “Guinea Pigs” by substituting for Agency Law in the long-standing prescribed first-year curriculum (which also included Torts, Contracts, Property, Civil Procedure, etc.) a brand-new experimental course entitled “Development of Law and Legal Institutions”?

3. Did “DLI” as it was known, focus first on obsolete law?

4. Was Exhibit A the Los Angeles criminal ordinance which was still on the books in 1964 from the “horse and buggy days” that if you are driving a “horseless carriage” (car, truck, etc.), you must be preceded by a servant on foot who is ringing a bell warning of your approach and, if at night, the servant must also be bearing a lantern?

5. Since most political jurisdictions have no mechanism for identifying obsolete laws and revoking them, is this Los Angeles criminal ordinance still on the books?

6. Are such obsolete laws occasionally (or perhaps even often) used by politicians to persecute opponents and groups of which they disapprove?

7. Did “DLI” then focus on Civil Disobedience?

8. Was Exhibit A for Civil Disobedience the then-long-forgotten “Dorr Rebellion”?

9. Was one of the original 13 American States the former English Colony of “Rhode Island and Providence Plantations” (hereinafter “RI&PP”?

10. Did the 1663 Royal Charter creating RI&PP provide that the English Monarch would appoint a Royal Governor and that the Royal Governor would appoint from among the general population individuals to serve in a Royal Legislature?

11. After the American Revolution (1765-1783) succeeded, did RI&PP continue to operate under the 1663 Royal Charter with the sole modification that the legislature appointed by the Governor would, going forward, elect the Governor, but the Governor would continue to appoint the members of the legislature -- with no popular elections for anything?

12. Did this state-of-affairs continue until John Dorr’s Rebellion (1841-1842)?

13. During the short period leading up to Dorr’s Rebellion, did John Dorr and his associates petition what we will call, for ease of identification, the Royal Governor and the Royal Legislature, to hold a Constitutional Convention for the purpose of drafting a “democratic” constitution that would be subject to ratification by a popular election?

14. As a footnote, should it be noted that these questions are based on Harvard Law School’s 1964 version of Dorr’s Rebellion? And that current-day politically-correct history revisionists describe Dorr’s rebellion as an attempt by “middle class landowners” (rather than “democratic” forces) to take over the Rhode Island government -- conveniently ignoring the fact that all “democratic” governments of that day not only required citizenship to vote (which several modern-day court decisions no longer require) but also limited the franchise to male landowners?

15. Did the Royal Governor and Royal Legislature tell John Dorr to get lost?

16. Did John Dorr then issue a public call for an Unofficial Constitutional Convention that proceeded to meet and propose a democratic constitution?

17. Did John Dorr and his associates then petition the Royal Governor and the Royal Legislature to hold a general election to decide whether to adopt their constitution?

18. Did the Royal Governor and Royal Legislature tell John Dorr to get lost?

19. However, now in “full panic mode” did the Royal Governor and Royal Legislature quickly draft an Official Constitution for approval in a popular election that did little more than remove the word “Royal” from the 1663 Royal Charter wherever it appeared?

20. At the Official Election was the Official Constitution resoundingly defeated?

21. At an Unofficial Election a week later, was the Dorr Constitution overwhelmingly approved?

22. At the Unofficial Election in which candidates ran for the to-be-created offices, was John Dorr overwhelmingly elected Governor and were his associates overwhelmingly elected as the members of the legislature?

23. Did John Dorr and his associates then petition the Royal Governor and the Royal Legislature to vacate their governmental premises?

24. Did the Royal Governor and the Royal Legislature tell John Dorr and his associates to get lost? That their election was unofficial so they were mere trespassers and would they please vacate the premises?

25. Did John Dorr and his associates then plan an armed rebellion against the Royal Governor and the Royal Legislature?

26. However, did they as a precaution think it prudent to capture the State Armory as a first step?

27. Did U.S. President John Tyler promise Federal Troops to protect the Royal Governor and the Royal Legislature?

28. Were 2,000 armed men to support John Dorr promised by Tammany Hall (the legendary NYC federation of labor unions whose headquarters was located on 17th Street half a block east of the plaza where Park Avenue and Broadway cross paths as both head south, as a result of which the plaza is still called “Union Square” to this day)?

29. Was U.S. President John Tyler’s promise controversial because Section 4 of the U.S. Constitution provides: “The United States shall guarantee to every state in this union a republican form of government, and shall protect each of them against invasion; and on application of the legislature, or of the executive (when the legislature cannot be convened) against domestic violence.”?

30. After all, wouldn’t President Tyler’s action, if successful, guarantee Rhode Island a ROYAL NON-DEMOCRATIC form of government?

31. And wasn’t the “domestic violence” that he was seeking to quell, aimed at toppling Rhode Island’s Royal Governor and Royal Legislature?

32. On that fateful day in 1842 when the attack on the Rhode Island State Armory was scheduled to occur, had both President Tyler’s Federal Troops and Tammany Hall’s 2,000 armed men failed to materialize?

33. Were all of the wives and sweethearts of John Dorr and the members of his armed force left at home weeping and wailing that the rebellion might fail and their men might then be executed as traitors?

34. Did John Dorr fail to appear on the bluff overlooking the armory where his troops were assembled for reasons that were not explained in our DLI materials?

35. Without John Dorr to fire the first cannon, did his armed rebellion fizzle?

36. Did John Dorr immediately flee to New Hampshire where he knew that his good friend, the New Hampshire Governor, would refuse extradition to Rhode Island for prosecution as a traitor?

37. Did the Royal Governor and Royal Legislature, now realizing that they were once again perched on a powder keg, hold a new Constitutional Convention that, in effect, proposed a document identical to the Dorr Constitution that had been unofficially ratified by the unofficial election?

38. Was the new Constitutional proposal then overwhelmingly approved at an official election?

39. Did John Dorr then return to Rhode Island to a tumultuous reception?

40. HOWEVER, were the Royal Governor and Royal Legislature still in office until a new election could be organized to elect a Democratic Governor and Democratic Legislature?

41. So did the Royal Governor interrupt John Dorr’s tumultuous reception to arrest him for treason?

42. Was John Dorr then prosecuted for, and convicted of, treason against Rhode Island’s Royal Government?

43. Once more realizing that he was perched on a powder keg, did the Royal Governor try to pardon John Dorr?

44. Did John Dorr refuse the pardon on the grounds that accepting a pardon would constitute an admission of guilt for which he was being forgiven?

45. As their last official act, did the Royal Legislature and Royal Governor pass a law that provided that John Dorr had NOT been guilty of treason?

46. Did our DLI course teach the BGO (“Blinding Glimpse of the Obvious”) that leaders of all Civil Disobedience (whether armed revolution or merely a rally for which a permit has not been granted) have to be prepared for whatever consequences, including criminal penalties, might be imposed for failure?

47. And did our DLI course teach the BGO that just because your political cause fails and you are criminally prosecuted and convicted -- does NOT mean that your political cause was NOT just?

QUESTION FOR THE SECOND AND THIRD SHORT QUIZZES --

48. Is there a difference between the Civil Disobedience of John Dorr, the Civil Rights Movement and Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) in her War Against President Obama, on the one hand -- and on the other hand, the criminal “leaking” of classified information by our Intelligence Services to eliminate from our Democratic Government whomever displeases them?

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