Fix Our Democracy

Fix our Democracy (Legislative Agenda)

To fix our democracy, the following 8-year agenda is proposed for the four two-year election cycles from 2021 to 2028.

Election Cycle 1 – 2021 to 2022 (Democracy):
1. Work with Congress to discontinue the Electoral College in presidential elections and distribute electoral votes to all the presidential candidates in proportion to the number of votes they received in each state (one person, one vote). See detailed discussion and Appendix 4A and 4B below.
2. Work with Congress to establish federal term limits for senators and representatives to two (2) six-year terms for senators and six (6) two-year terms for representatives. Establish term limits for federal judgeships that now have lifetime terms to a term of sixteen (16) years, with terms staggered to allow each president to permanently appoint only one (1) Supreme Court Justice and eighteen (18) to twenty (20) Justices of the Courts of Appeals during each four-year presidential term in office. See detailed discussion and Appendix 5A below.
3. Work with Congress to develop standardized and unbiased congressional redistricting criteria and establish independent redistricting commissions within each state to eliminate the current practice of gerrymandering.
4. Work with Congress to establish an official one-year process for the election of the president and provide a relatively inexpensive process for presidential candidates to present their ideas to a national television audience. See detailed discussion and Appendix 5B below. (Federal Election Commission)
5. Work with Congress to implement the Public Personal Identification System (PPIS) as an adjustment to the 2020 Census as described below, to provide instant background checks and address the problems of violence in our schools, internal crime, illegal immigration, identity theft, cyber-crime, police brutality, congressional redistricting, voting, and pandemic tracing. See detailed discussion below and Appendix 13 for organization chart of PPIS. (Department of Commerce, Department of Justice)
Election Cycle 2 – 2023-2024 (Democracy):
1. Work with Congress to transform our prisons and jails from very expensive places to store and punish people to places where people can begin to restore their lives and become productive and law-abiding citizens, by considering the following reforms:
  1. Establish community-based drug rehab programs to reduce drug-related crimes.
  2. Provide ways to avoid prison sentences for nonviolent drug offenders.
  3. Utilize the proposed PPIS to provide alternatives to money bail to reduce pretrial detention rates.
  4. Provide counseling to prison inmates to help them overcome emotional and relationship problems.
  5. Provide prison inmates with access to high school and college training programs.
  6. Provide potential employers with the rehabilitation history of convicted felons.
  7. Provide a pathway for rehabilitated prison inmates to regain their full citizenship.

See detailed discussion below and the attached appendices for crime and prison statistics. (Department of Justice).

