Litigious Humboldt

For an out-of-the-way county like Humboldt, has seen a lot of big legal action recently. These lawsuits will have significant impacts on the future of the area.

Some of the biggest litigation involved the Pacific Lumber Company, also known as PL or PALCO. PL was originally a well-respected lumber company, with ample land and what seemed to be inexhaustible timber resources. That is until 1985, when PL was the victim of a hostile takeover.

After the Maxxam Corporation acquired PL, it began over harvesting the timber, causing a great deal of anger and divisiveness in Humboldt. There were allegations that Maxxam falsified documents dealing with timber harvests and sales of land, prompting District Attorney Paul Gallegos to file a complaint for fraud and personally try the case.

The case was eventually thrown out by the courts in 2008, but not before the case divided the county in an “us vs. them” battle culminating in an unsuccessful recall election against Mr. Gallegos in March 2004. PL’s legal woes continued when creditors squabbled over the remaining carcass of a once proud company that Maxxam ran into the ground. The restructured company, now known as Humboldt Redwood Company, is struggling to survive with a skeleton mill.

While PL seemed to be falling apart at the seams, another company seemed very stable: Humboldt Creamery, the local dairy co-op. With a number of high-profile contracts including making ice cream for Costco and providing the military with most of its powdered milk needs, the future of the co-op seemed bright. Until 2009 when the CEO, Rich Ghilarducci, admitted to cooking the books. He did so rather than admitting to co-op members that the Creamery was having financial problems.

The resulting chaos ended with the sale of the Creamery to a corporation and a 30-month sentence for the disgraced former CEO. Many dairy families thought that Mr. Ghilarducci was let off easy by an urban federal court not familiar with farm country values. The once proud co-op run by the dairy farmers themselves has now gone corporate, and the farmers aren’t too happy with the court's role in the downfall.

Now Humboldt finds itself embroiled in more litigation. CalTrans and the Federal Department of Transportation are looking to widen Highway 101 through Richardson Grove State Park. Large redwood trees flank the narrow road so tightly no long tractor-trailers can pass. The plan was to remove a few of the trees and widen the road to a point that more commercial vehicles could reach Humboldt and possibly spur an economic upturn in a county losing more and more blue collar jobs.

But environmentalists want to protect the trees, and some locals feel that better connections with the rest of California will damage the unique feel Humboldt County has as a mostly isolated area. They have begun filing injunctions to block the planned widening creating more tension between different factions in Humboldt. Some locals feel that a bunch of hippies with no roots in the area are abusing the legal system to stop progress.

Humboldt appears to be turning to the legal system to resolve more of its conflicts. Yet as a rural county, is this an expected behavior? For a county with more trees and cows than people, and which prides itself on being mellow and accepting, Humboldt certainly seems to have a lot of attorneys running around these days.

The Justice Bus

On warm summer days and frigid winter mornings alike, law students step out of cars into what some would call "the middle of nowhere" of California. These students spend one or two days providing necessary legal services to low-income rural Californians with the help of local legal aid attorneys. Through these students' work, many rural individuals find solutions to their legal problems. These students are able to provide these services because of the Justice Bus.

The Justice Bus, a program facilitated by One Justice, creates opportunities for law students and summer associates at large law firms to provide legal services in rural California by coordinating legal clinics on weekends. The Justice Bus program organizes every aspect of the legal clinics, from publicity to coordinating with legal aid organizations. Ironically, typically no bus is involved, but rather the program coordinates carpools to save on costs.

According to the California Commission on Access to Justice and its report "Improving Civil Justice in Rural California," many low-income rural Californians do not receive the legal services they need. Approximately 1.6 million Californians who live in rural areas qualify for legal aid and at least one-third of those who qualify need legal services each year. Limited funding combined with the need to cover large geographic areas restricts the ability of legal aid attorneys to travel to and consult with rural residents. In addition, many rural areas have few or no attorneys who can provide pro bono work. Rural communities need new solutions to address the problem of access to legal assistance.

