Alaskan Families are Being Harmed…
By Jessica Pleasant
Notice to International Readers: This site can be read in six languages. Just peck the popup at the bottom of the page to change from English. Ang site na ito ay mababasa sa anim na wika. I-peck lang ang popup sa ibaba ng page para magpalit mula sa
One hallmark of civilization is governance by Constitutional laws instead of by tyrants.
The most compelling reason Supreme Court Order 1993 must be Overturned strikes at the foundation of the entire statute. Once the foundation of a statute is found unconstitutional the rest of the statute is suspect.
[1] SCO 1993 as dictated by the AK Supreme Court
This is the last in a series of articles detailing fallacies and illegal requirements violating the Alaska Constitution, and documenting specifically why SCO 1993 must be overturned. Previously I have addressed the unfairness of the Grandfathering Clause.
[2] Activist Judges do Administration’s bidding Ex Pos Facto, Jessica Pleasant 12/12/2023
I next offered a counter to the State’s argument that there was a need for a Process to respond to a group of complaints by ALASKANS seeking review of their cases by a Constitutionally guaranteed Independent Grand Jury.
[3] Public Officials vs. The People: Alaska’s Due Process, Jessica Pleasant 01/13/2024
This final argument establishes the court cannot salvage this law lacking legal foundation. SCO 1993 must be immediately overturned in its entirety if Alaska is a state based on laws. The reason is undeniable and certain identified parties to this argument are the single clearest population to prove the injustice of SCO 1993.
Parents Must Not be Denied Any Longer
Parents of families harmed by Alaska’s Office of Children Services have standing, and are THE compelling reason for judicial correction of this injustice. If Alaska courts remain negligent on this matter Federal courts will certainly have to intervene after the SOA under Gov. Michael Dunleavy has damaged even more families.
[4] Alaska OCS Crisis; Parents Demand Accountability DONN LISTON November 15, 2022
Other claims requesting a grand jury may be denied for any number of random excuses the governor’s appointed District Attorney (DA) can fabricate, but impacted parents have been arbitrarily rejected for a grand jury investigation by being dismissed as only an individual or small group. Parents are more than incidental parties.
What Gov. Dunleavy Should Know about Parental Involvement
SCO 1993 is misapplication of law and dismissal of the Constitution as might occur in a tyranny. The dictated statute asserts a complaint may be denied Grand Jury hearing, at the discretion of the DA, if it appears to be a personal agenda. Of course the agenda of the DA is the governor’s (political) agenda. Therefore, by the contrived rules of the court harmed parents are unable to make a complaint on their own, requiring by this burden a random citizen to make a complaint on behalf of the family or families harmed by unlawful practices of the State. This violates the statutory powers and duties of the AK Commission on Human Rights in the provision AS 18.80.060(a)(5), due to parenthood being classified as a protected class.
[5] State Commission of Human Rights, AS 18.80.060
As foundational building blocks of society, parents of families must receive special recognition in a civilization governed by laws over tyrants.
Multiple legal concepts and terms apply. The reason parents are the key to overturning SCO 1993 is based upon the combination of interested parties and view-point discrimination.
[6] Interested Parties:
Why AK Prosecutors are Afraid of Grand Juries 03/06/2024
[7] Viewpoint Discrimination:
Alaska Courts Promote Viewpoint Discrimination April 13, 2024
Furthermore, this combination of Interested Parties and Viewpoint Discrimination does not allow for excuses. The State can claim a person with a complaint regarding a different office in the bureaucracy received due process for review, but that doesn’t automatically make it so. On the other hand, parents do not even have the option to file a complaint for an investigation into OCS under the SCO 1993 law contrived by Gov. Dunleavy’s Supreme Court.
AK Parent’s only legal weapon against SOA Tyranny is in the power of the grand jury, not the Governor’s unelected hatchet-man DA.
[8] Power of the Grand Jury DONN LISTON May 3, 2022
Demand for Justice Under the Law
Any lawsuit requires at least two interested parties, expected to be at odds with each other. But with regard to children held within State custody, the STATE and the PARENTS are the sole interested parties. SCO 1993 disregards parents’ legitimate concerns because they are the parents.
Gov. Dunleavy: How can the State be allowed to silence and chill concerns or view-points of parents?
Newly established Criminal Rule 6.1 may read like it is meant to affect all citizens the same, seemingly viewpoint neutral, but many exceptions and exemptions required in the rule is a sign the statute is trying to censor a certain viewpoint. Pursuant to Turner Broad. Sys. V. FCC, 512 U.S. 622, 642–43 (1994): Nor will the mere assertion of a content-neutral purpose be enough to save a law which, on its face, discriminates, based on content.