Work with local, state, and federal law enforcement agencies to utilize the PPIS to establish a program to enable every citizen in the community, by use of their cell phones, to partner with law enforcement in identifying and apprehending those who are involved in human trafficking, unlawful prostitution, illegal immigration, and other criminal activity. See detailed discussion below and Appendix 11F for human trafficking statistics. (Department of Justice)
Once immigration across all borders of the U.S. has been brought under better control by the PPIS, work with Congress to begin the process of evaluating the approximately 12.0 million illegal immigrants that are currently in this country. The evaluation process would begin by setting a deadline date for all illegal immigrants to report to immigration authorities and document the circumstances surrounding their illegal status. Any undocumented illegal immigrants discovered after the deadline date would be candidates for immediate deportation, and anyone harboring these undocumented illegal immigrants would be subject to a fine and other penalties. The documented illegal immigrants would be forgiven for the first offense of being in the U.S. illegally and would be evaluated according to the Immigration and Naturalization Act (INA) principles approved by Congress. The INA principle concerning the reunification of families would give special consideration to immigrants who qualify for DACA and DAFA. These evaluations should provide a pathway to citizenship for those illegal immigrants who qualify under the INA principles and guidelines. Once the illegal immigrants have been processed and the flow of illegal immigrants has been brought under control by the proposed PPIS, the existing immigration process would continue to work as designed. See detailed discussion below and Appendix 12D for immigration statistics. (Department of Homeland Security)
Utilize the Public Personal Identification System (PPIS) for instant background checks and to track the flow of weapons and money crossing the U.S. borders. As the demand for illegal drugs is reduced as a result of the U.S. drug rehabilitation programs, U.S. drug enforcement authorities would be able to use the PPIS to track weapons and money and move up the supply chain to the higher-level drug dealers, middlemen and drug producers, but they would need to establish close working relationships with the drug enforcement authorities in Mexico and other countries to gather the evidence necessary to obtain convictions. See the website entitled “Origins” at https://www.originsrecovery.com/fast-facts-drug-use-united-states/ (90) for some facts about drug use and addiction in the U.S. See the website intitled “TheRichest” at https://www.therichest.com/rich-list/world/15-utterly-shocking-facts-about-the -war-on-drugs/ (91) for some facts about the war on drugs. (Department of Homeland Security, Department of Justice)
Propose to Congress that the production, sale, and use of marijuana be legalized in the U.S. as a prescription drug for medical purposes and be regulated by the Food and Drug Administration. If it is determined that the side effects of medical marijuana, when used as prescribed, is causing more damage to some patients than the illness that is being treated, then the drug manufacturer and the prescribing doctor would work together to treat the side effects of those patients, and the patient or the patient’s insurance carrier would be reimbursed for those treatments by the drug manufacturer. When a large percentage of patients begin to suffer side effects more damaging than the illness being treated, then the marijuana would be taken off the market for that particular illness. This would be the case for all prescription drugs, including opioids. (Department of Justice)
Propose to Congress that the U.S. decriminalize marijuana and place some restrictions on its use for recreational purposes, which would include the following:
1. Restrict the amount of marijuana a recreational user may possess at one time.
2. Restrict the number of marijuana plants that a recreational user may grow.
3. Prohibit the sale of recreational marijuana, except as prescribed by state laws.
4. Prohibit the use of recreational marijuana around children under a certain age.
5. Allow recreational users to grow their own plants to reduce the impact of the illegal market.
6. Allow organizations to prohibit marijuana use in their facilities if they desire.
7. Set up guidelines for smoking marijuana similar to the guidelines for smoking tobacco.
8. Impose stiff fines and penalties on those who violate marijuana recreational use guidelines.

(Department of Justice)

