The New Virginia Plan
THE CALL TO FORM THE VIRGINIA CONGRESS OF COUNTIES
From the Middle Virginia Association of Freeholders May 28, 2020
Fellow Virginian,
As we watched our State Government degrade after several decades from what has now been
discovered as a concerted effort by the Republican Party to hand over the reins of power to the
Democrat Party, many of us sought the reasoning behind why certain parts of the state were not
being offered opposition candidates. Now that we have two decades of successive handing over
of power to one party through means of fraud and election engineering, we finally see the goals of
both of these groups we call, political parties. That is the erasure of our state and our nation.
As we watched the fraud evolve into a complete destruction of what we as Free people call “rights”,
the coming guaranteed blood shed against us becomes clearer by the hour. Those of us who know
our historical roots as Virginians and those who have joined her since 1776 and understand that
the same powers acknowledged by those of whom we call “founders”, are not powers limited by
time or circumstance. They are broad and permanent. They are the powers derived from the Public
Body Politic, also known as “The Public Weal”. The same Public Weal we find Virginia was born
from in our Declaration of Rights, from June 12, 1776.
The people who brought our ideology as “free people” forward, were those who had suffrage in
their time. We Freeholders of the 21st Century are made up of the same kind of people. The people
of suffrage. Today, in Virginia, we are seen to have suffrage if we are citizens of the United States
and are of 18 years of age or older. We Freeholders of Middle Virginia, developed a Declaration
to dissolve our current Virginia Government, that has been in existence since 1970, and call for a
Congress of Counties to be formed to then form a new constitution for our state in the attempt to
return us to our God given freedoms and common sense governance that respects the local
government’s ability to govern from the consent of those who have suffrage.
Our Declaration Committee, decided that rather than try to rewrite the words or the meanings of
our founders, we understood the Declaration of Rights was a template and we instead used it and
the Declaration of Independence from which that document took its powers and used them as an
overlay. If what we considered in our committee to be valid points for a restoration of our rights
through dissolving the current government and starting a new one to avoid bloodshed, then our
Declaration would appear to be prima facia in its presentation and using our founders as the most
acceptable foundation known to mankind, for a peaceful restoration of rights. This is why the
Declaration is of such length as the offenses to our people are so many more than 1776.
An addendum to the lengthy Declaration is a set of guidelines for the choosing of delegates to the
Congress of Counties. Please contact the persons who delivered these documents to you if you are interested in participating.
Your Servants,
Middle Virginia Freeholders.
VCDL Lobby Day 2020
January 20, 2020 in Richmond, Virginia
This is a 6 part series
Part 1. Prelude: Immediately after the 2019 election, Democrats declare war on gun owners and the Virginia political map changes color, from mixed red and blue, to pretty much solid green
THE ALARM WAS SOUNDED, BUT NOT EVERYONE WAS PAYING ATTENTION
VCDL had been screaming to anyone who would listen, that the election in November 2019 was not going to be business as usual. It was going to be absolutely critical, more than ever before, that gun owners support pro-gun candidates and vote.
Unfortunately, too many gun owners either weren't registered to vote, were "too busy" to vote, thought their vote "wouldn't count," or simply were not listening or paying attention to what was going on around them.
Mostly through court gerrymandering, the Democrats squeaked out a win in the election, giving them a narrow, but complete, control of everything. They (and Michael Bloomberg, who bought them) now owned the House of Delegates, the Senate, the Governor's office, the Lt. Governor's office, and the Attorney General's office.
There was no longer a firewall at all to protect Virginia's gun owners from whatever horrendous gun control might be introduced in the General Assembly in January, 2020. The only hope was the courts would uphold the U.S. and Virginia Constitutions - a fight that could take years and would be extremely expensive.
And the Democrats wasted no time in making it clear that law-abiding gun owners were going to get hit, and hit hard.
Michael Bloomberg wanted the millions of dollars he had donated to help Democrats win their elections, be repaid by passing strong gun-control in Virginia.
