Objective of Government
That the sole object and only legitimate end of government is to protect the citizen in the enjoyment of life, liberty, and property, and when the government assumes other functions it is usurpation and oppression. Alabama Constitution: Section 35
A chronology of United Nations (UN) land management philosophy and how it was transferred to the local government level.
INTRODUCTION
The origin and evolution of environmental influence upon US domestic land use policy is poorly understood by most politicians and virtually unknown to the general public.
This historical "connect the dots" timeline reveals how a series of international treaties has altered the American tradition of private property rights. These treaties resulting in federal mandates have gradually been assimilated into societal thinking through the legislative process and environmentally driven concerns characteristic of municipally popular "comprehensive planning". Herein is described how Athens, Al., like many other cities, has fallen victim to this deception.
The result is a socialistic restructured vision for ever increasing government controlled land management that ignores the sovereignty of individual land ownership.
The people who insist that the UN has no control over our land use policies, including those in Congress, either don't know, or don't want others to know, how the system works.
This is the truth behind "comprehensive planning", the connection that you and local politicians are not supposed to see:
Circa 1962, Proponents of government ownership and control of land use align with IUCN (International Union for the Conservation of Nature). The IUCN was founded by Julian Huxley who also founded UNESCO (United Nations Education Scientific and Cultural Organization) which the US has recently rejoined. The IUCN of Switzerland then became a proponent of land control by international treaty in order to circumvent the US Constitution and legislative system. [1]
1971, The IUCN plays a key roll in the development of the first UN Treaty on wetlands, adopted in Ramsar, Iran. [1]
1973, The IUCN is successful in persuading the UN to adopt its treaty on endangered species, establishing UN global policy on wetlands, endangered species and biosphere reserves. (Washington, DC 1973) [1]
1976, The UN establishes general policy on land use at the UN Conference on Human Settlements (HABITAT 1), Vancouver, B.C., Canada. Stating: "Land cannot be treated as an ordinary asset...public control of land use is therefore indispensable..." At this point the land use doctrine of the non-American world became the norm of international law with the support of the US Government. [1]
1979, At the direction of President Carter the US State Department entered into agreement with UNESCO to create a US man and biosphere program. Without congressional or state legislature approval, 47 UN biosphere reserves were quietly designated in the US. [1] (The Smokey Mountains National Park is a well known example.) Covering more than 70 million acres this agreement is the basis for the Wildlands Project which restricts the use of public land while seeking to acquire ever more private property through regulation. [5] Regulatory mechanisms like the Clean Water Initiative give the federal government jurisdiction over private land adjacent to streams broadening the scope of the earlier wetland policy. The Critical Habitat (Endangered Species Act) allows government to declare private land "critical" to a species thereby dictating how the land may be used. [1]
1981, The US is party to the UN Convention on Biological Diversity which codified the global objective of wildlife predominance and the movement of people into "sustainable communities". [2] From this came the term "sustainable development" officially adopted in 1987 by the UN World Conference on Environment and Development report entitled "Our Common Future". [3] NOTE: The Athens Comprehensive Master Plan adopted
December 2003, contains numerous references to "sustainability". Examples:
"Environmental Sustainability" page 4-21, "Sustainable Neighborhoods" page 4-26. [4]
Throughout the 1980s the IUCN further consolidated its influence on US domestic land use policy by recruiting over 60 major US environmental organizations such as The Sierra Club and The Nature Conservancy. [2] The IUCN also includes seven (7) departments of the federal government [2], such as the EPA, the US Forest Service [1], US Fish and Wildlife Service [2], and the Bureau of Land Management.
1992, The IUCN authors Agenda 21 adopted in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil at the UN Earth Summit Conference on Environment and Development. Agenda 21 is an official policy list designed to reorganize societies around environmental priorities utilizing local government for implementation via ordinances. [1] [3] The US is signatory to this international treaty with over 100 other countries. Vice-President Dan Quayle was the designated signer for the US.
1993, With lack of congressional ratification of Agenda 21 [1] [3], President Clinton creates, by executive order, the President's Council on Sustainable Development to translate Agenda 21 into domestic policy. [2] With seven (7) federal agencies already involved, transfer of "sustainable policy" to state and local government begins. [2]
With implementation at the local level being central to Agenda 21, federal agencies exerted the tenets of "sustainable development" through a maze of environmental regulations promoted under the concept of "smart growth" [2], a term intended to appeal to rapidly growing cities such as Athens, AL.
To encourage city councils to adopt these restrictive "smart growth" plans, federal money incentives provide an irresistible lure (never mind the resulting federal control).