Election Cycle 3 – 2025-2026 (Democracy):
1. Propose to Congress that, to significantly reduce the stigma associated with dedicated mental health counseling, include mental health counseling as an integral part of any funding for general counseling programs for improper conduct at schools, prisons and jails, drug rehabilitation centers, and homeless shelters. In this environment, everyone receiving counseling for improper conduct would also get mental health counseling, but only those individuals who exhibit serious symptoms of a mental illness would be referred to dedicated mental health facilities for mental health counseling and treatment. Medicaid and the ACA already have provisions for mental health and substance abuse treatment services. See Appendices 12E and 12F for mental health and homelessness statistics. (Department of Health and Human Services)
2. To increase contributions to the Social Security OASI and DI funds, propose that Congress allow citizens who earn very high incomes in their early years such as athletes, entertainers, lottery winners, etc. to prepay their Social Security retirement to certain levels to assure that they will have income after they have reached retirement age. Wealthy citizens could use this program to prepay the Social Security retirement for some of their relatives or close friends. See detailed discussion below and the attached appendices for a history of Social Security Trust Fund operations. (Department of the Treasury)
3. To make product liability insurance and malpractice insurance affordable for all professions, including the medical profession, propose that Congress set limits on liability insurance and establish a legal process that assures fair and timely court decisions for the defendants and the plaintiffs. Proposed that the value of a human life, as it relates to insurance and criminal activity, be set at $200,000, with various percentages of this value for bodily injuries. Then multiples of this $200,000 value could be set for the various levels of negligence, ranging from 0 to 10, with the maximum award being $2.0 million plus court costs and attorney’s fees, which would also have predetermined limits. More prosperous individuals would purchase additional insurance to cover their potential losses above the $200,000 value of life. For the protection of vital professions and vital industries, lower limits might be set for maximum awards. Gross negligence would cause the professionals or company leaders to lose their jobs and go to prison, and the proposed PPIS would assure that the professionals could not practice again until they are recertified. This could provide incentives for medical professionals and medical facilities to locate in rural areas and small towns. (Department of Justice)
4. Propose to Congress that the pharmaceutical companies that develop prescription drugs and the doctors they work with be held accountable for treating the unusual side effects caused by their prescription drugs. If the side effects of a drug create a condition that is worse than the illness being treated by the drug, when the drug is used as prescribed, the pharmaceutical company and the doctor would be responsible for treating those side effects of the patient. The pharmaceutical company would reimburse the patient or the patient’s insurance company for the treatments associated with those side effects, which might include drug rehabilitation if the patient becomes addicted to the prescribed drug. This means that the drug companies and prescribing doctors would be responsible for setting limits on the number of prescription drugs consumed in a given time frame, and monitoring the usage patterns of their patients to assure that they are not overusing their prescriptions. The proposed PPIS would help to determine if the patient is obtaining prescription drugs from sources other than the prescribing doctor. (Department of Justice)
Election Cycle 4 – 2027-2028 (Democracy):
1. When a pregnancy is the result of a consensual relationship between the man and woman or boy and girl, propose that Congress consider modifying the Roe vs Wade abortion decision to include the primary and secondary family stakeholders. In the case of independent adults, the primary stakeholders would be the father and mother of the unborn child, and the secondary stakeholders would be the parents of the father and mother of the unborn child. In the case of dependent children, the primary stakeholders would be the parents of the dependent father and mother of the unborn child, and the secondary stakeholders would be the dependent father and mother of the unborn child. Family planning clinics, health agencies, and schools would be required by law to report the pregnancies of dependent children to their parents or caregivers. The parents of the father and mother of the unborn child have a stake in the abortion decision, because the unborn child will determine the future health and survival of the family tree of the parents. See detailed discussion below and Appendix 11A1 and 11A2 for abortion statistics in America. (Department of Health and Human Services)
2. To preserve the sanctity of the traditional marriage between a man and a woman and to avoid violating the biblical laws concerning sexual intercourse between same-sex couples, propose that Congress consider establishing a federal law that legalizes same-sex “civil unions,” which would provide most of the same social and financial benefits as the traditional marriage. These social and financial benefits would include family leave, hospital visitation, family health coverage, joint tax returns, child custody, spousal and child support, inheritance rights, and division of property. Each civil union couple would decide whether or not their relationship would involve sexual intercourse, and that relationship could be spelled out in the civil union contract if desired. See Appendix 11B for LGBT statistics in America. (Department of Justice)

Detailed Discussion of Electoral Process and Proposed Legislative Solutions

In America, bribery has been institutionalized in the form of political contributions, which enable the wealthy to control or influence the governmental electoral process, the legislative process, the congressional appropriations process, and the ability of government to implement programs that benefit the people. Appendix 3A is a summary of the political contributions in America for the 2015 and 2016 election cycle retrieved from the www.opensecrets.org/ (45) website on September 25, 2016. The website keeps track of political contributions made by thirteen (13) industrial sectors to the presidential campaigns and to each of the standing committees in Congress, where legislation and appropriations are developed. Appendix 3B is a profile of the 13 industrial sectors that the above political contributions were based on. Appendix 3C is a profile of the 15 proposed industrial sectors that would be used to manage monetary policy as part of the proposed Asset/Capital-Based Monetary System by the congressional Monetary Policy Committees, which are based on the IRS Business Activity Codes.

Based on the data available on September 25, 2016, the industrial sectors contributed about $779.5 million to the presidential campaigns or an annual average of $32.5 million per candidate for the 24 candidates; about $2.6 billion to the committees in the Senate or an annual average contribution of $7.4 million per senator; and about $735.6 million to the committees in the House or an annual average contribution of $1.0 million per House member. Based on the potential salaries of the presidential candidates, the institutional bribery ratio of the average annual contributions to each presidential candidate to the salary of the President is 40.6 to one. When only the contributions to the two winning party presidential nominees are considered, the institutional bribery ratio of the average contributions to the winning party candidates to the potential salary of the President go up to 524.8 to one. The institutional bribery ratio of the average annual contributions to each Senator to the average salary of each Senator is 21.3 to one. The institutional bribery ratio of the average annual contributions to each House member to the average salary of each House member is 2.9 to one.

