From the February 2000 Idaho Observer:

Martial law is coming -- one city at a time

Help us to draw your sleeping countrymen a map

by Don Harkins

City councils all across the country are passing emergency powers ordinances -- all of which are nearly identical in form and content. The ordinances empower the nation's unelected city administrators (city managers) to take complete control of town functions during a declared state of emergency. The ordinances also turn municipal emergency administrators into agents of the federal government in the event of a declared state of national emergency.

The Idaho Observer became aware of this serious threat to our way of life in the winter of 1998 and by the time we printed, “Has your city adopted this 'emergency' ordinance (The Idaho Observer, April, 1999)” the problem had become much worse.

While most sovereignty-conscious Americans are awaiting some overt sign that will signal the commencement of a brave new age of global socialism, the infrastructure for our collective enslavement is quietly being laid, city by city, all across this still sleeping nation.

We believe that almost every city council in America has adopted such sweeping emergency powers or is seriously considering granting themselves those powers.

The replacement of elected government officials with unelected administrators is metropolitan government. Metropolitan government was exposed in the late 50s by Jo Hindman (Terrible 1313, Terrible 1313 Revisited, The Metrocrats and Blame it on Metro) and Joe Spenner in the early 90s (Rockefeller Regionalism: The Shadow Behind Oregon's LCDC). This unconstitutional form of government is being implemented all over the country -- particularly in the nation's more densely populated areas such as Chicago, New York, Los Angeles, Portland and Seattle.

Metro is pitched to citizens as a way to reduce taxes by streamlining government services in overlapping city, state and county jurisdictions. Unwitting citizens then vote to provide for the hiring of “expert professionals” to eliminate costly redundancies in government services. Once in office, these unelected “experts” begin exercising ever-increasing amounts of policy-making power over an ever-widening spectrum of municipal activity.

The true purpose of metropolitan government, as stated by its architects, is to replace elected officials who are answerable to the citizen at the voting booth with hired professionals who are answerable only to those few people in a community who are able use their power and influence to secure the appointment of preferred professionals.

According to several municipal emergency powers ordinances we have seen, the city manager, upon assumption of emergency powers in a declared state of emergency, is empowered to shut down utilities, close stores, barricade streets, declare curfews, ration food and other necessary items and mobilize police agencies and soldiers. The non-elected city manager will also be the point man to interface with federal agencies such as the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA).

In a declared state of national emergency, FEMA has been granted, through legislation and executive orders such as EO 12919, the power to take control of and administrate crises on a national level.

FEMA will dictate the activities of your emergency-empowered administrator and will allocate emergency funding to your community based upon its level of cooperation with federal agencies.

While most of America sleeps and while those of us who are awake are awaiting an obvious sign that the New World Order has arrived, the groundwork for the military occupation of America is being laid by our local leaders.

Strength in numbers

Between readers of The Idaho Observer and other concerned Americans all over this country who subscribe to alternative publications, there is at least one of us in almost every town from coast to coast. However loosely affiliated, we represent the only group of Americans who are positioned to stop the quiet construction of occupational machinery in our beloved country.

Go to your city hall. Find out if your city has passed an emergency powers ordinance or if passage of such an ordinance is being considered. The ordinance will be publicly available at city hall as a part of your city's municipal code. Some cities have a website that posts city codes and other public information.

Make two copies of the ordinance; keep one for your records and send the other to: The Idaho Observer, PO Box 1353, Rathdrum, Idaho 83858-1353. Include your name and a phone number where you can be reached in case verification becomes necessary.

We will then, on a map of the United States, stick pins in the towns whose elected officials have passed model ordinances that give dictatorial power to an unelected city manager or city administrator during a declared state of emergency.

We need to have copies of these ordinances postmarked by March 15, 2000, so that we can process this information and alert the nation by May 15, 2000.

It is our duty as Americans to expose the machinery that is being built to facilitate the occupation of our sovereign states by federal forces. Please take charge of finding the emergency powers ordinance in your city and help us in this most urgent endeavor.