This is the tenth of many weekly analysis pieces detailing what Congressman Platts has voted on, or bills that he has sponsored/co-sponsored. Mike Koffenberger - Libertarian Candidate U.S. House of Representatives District 19 PA I will briefly describe his action, the bill, and then detail how I would handle the same. Since it is not my full time job to read the entire bill (yet – with your help), I will read the summaries and base my decisions on those. I will also try and describe how libertarian principles apply in my decisions. During weeks that Congressman Platts is not in session or co-sponsoring bills, I will re-visit some of his older votes on legislation that has a had detrimental effect on our liberties.

Other than the debate in the House over the proposed Balanced Budget Amendment (which I discussed in last week’s report), not much of consequence happened again this week. Therefore, a return visit to Congressman Platts’ voting record will take place in this week’s edition.

This week I will discuss a bill passed and signed into law in 2009, H.R. 1388: Serve America Act, or “The Edward M. Kennedy Serve America Act.” This bill amended the National and Community Service Act of 1990 and the Domestic Volunteer Service Act of 1973 by revising programs and appropriations for them. In order to originally implement the Serve America Act, President Obama requested and received $1.149 billion, and a requested budget of $1.4 billion.

This bill can certainly be considered a first step towards forced service to the government. It created a Congressional Commission on Civic Service that would explore whether or not a reasonable MANDATORY service requirement for all able young people could be developed. We outlawed slavery with the 13th Amendment. “Neither slavery or involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.”

Here are some of the more troublesome provisions summarized below:

 Establishes Youth Engagement Zones to involve middle and high school students in community service.

 Establishes the Education Corps to improve schools, the Healthy Futures Corps to serve unmet health needs within communities, the Clean Energy Corps to work on energy projects, the Veterans Corps to work with veterans and their families, and the Opportunity Corps to work with the economically disadvantaged.

 Establishes the Serve America Fellowship to assist with areas of national need, as determined by the State Commission on National and Community Service.

 Creates the National Service Reserve Corps of former national service participants and veterans who are capable of being called into service in the event of disaster or other emergencies.

 Establishes the Social Innovation Fund, National Service Programs Clearinghouses, and Volunteer Generation Fund to help local groups train, develop, and maintain volunteers.

Does any of this trouble anyone else? Unless I am mistaken, volunteering to help your community is just that…volunteering. How does mandated (forced) volunteering help develop our youth into responsible citizens when it makes it a requirement to graduate from school? When kids are forced to do these things, will it make them more or less willing to volunteer in their community?

Sure, as parents we all want our children to grow up and be responsible and honorable citizens of their communities. Having the government mandate or socially engineer their behavior is disturbing. It would be a very short step to include mandatory military service in future bills as expansions to this one. Representative Charlie Rangel submits a bill each year to do just that. It is only a matter of time until it passes. One of the provisions of his bill would authorize the induction of those “volunteers” into the uniformed services during wartime.

While Congressman Platts was not an original co-sponsor of the bill, he voted in favor of passing this when it reached the House floor both times it came up for votes. There is no Constitutional authority for legislation such as this. I would not vote for such legislation, and I would most assuredly speak out against it. Mandatory service to the government does not constitute a republic form of government, nor a democratic one at that. Mandatory service to the State falls under a fascist form of government.

This week was yet another week lost without Congressman Platts submitting a bill to return our lost liberties, regain fiscal sanity, bring our troops home, or return our government to its Constitutional limitations. This is one of the main reasons that I am challenging him in the 2012 elections. To my knowledge, he has never submitted one bill that would greatly affect a return to the principles above. He consistently submits or supports small pieces of legislation that further regulate every facet of our lives.

Follow my campaign at mikeforpa.com and the home page of the York County Libertarian Party: yorklp.org.
For Liberty,
Mike Koffenberger
Libertarian Candidate for the U.S. House of Representatives

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