Institutional Racism in OCS Practice
According to Alaska Office of Children’s Services Statistical Information, OCS is disproportionally impacting the lives of AK Native children. The statistics of Children in Out-of-home care during February 2024 recorded:
1. 2,647 Children were in Out-of-home care during the month; of these children 1,812 were Alaskan Native/American Indian (68%)
2. 63 children were removed from their home; 28 of these were Alaskan Native/American Indian (44%),
3. 67 children were discharged from Out-of-Home care; 50 of these were Alaskan Native/American Indian (75%)
Alaska Population: 733,406
Racial Profile:
White 64.1%
Hispanic 7.7%
Asian 6.7%
Black/African American 3.7%
TOTAL: 82.2%
American Indian/AK Native 15.7%
In fact, the high-handed SOA has been known to retaliate against parents who raise concerns about the conduct of OCS officers. With no voice to initiate a complaint against OCS before a grand jury, the parents’ formal requests for review becomes the metaphorical nail in their coffin or signing the death warrant for that family.
These parents become victims of official abuse.
[9] Alaska’s 3rd World Child Protection System Destroys Families, DONN LISTON 07/26/2023
Alaska’s OCS is willing to commit fraud and witness/evidence tampering. When OCS caseworkers alter a child’s statement and intentions in an interview it is creating evidence that includes fraudulent reports. The SOA takes advantage of Institutional Control of who speaks with the children and even parent’s accessibility; holding great influence by mere overloaded case managers over what is allowed in the minds of the children.
For these two reasons, the sections in Criminal Rule 6.1 preventing individuals and small groups from filing personal complaints should be considered unconstitutional. The following provisions in the statute are not severable from the aforementioned discrimination against parents. The Severability Clause is being used by Liberal/Progressive Racist Courts to preserve the rest of the statute. If the intake process of complaints is already tainted, then the rest of the provisions in SCO 1993 cannot stand on their own.
Previously this writer discussed how the SOA used the grandfathering clause–created after the US Civil War ended to allow adult children of the Confederacy to be able to avoid new literacy standards to vote in political elections–to disproportionately affected racial minorities due to illiteracy caused by generational racial discrimination, or by having English as one’s second language. English was the only language printed on ballots.
At the time of Alaska’s literacy laws, knowing English–let alone knowing how to read and write in English–was a barrier for aboriginal communities across all of America. The State of Alaska impacted the Alaska Native community with passage of the Voter Literacy Act of 1925. In this same manner today as before, SCO 1993’s discrimination against harmed families is being hidden behind a rule that appears to be view-point neutral but isn’t.
[10] Alaska voting rights: A history of Native American voter suppression, azcentral.com
Alaska stood strong against racial discrimination even before statehood. Today, without an ability to demand a Grand Jury for institutional abuse–as was originally envisioned by State of Alaska Founders–the Liberal/Progressive AK Supreme Court has enabled a new form of racism by any appointed wannabe Bull Connor AK DA.
[11] Roy Peratrovich: Gruening Civil Rights Fight Recalled DONN LISTON 06/28/1974
The U.S. Indian Citizenship Act of 1924 passed by Congress allowed citizenship for Native Americans. Likely no coincidence, in 1925, the Alaska Territorial Legislature had passed the Alaska Voters Literacy Act requiring voters to speak and read English, automatically excluding non-English-speaking Alaska Natives and Native Americans…The 1965 Voting Rights Act eliminated poll taxes, literacy tests, and other barriers, and was a step forward for Native Americans, as well as Asian Americans, African Americans and Latinos.
Provisions of SCO 1993 violate two protected classes of Alaskans. First, CR 6.1 unfairly discriminates, and harms based on race, because Alaska Native children are most impacted by institutional racism of OCS, with parents not being allowed to speak for their own children by requiring a grand jury investigation of acts against them while in SOA Custody.
Secondly, The Alaska Law also identifies parenthood as a protected class. When a child is in the possession of OCS the State and the parents ARE the INTERESTED PARTIES. When the Governor-appointed DA denies an OCS complaint, due to belief the case is of a so-called personal nature, he/she is censoring the only other interested party in a child’s life. This occurs while acting as loco parentis–as the legal representative of the Governor of Alaska–usurping these children as creatures of the state.
Parenting Liberty before the State
U.S. Supreme Court case of 1925, Perce v. Society of Sisters, the State of Oregon created educational laws that forced children to attend school in their homes’ school district. This impacted the parental rights to choose if their child(ren) can attend religious schools.