The Justice Bus may be one such solution, and it allows all law students, from first years to third years, to have practical legal experience. Students conduct intake, draft legal documents, and provide self-help education. Also, as importantly, the Justice Bus exposes law students to the struggles of low-income people in rural communities, including their problems with accessing legal services. Hopefully, some students who participate in this program will consider practicing in a rural community in the future or at least will participate in pro bono activities in rural communities.

The Justice Bus gives legal aid organizations with whom it partners the opportunity to serve more clients. The executive director of the Watsonville Law Center, Dori Rose Inda said that help from the Justice Bus law students enabled her organization to assist three times as many people as normal. The Justice Bus is making a difference for the clients of many legal aid organizations.

The question, though, is whether the Justice Bus really is making a difference in rural communities. On more than one occasion, the Justice Bus has visited communities that are questionably rural. Recently, the Justice Bus took a group of Skadden summer associates to San Mateo to provide legal services. San Mateo has a population of over 91,000 people. By many standards such a population, especially in a county with almost 800,000 people, is not rural. However, the Justice Bus in its publicity about the clinic referred to San Mateo as rural. Maybe the Legal Aid Society of San Mateo County was in particular need and the Justice Bus stepped in to help. While that might be the case, it seems to detract from the initial purpose of the Justice Bus: to serve rural communities.

Maybe one solution to the problem would be to have the Justice Bus partner with rural attorneys who are interested in pro bono work as opposed to only legal aid organizations. This option may not have been successful in the past and may be why the Justice Bus drifted towards partnering only with legal aid organizations. If it partnered with local rural attorneys or small law firms, though, the Justice Bus would have more options for where it could go because legal aid in rural areas is limited. For example, instead of going to Redding to work with Legal Services of Northern California, as students from McGeorge did last March, maybe the Justice Bus could stop in Red Bluff first or take a right and drive into the wilderness to Quincy.

This is not to say the Justice Bus does not visit any rural areas. In 2010, Stanford Law School students assisted low-income seniors in Mariposa County, a county of less than 19,000 people. The town they visited, Mariposa, has a population of around 2,000. By most any definition, this would fall into the rural category. More trips to areas like Mariposa County are necessary to serve the California rural communities that are in greatest need.

While this program is helpful to the areas it targets, its scope of service is limited. The Justice Bus will visit a limited number of rural locations if it operates only on weekends, coordinates solely with legal aid organizations, and gets distracted from from serving rural communities. Maybe if the program expands it will have greater influence and will connect with more local attorneys in rural areas. For now, it is doing what it can, but the legal community must find more solutions to address the overwhelming need for legal services in rural California.

Law and Order in the Ozarks (Part LXXXV): If a tree falls in the forest ...

An old saying queries, "if a tree falls in the forest and no on hears it, does it make a noise?" A law and order analogy to this adage might be, "If a law is on the books, but no one enforces it, is it a law?" I was reminded of this reality recently by an editorial in my hometown newspaper, the Newton County Times (August 17, 2011). The editorial was cleverly titled, "It's time to bite the dogs." It's a play on the old newspaper phrase, "Man bites dog," which is often used as a metaphor for an "unusual, infrequent event that is more likely to be reported as news than an ordinary occurrence (such as dog bites man)."

The editorial tells of a recent dog-bite incident in Jasper--a dog of unknown origin bit a girl in the face, requiring stitches in her lip and nose. The girl's parents, the editorial reports, intend to attend the next City Council meeting to draw attention to the incident, ask the community for support, and explore what can be done to prevent similar incidents in the future. According to a letter to the editor by the girl's parents, the city of Jasper has a 20-year-old leash law, but it has never been enforced. According to Police Chief Pete DeChant the city has only a "policy" of requiring dogs to be leashed in Bradley Park, though no provision is made for its enforcement. Whatever the state of written law, the editorial notes that neither Jasper nor Newton County has an animal control division in its law enforcement--which isn't terribly surprising given that the city doesn't even have an officer on duty round the clock, and the sheriff's office is stretched to cover the entire county.