Having created such an attractive combination of incentives, growth management and politically correct environmentalism, local elected officials everywhere are now clamoring to purchase a professionally produced "smart growth" outline commonly known as a "comprehensive plan". Athens, AL was no exception. According to the Minnesota publication From Policy to Reality: Model Ordinances for Sustainable Development, a community's "comprehensive plan" is the first step in implementation of "smart growth" and "sustainable development". [6] Agenda 21 cannot succeed without "sustainable development" in place.
The suppliers of these plans, firms such as Barge, Waggoner, Sumner and Cannon Inc. (the architect of the Athens Comprehensive Master Plan) at the behest of federal agencies (now the "arm" of treaty implementation) have incorporated Agenda 21 with its "sustainable development" and "smart growth" principles into "comprehensive plans" since the early 1990s. This is why "comprehensive plans" appear strikingly similar everywhere except for the name of the plan and the name of the city.
The result: Athens, Al. unknowingly purchased, for $85,000 and adopted December 22, 2003, a private property restrictive "comprehensive plan" fashioned around an international concept of land management born of a UN
treaty that the US should never have signed. Thus, the incremental destruction of property rights in favor of "sustainable development" is underway in Athens, AL - financed by your tax dollars and promoted by
ignorant-local politicians.
The disassociation of "comprehensive planning" from this socialistic international influence is deliberate and clearly described in Agenda 21 to AVOID DETECTION by local officials. [3] In the case of Athens, AL City
Council and Planning Commission, it worked remarkably well.
Athens, AL is not alone. Virtually every state and community has been targeted to undergo a similar transformation into what Science Magazine described in 1993 as "the transformation of America to an archipelago of human inhabited islands surrounded by natural areas". (page 1868)
Across the land, Agenda 21 is being implemented. Elected officials at every level are being co-opted by the sophistication of a well-devised international strategy that is being implemented LOCALLY. [3] Absent from
all these visions of the future is a fundamental value on which America was built: the sovereignty of individual property ownership; the basis for personal wealth.
CONCLUSION
This land-management transformation of America was designed by the IUCN in Switzerland, adopted by the UN and due to US treaty obligations being systematically implemented across Alabama and in every state, by
bureaucrats and environmentalists (NGOs, Non-governmental organizations) who have no accountability at the ballot box. Elected officials, who are accountable, are allowing and assisting the transformation to go forward.
The politicians at every level who are responsible, should be removed from office. Their replacements should be constitutional statesmen who understand and respect the essence of freedom embodied in our Founders'
vision of private property ownership.
"Sustainable development" (smart growth) is government-managed development. [7] "Comprehensive planning", whatever name it goes by, has become the vehicle of implementation for "sustainable development".
Armed with a full understanding of Agenda 21 and its corrosive effect on freedom, local grassroots organizations are confronting elected officials and winning battles for freedom. The "Smart Growth" legislation
proposed in Kentucky was soundly defeated. A Sierra Club-sponsored "Smart Growth" initiative in Arizona was also soundly defeated. Sanibel, Florida withdrew its endorsement of the Earth Charter. Florida's five-year
"Sustainable Development" pilot program was not renewed. [7]
With increasing frequency, freedom-loving individuals are interjecting themselves into "visioning councils," and "stakeholder councils" to insist that property rights and individual freedom be identified, valued and
protected in all visions of the future. [7]
Freedom cannot survive "sustainable development". But then - "sustainable development" cannot survive in a free society. Every candidate in every election should be asked to publicly declare their commitment to a free
society, or a sustainable society. [7]
You are not truly free when the government controls your land. This subversion of one of our basic liberties was decades in the making; it will require years of unrelenting activism to reverse and eternal vigilance to preserve.
REFERENCES
[1] "Why The Government Is Grabbing Our Land" by: Henry Lamb - The Beacon July 2003. (Henry Lamb is the Executive Vice President of the Environmental Conservation Organization, Chairman of Sovereignty International, a nationally known advocate of private property rights and regular attendee of international UN conferences/summits.)
[2] "United Nations Report - UN influence in Alabama" by: Henry Lamb -Canada Free Press, www.unwatch.com/un-alabama.html, May 22, 2003. "UN Influence in Alabama" by Henry Lamb - The Ecologic Powerhouse, page 20, August 2003.
[3] "Sustainable Communities - Under Construction Everywhere". eco-logic January/February 1998, www.sovereignty.net/p/sd/suscom.htm.
[4] The Athens Comprehensive Master Plan by: Barge, Waggoner, Sumner & Cannon, Inc., December 2003, pages 4-21, 4-26.
[5] "UN Land Grab In The Works" by: Henry Lamb - WorldNetDaily.com October 12, 2002.
[6] From Policy to Reality: Model Ordinances for Sustainable Development - Minnesota Environmental Quality Board. September 2000 (page 6 and page 46).
[7] "Unsustainable Freedom" by Henry Lamb - The Welch Report, May 2002.
Permission to reprint this letter to the editor may be obtained from the author by contacting ALG.