The fact that all 13 industrial sectors in America are making annual contributions to politicians that far exceed the salaries paid by the American people, along with the history of the banking system in America, is compelling evidence that special interest groups have the power to control or strongly influence the daily operations of government and the election of our governmental leaders. To rescue our government and the American people from the financial bondage imposed by these special interest groups, we the people must have the courage to demand that the power of government be returned to the people. To begin this process, we must address four tools that special interest groups and power brokers use to control our electoral and legislative processes: the Electoral College, the unlimited terms in office for governmental officials, the gerrymandering of congressional districts, and the exorbitant amount of time and money required to run for public office.

The Electoral College disenfranchises millions of voters by utilizing a “winner-take-all” strategy for electoral votes in all but two states. This means that the presidential candidate with the majority of the popular votes in a state will get all the electoral votes, and all the popular votes going to the minority candidates in a state will be lost. It is extremely important that the vote of every citizen be counted toward the results of every general election and that the votes of a group of citizens are not eliminated by the electoral process or replaced by the votes of the small group of elected officials in the Electoral College.

Appendix 4A and Appendix 4B show the results of the 2016 presidential election by two different electoral methods: the current “winner take all” Electoral College Method; and by the proposed People Method, which distributes electoral votes to all the presidential candidates (one person, one vote) in proportion to the number of votes they received in each state. By the “winner take all” Electoral College Method, President Trump won by 77 electoral votes. By the People Method, Secretary Clinton would have won by 6.36 electoral votes, but since neither candidate had a majority of all the electoral votes, a run-off election would have been required in fourteen (14) states to determine the winner (AZ, CO, FL, ME, MI, MN, NV, NH, NM, NC, PA, UT, VA, and WI).

By the “winner take all” Electoral College Method, President Trump won the election with 2,868,691 fewer votes than Secretary Clinton and with only 46.1% of the total votes cast in the election. This “winner take all” process effectively disenfranchised 53.9% of the votes cast in the election, or 73,684,412 votes. If we are to become a true democracy, this should never happen again.

Appendix 4C is a further analysis of the 2016 Electoral College “winner take all” method. Although President Trump won the election with 46.1% of the popular vote and almost 2.9 million votes less than Secretary Clinton, he won the majority of the Electoral College with only 43.1% of the popular vote and almost 3.4 million votes less than Secretary Clinton. Theoretically, using the “winner take all” method, it was possible for President Trump to have won the election by winning only eleven states and 24.1% of the popular vote. This is a mockery of our democratic process, and must be corrected.

The “winner take all” strategy of the Electoral College allows presidential candidates to concentrate their campaign efforts in a few “battleground” states with large concentrations of electoral votes. The People Method requires that the candidates tailor their campaign message to all the states and consider the needs of every state, because any state can determine the outcome of the election.

In order for the full power of the vote to go to the American people (one person, one vote), the “winner take all” strategy in the Electoral College must be eliminated in favor of the apportionment of the electoral votes in each state in accordance with the total votes received by each candidate. If this process does not provide an overall majority of votes for the leading candidate, then run-off elections would be conducted between the top three candidates in those states that did not have overall majorities.

The second tool that power brokers use to control and influence elections and governmental decisions is the unlimited terms in office of governmental officials. As revealed in Appendix 3A above, senators and representatives receive astronomical political contributions from the thirteen industrial sectors who control and influence the legislative and appropriations decisions of the standing congressional committees. These huge political contributions make it very difficult for an incumbent senator or representative to be defeated in their congressional district at the state level, and relatively easy for an incumbent to be defeated if those huge contributions should go to an opponent at the state level. Consequently, these contributions can have an enormous influence on the deliberations of the Congress, and can keep incumbents in office for many years with very little competition from the state level. As a result, the power brokers and special interest groups have the power to cause decisions to be made by the Congress to restrict competition and negatively impact the common good of the people and the nation.