Besides paying back Bloomberg, there were two other reasons Governor Northam had made gun control a major agenda item. The Governor wanted to take attention away from his racism, and even more importantly, comments he had made during a radio interview where he came out in support of state-sanctioned murder of babies who survived an abortion and were born.
Dr. Mengele would have been proud of Northam's calm and clinical description of how the murder of a living baby would be performed. But Virginians, even those who are pro-choice, were disgusted and horrified.
So to begin implementing Northam's agenda, Senator Dick Saslaw pre-filed SB 16, which redefined "assault weapons" to cover a wide variety of common, semi-automatic firearms and outlawed all of them. SB 16 also banned magazines that hold more than 10 rounds, suppressors, and bump stocks. After July 1, 2020, all those items would be contraband and the state would not compensate gun owners for them, even if destroyed or turned over to the police. Mere possession of those items after July 1 would be a FELONY. SB 16 was a top agenda-item for Bloomberg.
Law-abiding gun owners, who had legally bought their guns and had no intention of harming anyone who was not trying to harm them, could have their firearms confiscated and be headed to prison.
Other bills to pacify Bloomberg included: One Handgun a Month, Universal Background Checks, Red Flag laws, prohibitions on children having access to firearms, drastically reducing reciprocity with other states, more restrictions on ranges, and allowing local government to have complete control over the possession, carry, transportation, and storage of firearms! That wasn't all the bills, either.
About the time of the election, the Carroll County Board of Supervisors did the first Second Amendment Sanctuary resolution, followed shortly by Campbell County doing the same thing.
We realized the potential of such resolutions in the upcoming battle in the General Assembly in January. The resolutions, if there were enough localities doing them, would get the attention of the General Assembly. The resolutions would also encourage sheriffs and police departments not to enforce unconstitutional gun laws and Commonwealth Attorneys not to prosecute those in violation of those laws. Finally, sanctuary localities would be very unlikely to enact any local gun control if given the chance to do so by the General Assembly.
It was a win, win, win, and VCDL jumped in with both feet.
VCDL developed a model Second Amendment Sanctuary resolution that was provided to localities which were considering, or being asked to consider, passing such a resolution. We helped coordinate with local members to get the word out about upcoming Board of Supervisor, City Council, and Town Council meetings. The idea was to create large turnouts in support of the locality becoming a sanctuary.
The results were better than we had dreamt possible. Between local grassroots efforts and VCDL's membership participation and coordination, we were seeing turnouts of between 500 to 600 people at local government meetings that were lucky to have 10 people there normally, and 50 on an incredibly busy night! Meeting rooms were overflowing, phones ringing off the walls, and email in-boxes jammed.
My first interaction with the coming tidal wave was early into the movement when I attended my first sanctuary meeting, which was in Amherst County on November 19, 2019. It had taken a few hours for me to drive there and I needed to "hit the head" after having a diet drink on the way up. I thought that I would simply park my car in the Amherst government building parking lot and run in to use the restroom.
When I got close to the meeting, my jaw dropped. Crowds of people were crossing the street to get to the meeting. The parking lot was full, the building was overflowing, with the crowd outside the building wrapping around the parking lot, and that was well before the meeting was scheduled to start! So much for "running in" to use the restroom and then getting a seat in the meeting room! I would be lucky to get in the building...
I brought a roll of 1,000 Guns Save Lives stickers and they were handed out to those in attendance. Thanks to the efforts of ex-Speaker of the House of Delegates, Vance Wilkins, I got into the building and was given the chance to address the Board of Supervisors. The size of that meeting was probably 500 to 600. This photo shows the large meeting room on the left, filled to capacity, with a crowd filling the hallway, staircase, foyer, extending out the door, and around the parking lot:
The next night I attended the Amelia County meeting. When I arrived, I realized that this was going to be a big turnout, too - I was elated! Sure enough, there were over 600 people at that meeting. I had the opportunity to address both the Board of Supervisors AND the large overflow crowd outside the building. Senator Amanda Chase and Delegate John McGuire also addressed the crowd. Like the gun owners in Amherst, the Amelia crowd was motivated. It was absolutely wonderful to behold. This photo shows part of the crowd outside. The meeting room and hallway were filled to capacity, too:
At first the Democrats said that this was an "Appalachian thing" and it wouldn't spread.
