Constitutional Sheriff in Indiana stares down the feds; the feds blink

Heroic interposition of County Sheriff in Elkhart IN between upstanding citizen running a dairy farm and the FDA officials who are intent to stop him from selling his milk, claiming illnesses were traced back to his dairy. There is no objective evidence to support the FDA claim, according to the source of this story. The feds just pulled their subpoena on the farm owner, Mr. Hochstetler:

"...While it's not clear exactly what kind of maneuvering led to the federal pullback, one factor working for Hochstetler may have been the efforts of his county sheriff, Brad Rogers of Elkhart County. He wrote two letters to the Justice Department warning it not to conduct inspections of Hochstetler's farm without a warrant from a local judge. In the process, he got into a debate over the limits of federal power and the U.S. Constitution with the Justice Department's Goldstein.


Earlier this month, Rogers emailed Goldstein that there had been "a number of inspections and attempted inspections on (Hochstetler's) farm..." He warned that "any further attempts to inspect this farm without a warrant signed by a local judge, based on probable cause, will result in Federal inspectors' removal or arrest for trespassing by my officers or I."


That prompted Goldstein to cite the U.S. Constitution's "Supremacy Clause," which he said "has been interpreted since the earliest days of this nation to mean that federal law trumps state law whenever the two conflict."


Goldstein argued further that the Federal Food Drug and Cosmetic Act allowed federal agents "to enter Mr. Hochstetler's property...without a warrant at all--pursuant to a long line of federal cases..." Moreover, he warned the sheriff that federal agents could arrest him-- "that the 'refusal to permit entry or inspection as authorized by section 374' is in itself a federal criminal offense, which under certain circumstances is a felony punishable by imprisonment for up to three years..."


The Goldstein letter prompted Rogers to reply, in a letter just being sent today, "When you assert that federal law trumps state law, it is a distortion of the intent, content and extent of the supreme law of the land--the U.S. Constitution-seen through a myopic and misunderstood view of Article VI, section 2 (The Supremacy Clause)."


He also asserted that "the Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act could be deemed unconstitutional if and when challenged vis-a-vis the Tenth Amendment juxtaposed with The Commerce Clause."


He added that "our form of government was based on the principle that all officials exist to secure 'Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness.'...Your 'cosmetic' regulations will never 'trump' those principles. The citizen in question is a good man and has committed no crime. He is an upstanding member of this community. He does not have to allow you access to his property for the FDA to conduct random inspections."

Sheriff Brad Rogers, Elkhart IN

Heroic stand.  Sheriff Rogers deserves our praise and support. 


Sheriff Mack is right, Constitutional Sheriffs and the Tenth Amendment are the path back to the republic.


Original article here


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