Musician sues over Houston’s ban on busking

Tony Barilla is an accomplished accordionist who wishes to busk—that is, play in public for tips—in the streets of Houston. But Houston bans performing for tips in most of the city. And in the few blocks where performing for tips is allowed, performers must secure a permit and permission from abutting property owners of the performance site, establishing a “heckler’s veto” over the busker’s speech.

The First Amendment, however, protects Tony’s right to earn extra money while engaging in free expression. So now, he’s fighting back.

Read More

The Magna Carta offered more property protection than modern U.S. states

Eight dollars and 41 cents. About the cost of a Chipotle burrito. That’s how much Uri Rafaeli owed the treasury in Wayne County, Michigan, for property taxes. To get that $8.41, the county took his house and sold it for $24,500 (or about 3,000 burritos). They kept every penny for themselves.

There is a word for this practice: theft. And writing for the Foundation for Economic Education, David Deerson explains that Wayne County is not the only one winning big on the minuscule mistakes of the little guy: it’s every county in Michigan and in a dozen other states, as well.

Read More

The Hill: EPA appeals board is unconstitutional without reform

Democratic accountability is a cardinal principle in a constitutional republic. Requiring government actors to be answerable to the people protects the public from arbitrary and tyrannical governance. Though safeguarded by the Appointments Clause, these principles have been ignored in recent decades, enabling massive growth in the regulatory state.

As Michael Poon explains in The Hill, the result is myriad unaccountable bureaucrats with significant authority, including the Environmental Appeals Board—an arm of the EPA that’s handled administrative appeals of permitting decisions and civil enforcement actions since its stealth creation in 1992.

Read More

Federal lawsuit aims to protect private ranch property and a unique way of life

Hollister Ranch, California, is widely known for its 150 years as a working cattle ranch, and its biologically significant coastal habitat spread across miles of shoreline.

A new state law, however, empowers the California Coastal Commission and other state agencies to devise new public beach access plans that would threaten the ranch’s right to privacy, upend longtime conservation efforts, and destroy a host of constitutional rights.

To protect their privacy, property rights, the environment, and coastal resources, and to uphold existing constitutional rights, Hollister Ranch property owners are challenging the law in federal court.

Read More