But they were wrong. Places like Virginia Beach, Fauquier County, Prince William County, Spotsylvania County, and Amelia County started looking at becoming sanctuaries. The Appalachia theory dried up and blew away. Crowd sizes were now up to at least 1,000 at local government meetings.
Starting to feel a little panicky, the gun controllers were writing letters to the editor criticizing VCDL and saying that the sanctuaries were no big deal and would have no affect.
That didn't deter the movement, either. More localities came sanctuaries and the crowd sizes were between 1,000 and 1,500. That "no big deal" had taken on a life of its own.
The movement began spreading like a wildfire and real panic set it for the Democrats. Congressman McEachin did one of the dumbest political stunts I have seen in a long time. He decided to throw gasoline on a roaring fire to put it out. He told the press that the Governor could call out the National Guard to force localities to enforce new state gun laws.
At the same time to help slow down or stop the sanctuary movement, Senator Saslaw talked down his own bill - SB 16. He said that he had forgot to put in "grandfathering" that would allow gun owners to keep their semi-automatic firearms if they registered them, but no new sales would be allowed. Larger magazines, suppressors, and bump stock will still have to be destroyed or surrendered, though.
Instead of being intimidated at the thought of the National Guard being called out, or selfishly giving in so that they could keep their semi-automatic guns, while denying the next generated of gun owners that same right, gun owners now showed up in record crowds of 2,000 to 3,000+ people! They filled and overflowed large gymnasiums, with traffic alerts going out at 7 and 8 pm due to country roads being jammed in all directions!
I was so damned proud of every one of those patriots! Because of their efforts, now sanctuaries were popping up across the state almost daily. Sometimes six or more at a time!
Here is part of the attendance at the Bedford County meeting:
And about a quarter of the Rockingham County attendance:
The wildfire continued to burn across the state, until 96% of the counties and 94% of the state were sanctuaries. That number continues to grow. Currently there are 147 sanctuaries!
The map of Virginia is now almost totally green (the sanctuary color), including many areas that tend to vote Democrat. The message was clear, with both Democrats and Republicans hearing it. The Republican Party actually woke up in the middle of the movement and began registering tons of new voters at these hearings. The number of speakers topping over 100 in some cases. The gun controllers were pretty much no shows at these hearings.
The one attempt at repealing a sanctuary status fails
After the election in November, the incoming Board of Supervisors in Prince William County was now predominantly controlled by Democrats. The new chairwoman vowed she would repeal the County's sanctuary resolution, passed in December by the previous Board, as the first order of business in early January.
When that meeting finally came, the new Board moved the time of the meeting from the evening to 2 pm, in the middle of the work day, to minimize attendance by gun owners.
It didn't work. Thousands of gun owners flooded the building and over 120 of them spoke against any such repeal! The shocked Board voted to drop the repeal from their agenda, much to the chagrin of the chairwoman, and Prince William County continued to remain a sanctuary!
The Lobby Day countdown begins
VCDL's Lobby Day 2020 was now around the corner and grassroots activism across the state had set the stage for the upcoming fight against tyranny in the General Assembly.
I stood in complete awe at what had transpired since November and humbled at the immense trust that had been placed in VCDL, not only by Virginians, but Americans across the country, to lead that fight.
Last thought: Did Virginia have to go through this?
Sadly, I believe we all had to go through this "purgatory" in order to wake up enough gun owners from their sound sleep to actually affect a powerful and lasting change in Virginia.
The House, the Governor, the Lt. Governor, and the Attorney General positions are all up for grabs in 2021. Personally, I can't wait for 2021 to get here!
If we all hang together, the political retribution for the war on gun owners will be a marvel to behold! Payback will be coming and the General Assembly will once more be reminded that gun control is a third-rail that is best not touched.
We dare not fail at this.