The editorial nevertheless calls for more attention--and resources--to animal control. Acknowledging the cost of training and paying people to enforce animal control laws--assuming an enforceable ordinance were passed--the editor nevertheless calls for a change in "attitude ...for the health and safety of our community." I was heartened to read in his column of the prior efforts to address these issues. Among these is the work of a non-profit group, Newton County Animal Services, which seeks animal control solutions. Among other things, it has advocated spaying and neutering. The group has sought the assistance of the Quorum Court in the past--seeking a donation of land where a clinic could be built to accommodate visiting veterinarians to provide these services. To date, the Quorum Court has only permitted the group to use fairgrounds facilities for these low cost clinics, which are held a couple of times a year and also provide rabies vaccination services. Residents concerned about roaming dogs attacking their pets have met with the prosecuting attorney and sheriff, going so far as to present laws other communities have adopted to deal with such animal control issues. Still, public officials have failed to take the proverbial bull by the horns--presumably because these issues are seen as a low priority.

Consideration of these events and challenges in the context of impoverished, sparsely populated Newton County, population 8,311, makes me wonder if local officials essentially cede animal control to the "informal order" often associated with rural communities. Of course, to some extent, law enforcement must also cede many other issues that implicate human welfare (like drug manufacture and myriad other crimes) to informal order because money and space so limit what they can do. It is also a reminder of a service that city dwellers may take for granted, but about which rural residents can only dream.

Farmville (Part I): Peach fuzz

One would think that UC Davis Law (UC Davis was, after all, once called “The Farm” because it was an extension of UC Berkeley’s Ag program) would offer at least one agricultural law class due to the school's vicinity to California’s farmland. Unfortunately, no agricultural law classes were offered this year.

Given the increasing water scarcity, limited land supply, and the lucrative nature of Northern California farming, ag law and understanding of agricultural issues will become increasingly important in the coming years. I hope to elucidate the legal issues farmers face on a daily basis through this series entitled Farmville. To better understand legal issues that someone in agriculture might face, one needs to first understand what a typical California harvest is like.

My family has been farming in Northern California since they immigrated to the US in the 1960’s. At the ranch yesterday (laboring on Labor Day- funny) we had a crew of about 65 people harvesting our Starn variety of Cling peaches.

Farmer Dad

Two pickers are assigned to each tree. The pickers' hand pick every single peach from the tree- even the green and rotten ones. The pickers then dump the peaches into a bin where there is one “grader”, who removes all of the green, rotten, and small peaches.

Pickers pick all of the peaches and put them in their sacks

The peaches are then dumped into a bin where a grader sorts out the bad peaches

A typical harvest day

The bins are loaded onto a truck and taken to the peach station. At the station the truck is weighed and one bin is randomly taken from the truck and graded by a machine and then by hand. The grade received on this one bin is then multiplied by the number of bins on the truck. If a bin receives a poor grade, the farmer will see a very low return on his labor. The farmer therefore relies very heavily on his crew during the picking process because the peach farmer’s income for the entire year depends upon this single, annual harvest.

Loading the bins to take to the station

Currently, my family sells our peaches to Pacific Coast Producers (PCP), a co-op. After the station, the peaches are sent to the cannery. Cling peaches are very juicy, and in my humble opinion the best in the world. Due to their high sugar levels they do not have a very good shelf life. This variety, therefore, is used solely for canning. PCP sells our peaches, as well as a lot of other farmers’ in the area, to private labels for canning. Our peaches can end up at Costco, Sam’s Club, or in cans for Sunny Select.

Next time you pick up a fruit cup containing peaches, or eat canned peaches I hope you think of my family and the work it takes to get the peach from the tree to the can.

Glimpses of water justice in California

The golden state takes much pride in its abundance of natural resources. And why not? After all, miner's struck it rich in the 1848 Gold Rush, it is home to the tallest trees in the world-the redwoods, and it enjoys the eternal sunshine (hence the "golden")--just to name a few. Still, found within the state are whole communities that lack access to one of the most basic natural resources that humans need to survive:water.

