Posts Tagged → 1775
US Army Corps of Engineers: America’s Black Hole in Need of Cosmic Level Fixing
Because it is a relatively small part of our big military and kept in a dusty back room far from the shiny B-2 bombers, the US Army Corps of Engineers has been off the radar of legislators and commanders-in-chief alike since George Washington ended his presidency. But in the intervening 250 years since its founding, the USACE has gone from building bridges for troops and cannons, to aggressively stealing private property rights and forcing a Marxist environmentalist agenda on domestic citizens under the guise of “civil works.” Of all the federal agencies I have dealt with professionally and personally, including USEPA where I worked for seven years, the USACE has had the biggest mission creep in the worst directions of all. So, for USACE’s 250th birthday this year, can we please give Americans a gift of freedom, and see this most hidebound, insular, destructive, over-reaching, and unaccountable agency finally get the keelhaul overhaul that Americans deserve?
Not that I am rooting for Navy here, but our sacred Army has no business getting its good hands dirty with the USACE’s lawlessness. Big change must happen there, and with fresh new appointees from the Trump Administration, hope should be on the horizon. I hope these appointees are tough as nails, because they are facing a deeply entrenched bureaucracy as jealous of its ill-gotten power as any other federal agency has been, and they have the arrogant, dismissive staff culture to show for it.
USACE “manages” 12.5 million acres of formerly private land, much of it associated with water projects for hydropower, flood control, and public recreation. Sounds useful and wholesome enough: Waterskiing, fishing, hiking, families picnicking, with downstream communities protected from heavy rains up in the watersheds. Problem is, most of USACE’s flood control lakes are heavily silted in and barely functioning as advertised or designed. And probably 95% of this enormous land collection was obtained at gunpoint, through eminent domain against private American landowners, including the Seneca Nation, who still have a formal land treaty with the US government that was reached with George Washington himself, and which the USACE violated.
Absolutely nothing and no one is sacred to the USACE; not the US Constitution, not us citizens, not our property rights.
Anyone familiar with federal eminent domain knows it is rife with abuse and below-market values forced on private landowners for the most frivolous purposes. And while some federal agencies will attempt to reach willing-seller-willing-buyer agreements before going nuclear, the USACE just used legal sledgehammers against American landowners right from the get-go, because screwdrivers have never been in their toolbox.
But the situation is worse than just USACE’s rampant takings of privately owned lands that could have easily served the USACE’s goals while remaining in private ownership. Back in the 1950s-1970s good ol’ days of “Big Government Knows Best,” when the agency was most active, the USACE also stripped many of its condemned properties of their valuable subsurface oil, gas and or mineral rights, too, without paying for them. Not content with taking the surface rights for managing surface water, the agency simply took what it wanted and dared the beaten-down landowners to try to beat them in government courts. Today, millions of Americans are deprived of substantial and highly valuable subsurface private property rights at nearly every single USACE water resource project. These oil, gas, and mineral rights should be in their families’ private ownership, but are wasting away under USACE theft and neglect.
A group of military engineers and their civilian hangers-on have no business running public recreation facilities on American soil. The USACE’s job started as support of military combat troops in 1775, and it is incredible that we are having this discussion in 2025. The marrying of USACE hydroelectric dams and flood control facilities to public service recreation has not worked, because the agency’s staff developed a culture of untouchable bullies. The US military is not supposed to operate on American soil, for damned good reasons, but the USACE does so, with predictably bad results.
USACE is over-ripe for huge change. At the very least USACE needs the deep cleaning treatment of staff and structure that chief administrator Lee Zeldin is doing over at USEPA. USACE’s “civil works” must be spun off to actual civilian oversight and management in the agencies that have historically done this kind of public service and natural resource management. Nearly all of USACE’s physical assets should be moved to the Bureau of Land Management, the National Park Service, and the US Forest Service, all of which have much better track records dealing with public service than the USACE. Which is saying a lot, because all of these federal agencies have had real rough patches in their public land management history and public service interface cultures, too.
Josh First wrote his 1991 master’s thesis on the USACE’s nationwide water resource projects, and, ironically, has randomly ended up owning substantial acreages adjoining two USACE water resource projects in Pennsylvania as an entrepreneur. He will write about his own related experiences with USACE in future essays.
This essay originally appeared at American Thinker.
April 15th Tax Day vs April 19th Freedom Day
Today is April 15th, AKA “Tax Day,” because income tax reports are due to be submitted to the IRS by close-of-business today. Or at least American taxpayers are required to submit a somewhat detailed extension request today, because America’s tax laws and regulations are incredibly arcane and complicated. Everyone deserves the same opportunity to file the most law-abiding self-benefiting income tax report they can do.
(This is why I use a certified public accountant. There is no possible way in a zillion years that I would ever be able to fully understand or properly apply the tax laws and regulations to the income I have earned over the year. Yes, I have a very understanding CPA, someone who works with me, who goes over line items. The cost is worth it to me, given the potential consequences for making even small mistakes.)
April 15th symbolizes the government’s Sheriff of Nottingham coming to take away our money and our things, by threat of force. Nothing says “You are a serf and a powerless peasant” like having to bow and scrape before the mighty tax collector. It is worth noting that Senator Joni Ernst (R-IA) has submitted legislation that will remove all armed law enforcement roles and duties that the IRS has somehow accreted over the years, and sell off the agency’s weapons and ammunition. Isn’t it strange that the IRS of all agencies has amassed a huge armory and stockpile of ammunition?
Contrast today, April 15th Oppressive Government Compliance Tax Day, with the upcoming April 19th, which I am hereby naming Freedom Day. It is strange that we rarely ever hear about April 19th as a holiday or even a day of note, even though our great American freedom started exactly 250 years ago on April 19th…
On April 19th, an armed dispute erupted between American colonists and the British Army, in the towns of Lexington and Concord, Massachusetts, outside of Boston. What came to be known as “The shot heard ’round the world” was fired April 19th, 1775, on the Lexington town green. It is unknown who exactly fired this first shot, Minute Man or British regular, but what ensued was the beginning of the American experiment in democratic rule: Government of, by and for The People, and nor by king or powerful army.
What is most noteworthy about the April 19th fatal confrontation beween the colonists’ militia men and the British “regulars” is that the individual American citizens were almost as well armed as the Redcoats. Each militia member carried a long gun, an edged weapon like a long hunting knife or a short sword or a hatchet, and plenty of lead and black powder ammunition for a prolonged fight. British military personnel were armed with the latest and best of all weapons, but the quality of the Patriots’ armaments were often not too far behind.
This model of the 1775 Minute Man militia member has stood the test of time, as a great many Americans today are also well armed and well provisioned with ammunition. This model of an armed free citizen, capable of standing up to an oppressive and lawless government, was later enshrined in the 1787-1789 Second Amendment to the Constitution, which guarantees that all Americans can own and openly carry firearms at all times.
To me, what a strange and wonderful juxtaposition this week represents: Oppressive Tax Day backed by government force, vs. Freedom Day, the day that individual Americans collectively stood up for all oppressed individuals around the world. I think the takeaway message of this week is this: Pay your taxes, but keep your family well armed and always prepared, and always coordinate with those who share your freedom-loving views.
Some evocative images of April 19th 1775 and the resulting Bunker Hill battle by artist Don Troiani:
Artist Don Troiani’s depiction of the Minute Man patriots at the Lexington Green, April 19th 1775
Artist Don Troiani’s depiction of the Patriot militia at the Concord Bridge on April 19th, 1775
Artist Don Troiani’s depiction of the American patriots at the Battle of Bunker Hill