Central Scrutinizer
VIRGINIA GUN OWNERS SHIFT GEARS AS OTHER STATES CLOSELY WATCH WHAT'S TRANSPIRING HERE
As the Second Amendment Sanctuary movement, which had brought out over 105,000 gun owners over a period of only six weeks, started to die down (the state was pretty much solid green by the end of December), VCDL's Lobby Day became the focus for gun owners across the state - and - across the nation!
Most Virginia gun-owners realized that just because they lived in a newly-minted sanctuary locality, they were not safe from the crazy gun-control laws that were going to be headed their way from Richmond. Those in other states realized that Virginia, long a bastion of liberty and strong gun-rights, was the canary-in-the-coal-mine for the rest of the country.
Gun owners were filled with a resolve to send an unmistakeable message to the General Assembly and VCDL's Lobby Day became the rally point.
LOBBY DAY PREPARATIONS STARTED A HALF YEAR EARLIER ASSUMING "BUSINESS AS USUAL"
VCDL started to get ready for Lobby Day in late July of 2019, working through the red tape that was required to hold the rally on the Capitol steps at 11 am on January 20, 2020. We were figuring on our typical 600 to 1,000 people and were worried about the underpowered PA system that would be provided by the State. We had to use their PA system, even though we owned a far superior one.
We were looking to book our usual 3 buses: one for Tidewater, one for Northern Virginia, and one for Roanoke/Lynchburg.
Little did we know a giant firestorm would be headed our way in a mere six months. Nor had we any hint of all the attempts that would be made to minimize, sabotage, or to outright stop, Lobby Day.
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In early November, 2019 everything changed and by the end of December it was clear that our current planning was going to be woefully inadequate.
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THE MAGNITUDE OF THE NUMBER OF PEOPLE HEADED TO LOBBY DAY BECOMES APPARENT
Emails and social media, extremely active since November, really took off in as we approached the end of December.
We were hearing from groups all across the state, and even across the country, organizing to come - gun clubs, shooting ranges, political organizations, social clubs, etc.
VCDL began to book more buses, and then more, and then more again. In the end, instead of 3 buses, VCDL had 44 and there were at least another 50 that were booked by individuals and various organizations in Virginia. And there were more buses coming from out of state!
Texas had 7 buses coming. There was a bus booked by the Connecticut Citizens Defense League headed our way. More buses from Florida. People were coming from as far away as California, Nevada, and Washington State, even some from Alaska! And gun owners from states with much less freedom that we enjoy here were coming to support us (how humbling is that?): Illinois, New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Maryland. The list where people were coming from pretty much covered the entire country, except Hawaii!
What, no "aloha" for Virginia, Hawaiian gun owners? ;-)
In late December we were thinking that perhaps 30,000 people might be attending. Soon that grew to 50,000 and even as many as 120,000 was thought to be possible.
Now VCDL found itself in a different world for purposes of planning. Suddenly we needed to consider:
- renting port-a-potties (we started with 15 and ended up renting 65, but could have used some additional ones at the remote parking location)
- having places for people to park
- renting shuttle buses to run back and forth to remote parking (we booked 4 shuttles and that wasn't enough)
- somehow getting permission to have a real PA system
- arranging for trash to be collected in VCDL-provided trash bags and taken to the trash bins
- having a drone to photograph the crowd from high above
- two-way radios and body cams for Lobby Team Leaders and VCDL Leadership and
- where, oh where, do you put 50,000 or 120,000 people?
Our small, mostly volunteer organization, had to pull all that together in just three weeks!VCDL STEPS UP ITS GAME
VCDL Board of Directors members Pat Webb and Bruce Jackson kicked into high gear. I was so overwhelmed with an explosion of emails (I fell behind by 10,000 emails in just a few days), press interviews, and my own part of the planning for the event, that Pat and Bruce had to handle the flood of phone calls and the various emails that I forwarded to them. (The VCDL phone lines were pretty much ringing continuously.)
Pat was also arranging to get the port-a-potties, paying VCDL's bills, interfacing with VCDL's Executive members (many of whom had also kicked into high gear, too), helping me lobby, working on getting a better PA system option, AND running her gun store!