Safe drinking water to be exact. Here enters the question of water justice. The Environmental Justice Coalition for Water defines water justice as “[T]he ability of all communities to access safe, affordable water for drinking, fishing, recreational and cultural uses.”* Consequently, those who suffer from water injustice tend to be poor, immigrant, rural, or people of color. In the rural context, California’s massive agricultural system has tapped the state’s rivers and has their natural flows in order to fuel giant monoculture crop fields. Furthermore, the chemical fertilizers and pesticides used during the growing seasons seep into the soil and inevitably affect underground water basins.

According to an article in New America Media, 220 communities found within rural California struggle for access to affordable, safe drinking water. Traces of toxins that cause cancer and birth defects have been linked to people's kitchen faucets. In Lanare, California residents have had to pay a hefty fee for ensuring access to drinkable water. The choices set before communities like Lanare are privatize public works, buy bottled water, or drink what is available, which is often below state health standard water. All of these are expensive "choices."

With no reliable public works system, many people end up having to rely heavily on bottled water. Bottled water is a choice that comes with a mountain of hidden costs, and the environment foots much of the bill. According to a 2007 report by the Food and Water Watch, it is estimated that the United States consumes more than half a billion bottles of water every week and generates 2 million tons of PET plastic botttles waste every year.

To the north, a different kind of struggle over water is taking place along some of California's majestic rivers. In redwood country, native communities have been struggling to have full access to the river, claiming they depend on the river for economic, social and cultural purposes. Dams are the biggest barriers to the tribe's self-sufficiency.

The dams' alterating of the natural river flows have been linked to the rise of blue-green algae (BGA) or Microcystis aeruginosa, the 2002 massive salmon fish kill, and impending threat of loss of cultural knowledge. Throughout Humboldt and Shasta Counties one finds warning signs advising people not to go in the water due to the high levels of BGA. According to the World Health Organization and the Klamath River Keepers, chronic exposure to BGA has been linked to liver failure and cancer.

In the summer of 2002, residents of the Klamath River Watershed witnessed one of the largest fish kills in the nation's history. It is estimated that over 70,000 salmon died due to low water levels and high temperatures. The struggles of local tribes led up to a 5-year-long campaign targeting PacificCorps—a Scotland based multinational corporation. The “Un-Dam the Klamath” campaign successfully negotiated the removal of all the dams on the Klamath River basin.

Author of Water Wars, Vandana Shiva, reminds us of the important role of community and culture in the development of sustainable agriculture and water systems. In a brief interview, Shiva discusses water culture in India. Her analysis of water as a resource of life, culture and ecology and not as a commodity to be privatized and reap profits from is fitting to the discussion of water in rural California. Many Californian's like Indian citizens, have a deep intimate relationship to their water resource (i.e. rivers, lakes, pacific ocean). The relationships take on economic, social, spiritual and/or cultural dimensions. The Northern California tribes have been making this precise claim--without water there is no life. A claim we must take serious especially with dramatic changes in global climate temperatures.

While water (in)justice manifest on multiple scales throughout rural California, it is also becoming more apparent that communities are expressing a common demand to have local control of their resources. Signs of local autonomy abound in the state and beyond. In Stockton, Ca citizens ran out a multinational corporation (OMI-Thames) attempting to privatize the city's water system; in other parts of the central valley, residents are organizing campaigns to protect the diminishing groundwater from harmful agricultural chemicals; and lastly, more people are taking steps to ensure that corporations don’t manage their livelihoods through the exploitation of resources such as water (check out the take back the tap campaign).

The fall of (an) Empire

For all intents and purposes, Empire, Nevada was wiped off the map this year. Owned by the United States Gypsum Corporation, Empire existed to support United States Gypsum's mining and manufacturing operation in the area. Gypsum is an important component of drywall and when the housing bubble burst, the demand for new drywall all but disappeared, bringing Empire down with it.

According to The Daily Mail, the only remnants of the town will be an eight-foot fence and a sign saying, "Welcome to Nowhere." Even the town's former zip code has been relegated to history.

