Articles

This article first appeared in the wall 2023 edition of Sword&Scales. This year California legislators tried to create new criminal penalties for parents who "harass" school board officials or disrupt school board meetings. The legislators drafted a vague bill that defined harassment as two or more acts directed at an education official. Pot ...

2023 was a particularly big year for Pacific Legal Foundation. We celebrated our 50th birthday, which gave us the opportunity to reflect on moments that made PLF what we are today. Since 1973, we have had the privilege of changing lives: We've helped our clients challenge unjust government actions in the court of law and the court of public opin ...

This article first appeared in the winter 2023 edition of Sword&Scales. The birth of a child is a sacred experience in a mother's life. How and where she chooses to bring her baby into the world is a deeply personal decision that should be free from government interference. Yet in some states, certificate-of-need (CON) laws stand between ...

This article first appeared in the winter 2023 edition of Sword&Scales. In the mid-nineties, Jerry Thompson was headhunted for a Texas company that paid good money. He was a whiz at sales. So he moved his wife, Theresa, and two kids from Michigan to Texas. He loved living in Texas. But two years in, he couldn't stand his job. Why'd you ...

On December 16, 1773—250 years ago—Samuel Adams gathered an angry crowd in Boston. Three ships loaded with East India Company tea were docked in Boston Harbor.   One ship, the Dartmouth, had been docked for 20 days while the people of Boston protested and argued. That day, December 16, was the day the conflict would inevitably boil over—b ...

This article first appeared in the winter 2023 edition of Sword&Scales. Imagine you are a young child living in Salem, Massachusetts, in 1692. You are brought into a crowded meetinghouse where two magistrates—both commanding older men who serve on the council of Massachusetts Bay Colony—are waiting to interrogate you in front of an an ...

The Small Business Administration (SBA) is deliberately circumventing a nationwide injunction in Ultima Services Corp. v. Dept. of Agriculture—a case litigated by the Center for Individual Rights (CIR)—to stop racial preferences in the SBA's 8(a) program, which makes "socially and economically disadvantaged" small business owners eligible for c ...

Brian Wanner is the owner of Peters Brothers Trucking in Lenhartsville, Pennsylvania. But on some of the most important decisions facing his business he doesn't call the shots. Instead, he takes orders from regulators . . . in California — a state he doesn't even do business in. That's because the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protecti ...

This article first appeared in the winter 2023 edition of Sword&Scales. At 2:07 A.M. on Saturday, July 16, 2022, Sarah Perkins texted the family group chat: CPS just took custody. Her sister-in-law Dia wrote back: No no no no. Custody of both kids? Her brother-in-law Brian wanted to know. At 1:00 in the morning? They drove off ...