Bruce, who also does VCDL fulfillment, was shipping up to a hundred packages a day AND working his regular day job!
Executive members Tess Ailshire and Leyla Myers were coordinating the buses and putting out fires as they popped up. They were inundated, but kept going like Energizer bunnies.
Executive member Ken Van Wyk was organizing the lobbying team leaders and the packets they would be delivering to legislators.
Executive member Matt Gottshalk was arranging to make videos documenting Lobby Day and looking at ways that audio of the rally could be streamed so attendees in remote locations could hear the rally's speakers (that didn't pan out, unfortunately, due to the shear magnitude of the crowd size overwhelming any streaming capabilities we might use).
Our membership director, Sandy Ferris, was overwhelmed as membership soared - our membership TRIPLED in six-weeks! She went from working on membership applications part-time to doing so full-time.
Oh, and then there was social media! The influx of information on our Facebook page, moderated by EMs Ed Levine and Joanna Smith, was mind-boggling. Thousands of posts in a single day and up to a half-million views on one of the posts! I don't know how Ed and Joanna kept up, but they did. On top of that, Ed was involved in fund raising efforts!
EM Brendon Mooney was kept busy moderating Reddit and also working on fundraising ventures.
EM John Pierce got VCDL's Legislative Tracking System for 2020 up and running and helped me with legislation.
Vice-president Jim Snyder picked up some of the load by handling many of the non-legislative VA-ALERTs that needed to get out in a timely manner.
All that hard work paid off. Lobby Day came off almost without a hitch. It was both exhilarating and exhausting for everyone involved. I equated it to trying to drink out of 5 fire hydrants at one time!
All the VCDL members who worked their rear ends off to make Lobby Day 2020 happen, such as those who worked the VCDL table at the remote parking area or served on one of the VCDL lobby teams in the General Assembly Building, deserve our debt of gratitude for a job unbelievably well done!
THE GUN-GRABBERS TRY TO DERAIL, OR AT LEAST WEAKEN, LOBBY DAY
The gun-control crowd looked at the massive Second Amendment Sanctuary movement in November and December, along with the explosion of interest in Lobby Day, as a threat to getting their gun-control nightmare, uh, dreams, fulfilled.
They knew there was no way they could match the projected crowd size at the VCDL Lobby Day. They would be extremely lucky to get a few hundred people to show up, much less tens of thousands. So they had to come up with ways to discourage gun owner attendance and minimize the rally size.
They had already tried pooh-poohing sanctuaries, attacking VCDL in the press, threatening to bring out the National Guard to enforce gun laws, threatening localities with cutting their funding from the General Assembly if they became sanctuaries, and saying that guns would no longer be legal at the Capitol and General Assembly buildings.
One of the key attempts to scale back Lobby Day and to disincentivize attendance at local sanctuary meetings was when Senator Saslaw announced that he would change SB 16 to allow people to keep any "assault weapons" they already had, as long as those guns were registered with the state. Saslaw's hope was that would placate gun owners and they would go back to sleep.
Luckily, gun owners not only didn't fall for Saslaw's charade and go back to sleep. They only grew more determined to fight back against a government that seemed hell-bent on shredding the Constitution. Law Enforcement Today even reported that police officers were looking to join newly-formed local militias to fight back against unconstitutional laws! VCDL's membership meetings had become standing room only affairs.
Rumors were going around that guns would be banned in the City of Richmond and that the government was planning a violent confrontation with gun owners to discredit the Second Amendment movement. Doom-and-gloom predictions abounded. Enough to make many reconsider going to Lobby Day out of concern for their personal safety.
While some were certainly deterred, plenty were unfazed and determined to stand up to a government gone wild.
Sep 6, 2020
Central Scrutinizer
VCDL Lobby Day, January 16, 2017
01/22/2017 10:29 AM | Anonymous member (Administrator)
Full video of the Lobby Day Rally can be viewed by clicking here
Sep 6, 2020