Therefore, the people must demand term limits for senators and representatives: two (2) six-year terms for senators and six (6) two-year terms for representatives are recommended. Since the Judicial Branch of government is not immune from the influence of the special interest groups and power brokers, it is recommended that federal judgeships that currently have lifetime term limits be revised to term limits of sixteen (16) years. Supreme Court Justices and the Justices of the U.S. Courts of Appeals, who currently have lifetime terms, would have staggered terms such that the President would make only one permanent appointment of a justice to the Supreme Court during each four-year term in office. If more than one vacancy should occur during a President’s term in office, the President would make a temporary appointment to the excess vacancy to serve until the end of the President’s term in office. The next President would either confirm the temporary appointment or make a new appointment.

The same process would be applied to the 167 Justices of the U.S. Courts of Appeals. Appendix 5A is a proposed schedule for the staggered appointments of all 9 Supreme Court Justices and the 167 Justices of the U.S. Courts of Appeals. With this appointment schedule, the President would appoint one (1) Supreme Court Justice and 18 to 20 Justices of the Courts of Appeals during each term in office. To assure the timely appointment of all federal judges, it is recommended that a staggered schedule similar to this one be set up for the Federal District Courts with 10-year terms and the other courts with 15-year terms. This legislation should include a four to six-year implementation process to convert from the existing plan to the new plan.

The third tool that politicians use to control and influence elections is the gerrymandering of congressional districts. The redistricting that now occurs after each census encourages the political party in power to gerrymander (modify the boundaries of) the congressional districts in some states to help incumbent politicians, hurt their political competition, and choose their voters before their voters choose them.

In the past, the following criteria for congressional districts has been applied to the redistricting process: (1) compactness with established boundaries, so that voters can easily identify with a territory and their representative; (2) continuity of territory from one election cycle to another, unless there is a substantial reduction in the population of a district; (3) relatively equal populations between all of the districts within the state (one person, one vote); and (4) respect for existing political subdivisions, such as cities, towns, and counties.

An analysis by the Washington Post Newspaper (https://www.washingtonpost.com/ (50)) revealed that independent redistricting commissions have done a better job at avoiding gerrymandering, as measured by traditional redistricting criteria. It is recommended that Congress develop unbiased redistricting criteria for the establishment and appointment of independent redistricting commissions within each state. The representatives of the commission should come from a diverse cross section of the people within the state to improve the integrity of the electoral process and assure that the voices of all the people are heard in Congress.

The fourth tool that power brokers can use to control and influence elections is the exorbitant amount of time and money required to run for public office. The current two-year election cycle selects candidates for national office based on the amount of money they have or the amount of money they can raise to gain name recognition before they are able to present ideas for programs that will improve the quality of life of the American people. It requires any citizen desiring to run for a national office to spend an enormous amount of time and money to present their ideas to the people, and, if they are not wealthy, to spend substantial time away from their present occupations.

Because of the current system of institutionalized contributions to incumbent members of Congress, most incumbents can raise the money needed to fund their re-election campaigns, but new candidates have a difficult time funding their campaigns. When incumbents desire to run for a higher or a different national office, they run into some of the same problems as new candidates running for national office. They must spend an enormous amount of time away from the duties of the offices for which they were elected to serve.

In order to reduce the time and money required for candidates to run for the Office of the President, it is recommended that Congress give the Federal Election Commission the authority to establish a one-year process for the election of the president, and provide a relatively inexpensive way for the ideas of candidates to be presented to a national audience. To accomplish this, it is recommended that the following process be considered for the Federal Election Commission (FEC):