Justice James C. McReynolds wrote the now memorable quote regarding whether children can be mere creatures of the state: The fundamental theory of liberty upon which all governments in this Union repose excludes any general power of the State to standardize its children by forcing them to accept instruction from public teacher only.
[12] Children are not mere creatures of the state
By censoring parents’ voices, the Alaska DA is clearly engaging in viewpoint discrimination. This is the reason why the best argument against SCO 1993 is through the discrimination of the parents’ viewpoints. Since statistics show Alaska Native children are overrepresented in Alaska’s OCS system, the Alaska Native community is the most impacted by censoring viewpoints of the parents.
[13] Content and Viewpoint-Based Regulation of Speech
Where are AK Native Judges? Where are Native Organizations in this Fight? Why are Individual Native Families having to fight the SOA ALONE?
SOA 1993 is so wrong on so many levels but the AK Court System couldn’t care less how much harm is being caused. Why would the AK Supreme Court orchestrate such a convoluted order? Who are these lawyers in black robes trying to protect over the wellbeing of Alaskan families?
Alaskans are in an abusive relationship with our court system.
References:
[1] SCO 1993 revised as dictated by the AK Supreme Court
[2] Activist Judges do Administration’s bidding Ex Pos Facto, Jessica Pleasant 12/12/2023
https://donnliston.net/2023/12/activist-judges-do-administrations-bidding-ex-pos-facto/
[3] Public Officials vs. The People: Alaska’s Due Process, Jessica Pleasant 01/13/2024
https://donnliston.net/2024/01/whats-wrong-with-this-process/
[4] Alaska OCS Crisis; Parents Demand Accountability, DONN LISTON November 15, 202
https://donnliston.net/2022/11/alaska-ocs-crisis-parents-pursuing-accountability/
[5] State Commission of Human Rights, AS 18.80.060
https://touchngo.com/lglcntr/akstats/Statutes/Title18/Chapter80.htm
[6] Interested Parties:
Why AK Prosecutors are Afraid of Grand Juries 03/06/2024
https://donnliston.net/2024/03/why-ak-prosecutors-are-afraid-of-grand-juries/
[7] Viewpoint Discrimination:
Alaska Courts Promote Viewpoint Discrimination, Jessica Pleasant April 13, 2024
https://donnliston.net/2024/04/alaska-courts-promote-viewpoint-discrimination/
[8] Power of the Grand Jury, DONN LISTON May 3, 2022
https://donnliston.net/2022/05/a-plea-for-justice/
[9] Alaska’s 3rd World Child Protection System Destroys Families, DONN LISTON 07/26/2023
https://donnliston.net/2023/07/alaskas-3rd-world-child-protection-system-destroys-families/
[10] Alaska voting rights: A history of Native American voter suppression, https://azcent
https://azcentral.com
The U.S. Indian Citizenship Act of 1924 passed by Congress allowed citizenship for Native Americans. Likely no coincidence, in 1925, the Alaska Territorial Legislature passed the Alaska Voters Literacy Act that required voters to speak and read English, automatically excluding non-English-speaking Alaska Natives and Native Americans…The 1965 Voting Rights Act eliminated poll taxes, literacy tests, and other barriers, and was a step forward for Native Americans, as well as Asian Americans, African Americans and Latinos.”
[11] Roy Peratrovich: Gruening Civil Rights Fight Recalled DONN LISTON 06/28/1974
https://donnliston.net/1974/06/gruening-rights-fight-recalled-reprint/
[12] Children are not mere creatures of the state
https://www.aei.org/op-eds/schoolchildren-are-not-mere-creatures-of-the-state/
[13] Content and Viewpoint-Based Regulation of Speech
https://constitution.findlaw.com/amendment1/content-and-viewpoint-based-regulation-of-speech.html
The Court has recognized two central ways in which a law can impose content-based restrictions, which include not only restrictions on particular viewpoints, but also prohibitions on public discussions of an entire topic.6 First, government regulation of speech is content-based if the regulation on its face draws distinctions based on the message a speaker conveys.7 For example, in Boos v. Barry, the Court held that a Washington D.C. ordinance prohibiting the display of signs near any foreign embassy that brought a foreign government into public odium or public disrepute drew a content-based distinction on its face.8 Second, the Court has recognized that facially content-neutral laws can be considered content-based regulations of speech if a law cannot be justified without reference to the content of speech or was adopted because of disagreement with the message the speech conveys.9 As a result, in an example provided in Sorrell v. IMS Health, the Court noted that if a government bent on frustrating an impending demonstration passed a law demanding two years’ notice before the issuance of parade permits, such a law, while facially content-neutral, would be content-based because its purpose was to suppress speech on a particular topic.10