When United States Gypsum first announced the closure of its plant last December, some were optimistic that the plant would stay in working order and be ready to resume operations should the economy turn around. The company provided severance pay and allowed the laid-off employees to continue to live in Empire until June 20th of this year. When it became clear that the demand for drywall was not going to increase anytime soon, the fate of Empire was sealed.

When United States Gypsum's employees learned they were laid off last year, they were also effectively evicted on the same day. The company owned and operated Empire for the benefit of its employees. Without the town, there would be no one to work for the company, and without the company, there is no one to live in the town. Even if people were still willing to live there, it is unlikely that they would have the necessary support services. The LA Times reported that United States Gypsum "essentially served as mayor, police chief and landlord." While life could continue without those roles being filled, it certainly would not be the same.

When the economy killed Empire, it may well have delivered a fatal blow to nearby Gerlach as well. The US Census Bureau has lumped Gerlach and Empire together as a census designated place, and their fates may also be tied.

In 2000, the Census Bureau reported that 225 people in the towns were employed. With the loss of 99 jobs at United States Gypsum alone, that number was cut nearly in half. The effects of the closure have already cost the area a number of other jobs as well. As the Las Vegas Review Journal reported, Gerlach played host to the children that were bused in from Empire to attend school.

Many of the teachers in Gerlach have had to move to Reno in order to continue teaching. As of June 12th of this year, the Gerlach school district had only three high school students, all of whom had opted to take classes online. In fact, the early estimates were that the entire school district, pre-school through 12th grade, would have only 12 students. Just as there is no longer a need for teachers in the area, it is unlikely that the residents will continue to be able to support the town's three bars. And it does not require any stretch of the imagination to believe that those employed in other service industries will be forced to follow the teachers' path to Reno.

Only time will tell whether Gerlach follows Empire into the history books as just another name on the long list of Nevada ghost towns.

The wild west in our backyard.

The sinister murder of City Councilman Jere Melo in Fort Bragg several weeks ago highlights what has become a serious public safety issue, which also has environmental health implications. Melo was murdered in a remote area of Mendocino County by a marijuana grower squatting on forest land. Melo’s job was to manage thousands of acres of forest, and he was on location investigating reports of illegal pot growing on that land when he was killed.

The rural economy in Northern California is inextricably tied to the marijuana industry. Marijuana has become a major cash crop in areas where a once hearty forestry and fishing industry was the backbone of a robust rural economy. For example, some news sources report that marijuana accounts for two-thirds of the Mendocino County economy.

While much of the marijuana growing in California is tied to the legal medical industry, certain types of illicit grows create monumental environmental and public safety problems. One of the greatest concerns surrounding the industry regards the illegal large-scale growth of marijuana in California’s national parks. These grows pose major environmental hazards, as they often correlated with toxic dumping, illegal water diversions, and hazardous pesticides.

As a recent article on this subject in Legal Planet points out, marijuana industry is a hot button issue among California’s residents. This is true among California's rural populations too. Many locals whose families have been in the area logging or fishing for generations are outraged as outsiders move into rural areas to claim a stake in the burgeoning industry. These outsiders are often from out of state altogether. Many such locals are vehemently opposed to the marijuana industry. Other rural residents have begun growing marijuana as traditional forms of income have become harder to survive on.

For the last several decades, the Campaign Against Marijuana Planting (CAMP) has carried out raids, flying helicopters over sites in Northern California in search of illegal grows. Until recently, CAMP was known as a force that would terrorize small “mom and pop” farms. Many rural residents grew to dread the sound of CAMP helicopters in the summer sky.

However, recently the campaign has shifted focus to an issue which rural residents unanimously support. That focus, the New York Times reports, is the eradication of illegal grows in “state, county and federal parks, which Mexican drug cartels and other large-scale growers have found to be excellent locations for illicit farms, the authorities say.” These are the type of grows that Melo was investigating when he was murdered.

However, drastic budget cuts this last year threaten to undermine the state’s major mechanism for eradicating these dangerous grows.

