Thoughts on Administration
By Anna Von Reitz


The Federation of States is sometimes (not often) called upon to conduct investigations related to the operations of State Assemblies, and at this stage of things, the actions of Coordinators who are supposed to be acting as go-betweens, bringing forward questions that the Assemblies have and bringing back answers to expedite the process and ensure that everyone is working from a common template that will yield good results.

The customary Assembly template requires that four functions, which we refer to as "pillars", are organized in each Assembly and that the functions and services performed by those "pillars" are present, working correctly, and serving everyone as they should.

These four pillars include the General Assembly, the International Business Assembly, the Militia, and the State Courts.

This is a lot of work for people to wrap their heads around and organize themselves to accomplish, even when the proportion of the task is kept in measure and relative to the numbers of the people in each Assembly.

The Coordinators are not experts in any one of these functions when they start and are American State Nationals like everyone else, yet, by virtue of being identified as a "leader" of some sort they inherit the burden of many assumptions carried over from the Corporate Government.

Sometimes even they get confused and fall back into the old indoctrination and start abusing "power" and taking actions which are neither appropriate nor fair.

Americans have lost sight of the American Way and must find it again.

Similar to mistaking Coordinators for CEOs, there has been a tendency to think that every disagreement ends in litigation in a "court" of some kind and that rules of Due Process apply to business relationships which are really as simple as hiring and firing and not subject to this sort of legalistic process.

When the Federation has to spend the time and money to investigate wrong-doing at the hands of a Coordinator, we don't do it for fun or on a whim. We do it to protect the interests and rights of the members of the Assembly and to honor our responsibility as the Summoning Authority.

Recently, more than two dozen members of The Michigan Assembly contacted us with serious allegations of wrong-doing and denial of their basic rights: free speech being censored, cronyism, denial of the basic right to participate in their own government, profiling of members, arbitrary use of time-outs and false accusations of disorderly behavior. Other similar complaints have been made in other States.

It seems that we become what we hate.

Simple coffee klatches have been mischaracterized as "public meetings", and public meetings have been mischaracterized as private meetings. A miasma of ignorance, partisan politics, and self-service ---- and fear, of one kind or another, hangs over all these similar ugly circumstances.

When I was growing up I had the opportunity to see, first hand, that those who seek offices are seldom those who should be in office. Too often, they seek office because they are afraid or because they are self-interested, and neither one of these motivations can result in good performance.

Other times, people accept offices when they shouldn't --- when they really don't have the time or the interest or the skills or lack some other basic "piece" of personal stability --- but they resolve to try their best anyway.

I have sympathy for these folks and am grateful for their efforts, but again, when you are pinch-hitting with half a deck, and are distracted by other issues, it's hard to do the job and do it right. It also becomes far more stressful than it should be.

Under stress, then, people often say and do things in desperation that they shouldn't. They lose patience. They "pop" off and adopt a "my way or the highway" attitude toward people who are their equals and lose sight of the communal nature of the American Government.

It may be a cry for "Help!" but when that cry is expressed as a Mute Button or an arbitrary "Time Out" or in extreme cases, telling people that they can "never" be a member of their own State Assembly and have a voice in the public government in this country --- the rest of us must be forgiven for taking offense.

The perfect candidate for any position in any State Assembly is a stable middle-aged person who is not currently at odds with the corporate government and not fond of politics or gossip -- someone with life experience and skills related to the job.

We don't always have the largesse of perfect candidates, but we can try our best to get good people and get them into the right jobs.

Personal stress, and trying to do jobs that require more patience, or different skills, are the three top reasons that Assembly Officers and Coordinators fail.

We don't blame them for failing or not fitting or just getting it wrong, but when a Coordinator is denying the basic rights of Assembly Members to speak, to participate, to disagree, to ask questions --- and do all the other things necessary to reach consensus, we first try to correct the erring behavior; if they continue in this behavior, we investigate; and if they still persist in acting in an autocratic fashion and disrespect the equal rights of other members, we fire them.

From our perspective, there is a well-defined job to be done and we either get it done or we don't.

Part of the Coordinator's job is to uphold and teach and model the principles of the American Government. Some of those principles are clearly stated, as in the Bill of Rights, and others are built into the structure of our government.

From time to time, and for whatever reasons, a Coordinator may not know the Basics of what I call the "American Way", or, when under stress, may fall back on the autocratic indoctrination we have all suffered at the hands of the corporate government.

They may abuse powers that they don't actually have, and deny others the same rights that they cherish for themselves.

The Federation doesn't choose Coordinators. We work with those who volunteer from each State. We do, however, have the power to remove Coordinators who unreasonably trespass on the equal rights of others, or otherwise fail to perform the work required.

We don't do this lightly or without misgivings, and we do not do it with any pleasure or arrogance; we do it after thorough investigation, and we do it only when it is absolutely necessary.

We don't divulge the identities of our investigators, which would ham-string their efforts --- and they are not the "accusers" --- all and any accusations of wrong-doing arise in the Assemblies themselves.

To the extent possible, we wish for each State to build Coordinator Teams, and encourage Assemblies to develop multiple Coordinators who can share the work.

Simply having more than one or two Coordinators helps break the indoctrination of centralized "power"--- and helps prevent the politicking and bottle-necking that can otherwise stifle the growth of an Assembly and the joy of self-governance.

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