("Quid coniuratio est?")
OPENING STATEMENT OF JOHN TROCHMANN
On Thursday, June 15, 1995, some members of the various, unorganized militias testified before the Senate Terrorism Subcommittee. One of those who testified was John Trochmann of the Militia of Montana. The following is my transcript of his opening statement. Note that what follows is not the official transcript of Trochmann's remarks.
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JOHN TROCHMANN:
Greetings from Montana.
It is sad that this opportunity to address the Senate has arisen out of the Oklahoma tragedy. We wholeheartedly denounce the deplorable act of violence. We have and will continue to assist in any manner to apprehend all persons that may have planned and/or carried out that dastardly deed, at whatever level they may hide.
At the present time, we view the militia movement as a giant "neighborhood watch". The movement is made up of a cross-section of Americans, from all walks of life, with a singular mandate which is public and overt: the return to the Constitution of the United States, and to your oath to defend that Constitution.
The Declaration of Independence gives excellent insight as to why people feel the need to group together and participate in militia/patriot organizations. This document speaks for itself once again, as it did over 200 years ago, when flagrant injustice continues, out of control, by oppressive public servants. We request that this document be entered into the permanent record, as a partial support document to our statements.
The following are just a few examples as to why Americans are becoming more and more involved in militia/patriot organizations:
** The high office of the Presidency has been turned into a position of dictatorial oppression, through the abusive use of executive orders and directives, thus leaving Congress stripped of its authority. When the President over-rules Congress by executive order, representative government fails.
** When government defines human beings as a biological resource of the United Nations Ecosystem Management Program, maintaining that state and local laws are barriers to the goals of federal government; when the average citizen must work for the half of each year, just to pay their taxes, while billions of our tax dollars are forcibly sent to bail out the banking elite, while fellow Americans are homeless, starving and without jobs, Congress wonders why their constituents get upset.
** When government allows our military to be ordered and controlled by foreigners, under Presidential order, allowing foreign armies to train on our soil, allowing our military to label caring patriots as the enemy, then turns their tanks loose on U.S. citizens, to murder and destroy, or directs its sniper to shoot a mother in the face while holding her infant in her arms -- you bet your constituents get upset.
** When government refuses to hold hearings on government- sanctioned abuses, and whitewashes those hearings that are held; when government tampers with or destroys evidence needed to solve crime, and now considers the very idea of infringing upon the people's right of freedom of speech, assembly, and the right to redress -- after having destroyed the second and fourth articles -- how can Senators and Representatives ever question the loyalty of concerned Americans without first cleaning their own house?
"The law perverted and the police powers of the state perverted along with it; the law not only turns from its proper purpose, but made to follow a totally contrary purpose; the law becomes a weapon of every kind of greed. Instead of checking crime, the law itself becomes guilty of the evils it's supposed to pursue."
-- Frenchman, Frederic Bastier(sp?), 1884
We, the people, have about had all we can stand of the twisted, slanted, biased media of America, who take their signals from a few private, covert, special interest groups bent on destroying what's left of the American way. We respectfully request that you rely upon your own investigations, steering clear of the media and their rumor-gossip mills of disinformation. Although almost everyone in the movement has assembled under the first amendment -- freedom of speech and freedom to peaceably assemble -- we have not forgotten what our Founding Fathers have stated about the second [amendment]:
Former President James Madison: "A well-regulated militia, composed of the body of the people trained to arms, is the best and most natural defense of a free country."
Former Vice-President [Unclear] Gary(sp?): "I ask: What is the purpose of the militia? To offset the need of large, standing armies, the bane of liberty."
Why would he call the armed forces "the bane of liberty"? Who is the Pentagon waging activities against after campaigns to win over the populace -- and why? Why does military Civil Affairs manual 4110 seem to be so applicable in America today? (Paraphrasing) "Steps Necessary For The Overthrow Of A Nation".
May God be with America as He watches over the shoulders of you who write her laws. A nation can survive its fools and even the ambitious. But it cannot survive treason from within. America has nothing to fear from patriots maintaining vigilance. She should, however, fear those that would outlaw vigilance.
Thank you.
I encourage distribution of "Conspiracy Nation."
Coming to you from Illinois -- "The Land of Skolnick"