The federal Drug Enforcement Administration has vowed to keep financing its part of the program, but since CAMP is operated by the state, the state’s money appears crucial for it to continue. CAMP’s 2010 operations cost taxpayers more than $3 million. . . .The state budget for 2012 cuts $71 million from the Division of Law Enforcement, including the narcotics bureau.

While the issue of illicit marijuana grows in national parks has not received much attention in major media news until recently, law and order types and rural residents, have been aware of the problem for quite some time.

At the 2009 California Bar Association’s Environmental Law Conference at Yosemite, an entire panel and afternoon hike was focused on educating the public about the extent of, and hazards associated with, the problem. Led by a park warden and an officer from the California Department of Fish and Game, the panel highlighted both the environmental degradation and the safety issues posed by these grows. Squatters in Yosemite have been caught poaching animals, damming creeks to create reservoirs filled with pesticides long-banned in the United States, and with illicit firearms.

While Californians, rural and urban alike, agree that large scale marijuana grows on forest lands pose a serious problem that needs to be addressed, they do not agree on the best methods for doing so. Some argue that the only solution for stopping illegal grows is to legalize marijuana. Others are vehemently opposed to this option and believe that illicit grows will continue and, even increase, if marijuana is legalized. Regardless of how the problem is tackled, the tragic death of Jere Melo highlights the urgent need to address the issue.

License to drive, license to thrive

I'll admit it: I don't have a driver's license. Not having a license has been a mere annoyance to me (though admittedly an extreme annoyance to my husband, who constantly feels like he's driving around Miss Daisy). But this would not be merely an annoyance if I had children or lived in a rural community, and it would be downright crippling if I was faced with both.This story in last week's New York Times discusses the issue of driver's licenses in New Mexico, the only state besides Washington that allows undocumented immigrants who are in-state residents to get the same type of driver's license citizens can get. But this won't last long if New Mexico governor Susana Martinez gets her way. 

According to scholar Maria Pabon Lopez, much of the increased fear of issuing driver's licenses stemmed from the fact that the 9/11 hijackers were able to board the planes because they had valid driver's licenses, which, according to the 9/11 and Terrorist Travel report, were collectively obtained from Arizona, California and Florida (along with state ID cards from Maryland, Florida, and Virginia).

However, the past and current discussion for and against giving undocumented immigrants valid driver's licenses fails to address this law's affect on rural communities and individuals. While rural households have greater access to vehicles than urban areas (92.7% vs. 88.9%), they are faced with both a greater need for vehicles and a dearth in public transportation. According to a United States Department of Agriculture Information Bulletin, not only is public transportation only available in 60% of rural counties, 28% of those offer only limited services.

Rural areas are marked by vast spatial distance between services and among residents. In addition, work is increasingly moving away from rural residences. For both undocumented immigrants and citizens in rural communities, not having a car probably means not having a job. Car pools are an option, but they are limited in number and feature logistical limitations. 

Not only do driver's licenses affect them vocationally, lack of licenses will prevent them from providing for their children, receiving access to medical care, and taking care of their elderly relatives. Mother's who are unable to get their children (who very well may be American citizens if they were born in this country) to and from school and doctors appointments or provide them with basic necessities such as food would be deemed negligent by American legal standards and risk losing their children. The New York Times article quotes an immigrant mother who sums up this sentiment perfectly, “How will I take my children to school? ... How can I go to Wal-Mart to get medicine? If you take away our licenses, you take away our lives.”

For those against immigration, the argument of allowing undocumented immigrants to sustain themselves may not be persuasive. It is important to note that the somewhat lenient New Mexico law, that Martinez wants to reverse, was not designed to promote undocumented immigration, but rather to increase rates of car insurance and properly training drivers on driving techniques and traffic laws. 

In rural areas where driving is a necessity, undocumented immigrants who are unable to get a drivers license will be either unable to work (which does not mean that they will leave America but will instead may rely on tax funded welfare services) or they will drive anyway, probably without the necessary training and definitely without insurance. These options are not only detrimental to the American economy, they pose physical and economic danger to Americans. 

