Virginia

Yes, Virginia, there is a king, and he is the state


Citizens harmed by the policies and/or negligence of the state have no remedy under the law. 

Some Virginia communities have become aware that our state can (and does) do plenty of wrong, and that the state legislature and regulatory agencies always put the interests of corporations before the interests of the people.  They realize that their only remedy is to achieve local control, and that this requires challenging Dillon’s Rule, which maintains that political subdivisions of a state – counties, cities, towns – have no powers except those specifically bestowed upon them by the state.  Not surprisingly, Virginia is one of the 39 states that employ Dillon’s Rule – a concept that originated in a ruling by Iowa Supreme Court Judge John Dillon (a former railroad lawyer) in 1868, and was embraced in a 1907 US Supreme Court decision that state legislatures, and not the people, are sovereign.  Dillon’s Rule is not a statutory law enacted by elected governing bodies; it’s a judge-made law – the opinion of judges whose appointments and rulings are not subject to approval by the people.

So, with the assistance of the Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund, and armed with the Constitution of the Commonwealth of Virginia, which declares that, “all power is vested in, and consequently derived from, the people,” and the Code of Virginia, which states that “any county may adopt such measures as it deems expedient to secure and promote the health, safety, and general welfare of its inhabitants,” a handful of Virginia communities are organizing and demanding that their elected local governing bodies enact binding laws to protect the citizens and the environment from corporate assaults.  Virginia is, after all, a commonwealth – according to Merriam-Webster, “a nation, state or other political unit founded on law and united by compact of tacit agreement of the people for the common good; one in which supreme authority is vested in the people.”

Campbell County citizens presented to their board of supervisors an ordinance that would ban corporations from engaging in the land application of toxic out-of-state sewage sludge in the county.  Despite massive public support for the ordinance, however, the supervisors instead enacted an ordinance written and submitted by the sludge industry.

Montgomery County is under assault by Norfolk Southern Railroad Corporation and the Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation, which intend to construct a massive intermodal freight station in Elliston, one of three historic rural villages in an ecologically sensitive valley.  Adding insult to injury, the state has empowered Norfolk Southern Corporation to take private properties, against the owners’ will, via eminent domain.  Citizens organized in opposition, and presented the board of supervisors with an ordinance that would ban corporations from wielding eminent domain.  The county attorney advised the supervisors that, in his opinion, the ordinance is illegal – because of Dillon’s Rule, of course.  He’s written two letters to the Virginia attorney general, requesting permission for the board to move forward with the ordinance.  Six months have passed, and the attorney general has not responded.  He’ll never respond – he doesn’t have to.

In Botetourt County, citizens have organized in opposition to a Tennessee corporation’s proposed shale mine near the town of Eagle Rock, in one of the most scenic regions of the state.  The mine would level forested ridges and pollute sparkling streams.  Following a public presentation by CELDF’s Tom Linzey, the citizens decided to draft an ordinance that would ban corporations from engaging in mining without consent of local governing bodies.

The counties and communities bordering North Carolina, known as "Southside" Virginia recently were alarmed by the announcement that a huge uranium deposit discovered in the 1980s was being considered for widespread mining. The state legislature had passively blocked uranium mining by declining to establish regulation for the activity. This has been inaccurately referred to as a "moratorium" - and now that commercial uranium extraction appears to be financially viable, with federal support for renewed construction of nuclear reactors for energy production, the state has called for an industry supported study to establish that mining highly toxic radiological ores can be done "safely." People of Southside are broadly opposed, but denied their right to government at consent of the governed. In 2008 the town of Halifax adopted the Legal Defense Fund ordinance to ban such mining in the Town's jurisdiction and to establish corporate and individual liability for toxic trespass on human and natural communities.

In each of these communities, the citizens, threatened with devastating corporate assaults, have come to the realization that they have no remedy under the existing structure of law.  They now understand that, here in The Land of the Free, corporations are considered to be “persons” under the law, and that a corporation has all of the rights of a human being, with none of the responsibilities.  It’s clear that the right of a corporation to defile the environment and destroy the health and wellbeing of human communities for profit is inviolable.  These Virginians are aware that, when enough communities demand democratic local control, we’ll achieve it.

The Constitution of the Commonwealth of Virginia declares that “it shall be the Commonwealth’s policy to protect its atmosphere, lands, and waters from pollution, impairment, or destruction, for the benefit, enjoyment, and general welfare of the people of the Commonwealth,” and that, “government is, or ought to be, instituted for the common benefit, protection, and security of the people, nation, or community…and whenever any government shall be found inadequate or contrary to these purposes, a majority of the community hath an indubitable, inalienable, and indefeasible right to reform, alter, or abolish it.”

Yes, indeed.  Time to dethrone the king.