Will Grigg?s Liberty Minute

December 28, 2011

An Englishman, a Frenchman, and a native of Soviet Russia were condemned to death and granted one last wish. The Englishman requested a pipe; the Frenchman, a bottle of wine. The Russian told his captor: ?I want my neighbor Ivan?s horse to die.?

Mark Grapin, who lives in Virginia?s Fairfax County, has a neighbor like that. When the Army specialist returned from Iraq a couple of years ago, he built a sturdy and elaborate tree house for his two young sons as a gift before being deployed again. Grapin consulted the local building code office and was told that he didn?t need a permit. However, a single anonymous complaint to the County Planning and Zoning Commission resulted in an order to tear down the tree house.

Grapin filed an appeal with the local planning soviet, and then took his case to the media. After an eight-month struggle that cost a considerable amount of money, Grapin was able to extract permission to maintain the tree house ? which is on his own property ? for five years.

Many terms are suitable to describe a society in which property rights are nullified on the basis of a single anonymous complaint. The word ?free? isn?t on that list.

Let us take back the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free.