In addition, rural areas with declining population are often reliant on cheap immigrant labor. This is especially true of agricultural communities, where immigrant laborers do the hard work that others simply aren't willing to do. Creating barriers on immigrant livelihood in turn creates a barrier on rural livelihood, which is something these communities cannot afford during this Great Recession.

Post offices, politics, and rural access

In a report on rural broadband for one of my externships, I wrote about earlier attempts to extend service and access to modern technology to rural America: universal telephone service, rural electrification, the trans-continental railroad, and--the earliest example--the U.S. Postal Service. Earlier this year, the Postal Service announced that it is considering closing nearly four thousand post offices around the country, most of which are in rural or remote areas. Presented as a money-saving measure for the cash-strapped Postal Service, the plan would close post offices in 49 states and the District of Columbia. In a statement reproduced in this NPR blog post, Postmaster General Patrick Donohoe argued that

Our customer's habits have made it clear that they no longer require a physical post office to conduct most of their postal business.

Instead, Donohoe states, these communities may get stamps and flat rate boxes from a local vendor or automated "Village Post Office." Because the proposal targets offices with low service numbers, states with large rural and remote populations would be particularly hard hit. Although over 150 post offices in New York might close, they represent only 9% of their total. On the other hand, 35% of Arkansas', 29% each of Montana's and South Dakota's, and 28% each of West Virginia's and Wyoming's post offices would close.

In communities with already limited resources and sometimes inadequate or nonexistent advanced telecommunications, the proposed closures have already stirred up debate about issues of fairness, service, and access. In a blog post on the Daily Yonder, community organizer Carol Miller attempted to rally rural communities to fight the proposal:

My advice to every community on the closure list is to fight back - do whatever it takes to keep this constitutionally guaranteed service in your community.

It appears that rural communities have heard this call; a quick Google search about rural post office closures brings up articles, blog posts, letters to the editor, and whole websites dedicated to supporting rural post offices and preventing their closure. Many of these sources point to post offices as a community staple, a gathering place, and a lifeline to the outside world. Cutting off this access, they argue, would be a particular hardship for rural communities.

Almost immediately, politicians from across the country and across the political spectrum stepped into the fray. Maine's Senator Susan Collins, who is the ranking Republicans on the committee that oversees postal matters, issued the following statement:

The fact is, maintaining our nation's rural post offices costs the Postal Service less than one percent of its total budget and is not the cause of its financial crisis. While there are some areas where postal services could be consolidated or moved into a nearby retail store to ensure continued access, this simply is not an option in many rural and remote areas.

Representative Nick Rahall, a Democratic Congressman from West Virginia, submitted a blog post to the Hill's Congress Blog arguing that although the Postal Service has valid financial concerns, there are other factors to be considered in closing a post office, namely access. According to Rahall, in some rural areas the USPS delivers their competitors' packages because they are the only organization with an adequate delivery infrastructure.

Montana's Representative Denny Rehberg started the "Mail Drop Montana Initiative" in an attempt to protect the 80 Montana post offices proposed for closure. In an attempt to avoid post office closures, several Members of Congress have introduced bills to make other changes to the Postal Service, including proposals to go to a five-day delivery schedule.

The Postal Service is in real financial trouble, and it is clear that in one way or another, service will be cut. It also seems clear, however, that service cuts could have a larger impact on rural communities than on urban populations. Until our infrastructure for advanced technology (or competing mail delivery systems) is adequately serving rural areas, I would hope that Congress and the Postal Service would attempt to lessen the blow to rural areas.

For more information on this topic, see earlier blog posts here and here.

The attraction of country and western music--in Jamaica!

I was delighted by this story on NPR yesterday about Jamaicans' affection for country and western music. The story was prompted by the recent release of an album, Reggae's Gone Country, in which reggae musicians cover country music hits like Kenny Rogers "Gambler" and George Jones' "He Stopped Loving Her Today." The reporter, Baz Dreisenger, talked to several Jamaicans about the reasons for their affinity for country music, and those interviewed floated several ideas--mostly related to love of a good story, some noting that stories could be appealing morality tales while others noted that outlaws might be sympathetic.

