Property in Canada in the 21st Century

All my life, I have fought for the rights of the individual against the power of the state. I have never fought a battle where I wasn’t out-gunned, out-horsed, out-manoeuvred, out-manned, and out-supplied by the enemy. The state and its endless minions have all the money they ever require to take away the rights of the individual. The individual stands alone.

It is, however, the individual, not the mass of any state that makes the state great or small, significant or insignificant. England without Drake, Churchill, Sir Walter Raleigh, Captain Cook, Wellington, or Nelson might be England, but what would it be in the world of conquest? England without Chaucer, Shakespeare, Milton, Wesley, Newman, Woolsley, Byron, Tennyson, and many other great writers would still be England, but where would it be in the world of literature?

The great statesman, warriors, poets, priests… It was their individual achievements which shine in history. It was the great Romans from Cicero to Seneca who made the history of Rome great, not the mass minions of subservient, obedient slaves. Freedom is their one distinction. They lived in societies where they could buy, beg, borrow, or steal the freedom they needed, and thus could rise to who they really were – divine creators of the great destiny of man. Nothing else will ever change the world for the better. Why did they strive to so achieve? Because they desired to better themselves and acquire property, in the main. Without property, none could or would have the time and leisure to create anything. They would be busy with the necessities of life.

What distinguishes an Indian reserve, with its uniform under-cared for homes and mess? Is it really race or culture which is so indelibly fixed in the Indian psyche? No, race and culture quickly adapt and adopt, as is the case today. Few Indians today could survive as their ancestors did, having too often adopted the lethargy so easily available in modern culture in Canada and North America. Is it the lack of enough government funds to build new homes as the old ones deteriorate from lack of care? No, it is the lack of individual ownership of private property, which would motivate each individual to take pride and care of what they have earned and own.
The destruction of private property, be it by overt arbitrary, brutal forfeiture, or forfeiture by the gradual increase in taxation will eventually result in the equal distribution of poverty.

Why do we work? For money, so we can buy nice things for ourselves and those we love. The nice things are property. This gives us comfort, joy, satisfaction, and security which the state cannot give. Living in a state-funded apartment quickly deteriorates into living in a violent, drug-ridden ghetto. Without respect for, and security of property, all life, all work, all human endeavours become equally worthless and meaningless.

What we do to the Montague property, we can and will do to anyone else’s property. I am, at present, and have been since Monday the 14th of November, for the last two days, in a courtroom in Kenora, Ontario, deciding whether about $120,000 worth of firearms and other personal property is forfeit to the state because Mr. and Mrs. Montague possessed it without a license to possess it from and issued by the government. That, simply put, is the crime of the Montagues for which Mr. Montague was sent to jail for eighteen months, and Mrs. Montague was to forfeit all her firearms. They did not commit a crime with the firearms, have never threatened anyone’s security with the firearms, and did not take anyone’s property with the firearms. They held the firearms without a license from the government.

In ancient Rome, property was secure. In Rome of the decline of the 4th Century AD, magistrates would multiply laws to create new offences, to confiscate property to pay the magistrates. Law can become an extortion racket through civil forfeiture, through arbitrary forfeiture, created by regulatory offences.

Newer and various forms of the modern version of the decline of Rome is accomplished by the legislation called civil forfeiture laws, which make it possible for the state to take from the individual property for criminal offences that are deemed to have occurred in relation to or in connection with firearms for the mere act of possessing them. In some cases, this may be justified. In other cases, it may not. However, the arbitrary actions of the government in passing Section 491(1)(b), have determined that no court shall ever have discretion to decide whether the firearms should be forfeit to the government or not. As it’s written, it automatically occurs, whether it is justified in fact or not in the circumstances. No court is allowed to consider that issue.

One of the more frightening aspects of this arbitrary law, and of the interpretation of it placed on that legislation by the prosecution, were the words in the factum of the Crown attorney: “the Bill of Rights is just another statute. The Bill of Rights, although it has property rights included, is not of any effect on the legislation passed by Parliament.”

To hear those who advocate for the absolute dissolution of property of any kind, express their views, one can see how readily mobs could be swept along, out of ignorance, to the society in which the Soviet Union eventually was obliged to live. Those institutions based on the destruction of private property will eventually fail, because no society is greater than the individual, and no individual will work without the hope of earning private property. That’s why the Montague case is so significant. That’s why whatever happens to the Montague property could happen to your neighbours tomorrow and yours the day after.