The most telling comment to me, though, was this quote from University of West Indies professor and blogger, Annie Paul:

Country and western is music that comes from the people at the bottom ... so maybe there's some sort of sympathy there.

Interesting that even Jamaicans know who is at the bottom of the U.S. cultural and social hierarchy.

Gun-rights victory a rural defeat?

Gun right advocates have been on the offensive in recent years, focusing their sights on overturning urban handgun bans. They have celebrated two Supreme Court victories in the past three years. The decisions struck down handgun bans serving two decidedly urban areas: Washington, D.C., and Chicago. Yet the Court opinions in District of Columbia v. Heller (2008) and McDonald v. City of Chicago (2010) cited the need for guns in generally rural areas to support their positions.

While the justices in the majority looked to past rural gun use to support their position, I wonder if this is also a victory for rural life? At least one justice thinks not.

Justice Antonin Scalia supplements his textual analysis of the Second Amendment in Heller with historical anecdotes of support for the right to bear arms in essentially rural areas. He references an 1856 speech from Senator Charles Sumner, who extolled the need for pioneers to have guns during the "Bleeding Kansas" conflict.

The rifle has ever been the companion of the pioneer and, under God, his tutelary protector against the red man and the beast of the forest. Never was this efficient weapon more needed in just self-defence, than now in Kansas...

Scalia argues that Sumner's opinion was in keeping with most 19th-century Americans' view that all individuals had a right to bear arms in self defense.

In McDonald, Justice Samuel Alito goes one step further and suggests the writers of the 14th amendment specifically intended to incorporate the 2nd Amendment against the states. He cites an argument raised by Senator Samuel Pomeroy during the debates surrounding enactment of the 14th amendment.

Every man ... should have the right to bear arms for the defense of himself and family and his homestead. And if the cabin door of the freedman is broken open and the intruder enters ... then should a well-loaded musket be in the hand of the occupant...

In a McDonald concurrence, Justice Clarence Thomas argues the 14th Amendment's right to liberty was illusory for Southern blacks without the assurance they could bear arms in self defense against the Ku Klux Klan and other terrorist groups. (This example does not necessarily depict a rural setting, since the KKK was active in Southern cities, as well as in the countryside. However, the post-Civil War South is more evocative of rural life than a present-day Chicago)

Whether these three justices realized their anecdotes reflected rural settings is hard to tell. They do not acknowledge as much. Justice Stephen Breyer, however, fashioned dissents in both cases that took the urban-rural distinction to heart.

In Heller, he suggests the Founding Fathers would have understood the right to "keep and bear arms" included regulation of firearms in urban areas. He notes that Boston, Philadelphia and New York City had some restrictions on gun use within city limits during the colonial period. He also cites statistics suggesting much higher death rates from gun violence in urban areas compared to rural communities in the past few decades.

Breyer concludes by finding this evidence supports use of a "rational basis" standard for testing gun laws. (Scalia acknowledges Breyer's attempt to draw a distinction, but dismisses it as "interest balancing" that has no place in an enumerated constitutional right analysis.)

Ultimately, the Heller and McDonald decisions held that the 2nd Amendment includes an individual right to self defense. This holds both in rural America, as well as urban.

While the two decisions struck down urban gun legislation, Justice Breyer suggests in his McDonald dissent that the majority decision will prevent rural communities from dealing with gun violence resulting from suicides and accidents.

The decisions certainly appear to limit the ability of rural communities to regulate gun use. However, rural communities seem less inclined to do so. Professor Pruitt's Rural Rhetoric article notes that the Arizona legislature passed a gun-control law that only forbid children from carrying firearms in public in urban counties. The legislative history suggested legislators considered rural areas safer than urban ones, and that gun use is important for farming and hunting.

Guns cause problems in rural America, but rural Americans seem to be comfortable having them around (Breyer cites statistics that rural states have 60% gun ownership, compared to 15% in urban eastern states). So in that sense, the Supreme Court decisions should be considered a Pyrrhic victory for rural America.