In December prior to the election year, the FEC would work in conjunction with the State Election Commissions to select Electoral College electors for the Republican Party, the Democratic Party, and the Independent Party for each state using a standardized and unbiased process based on voting records and interviews. An independent would be defined as anyone who belongs to a party other than the two major parties or who does not typically vote consistently for one of the other two major parties.
Also, in December, all candidates for President would submit their applications to the FEC, except for the incumbent President, along with their party affiliations.
The FEC would set up at least two official national debates on a national television network for each of the three electoral parties in the month of February for mandatory participation by all new candidates for President who have been nominated by a certain number of voters from each party. The incumbent President would not participate.
After hearing the debates of all three parties, the three parties of Electoral College electors would vote on the candidates that should go forward to the Primary Election debates for their party. Each Republican elector would be required to vote for one of the Republican candidates or abstain. Each Democratic elector would be required to vote for one of the Democratic candidates or abstain. Each Independent elector would be required to vote for one of the Independent candidates or abstain. The percentage of electoral votes received by each candidate from their party electors would determine if they would participate in the nationally televised Primary Election debates. If an elector abstains from voting for a candidate in their own party, it means that, after hearing all of the debates, they believe there is a better candidate in one of the other two parties. The candidates that receive the majority of the electoral votes for each party would participate in the national debates during the primary election period for that party. If all the candidates for a party do not receive more than 25% of the electoral votes for that party, or if less than two candidates apply for a party, then no national primary selection debates would be scheduled for that party, but the poll numbers of the applicant(s) for that party might get them included in the primary debates of one or more of the other two parties.
After receiving the results of the three parties of Electoral College electors, the FEC would set up at least three official Primary Election debates on a national television network for each of the three electoral parties during the months of March through May of the election year, which would include the incumbent President. The results of the Primary Elections would be determined by the actual votes of the people, and the electoral votes would be apportioned to the candidates in accordance with the number of votes they received in each state. The winner of the Primary Election would be the candidate that runs against the candidates from the other two parties in the General Election for President. If no candidate receives a majority of the primary popular votes in some states, the electors from those undecided states would vote for a winner at the national convention for that party. The number of electors going to each of the Independent Party Conventions would be proportioned by the percentage of the independent vote that each Independent Party received of the total independent vote count. In order for a write-in candidate to be included in the Primary Debates of a party, he or she would have to poll at least as high as the least popular candidate in that party in at least two of the major national opinion polls.
After receiving the results of the Primary Elections and the national political conventions, the FEC would set up at least three official General Election debates on a national television network between the three electoral parties (Republican, Democratic, and Independent) during the months of August through October of the election year. The Independent Party might have more than one candidate in the General Election which may come from different party conventions. The results of the General Election would be determined by the actual votes of the people, and the Electoral College votes would be apportioned to the candidates in accordance with the number of votes they received in each state. If no candidate receives an overall majority of all the votes cast, a run-off election between the top three candidates would be conducted in those states where no winner received a clear majority before the end of November of the election year. (See Appendix 5B)
A similar one-year process could be established at the state level for the election of U.S. Senators and U.S. Representatives, as well as the Governor and other state offices.

Detailed Discussion of the Proposed Public Personal Identification System (PPIS)

Following is a proposal for a national public personal identification system that would include a redemptive process plus additional objectives and procedures to prevent identity theft and identify potential crimes before they have occurred. The national public personal identification system is proposed as follows:

Establish an official accurate personal identification database in the Census Bureau for the positive identification of all the inhabitants of the U.S. to prevent identity theft and to verify the status of every permanent and temporary resident of the U.S., which will be called the Public Personal Identification System (PPIS).
Establish a personal identification number and barcode in the PPIS for every person residing in the U.S. on a temporary or permanent basis and make that database directly accessible by the general public. The database would contain each person’s name, gender, birth date, national origin, race, status of citizenship, a personal ID Number/Barcode, and a current photograph. Each photograph would be mandated to be updated every 10 years or when there has been a substantial change in a person’s appearance. All of the traditional information being maintained by the Census Bureau on U.S. citizens would be in a separate database from the PPIS and would remain secure and confidential as it has been in the past.
Each personal identification number and barcode in the PPIS would be linked to a personal identification fingerprint database that would be maintained as a totally separate secure database by the FBI for every U.S. inhabitant. This secure personal fingerprint database at the FBI would be continuously updated by input from the PPIS. The FBI companion fingerprint database to the PPIS will be called the Personal Fingerprint Identification Database (PFID).
The FBI would use the information supplied by the PPIS to the PFID to update and verify the information in all the other criminal and non-criminal databases that are maintained by the FBI. And the FBI would supply information from its criminal databases to the PPIS to alert the public about specific criminals and potential criminal activity.
Every permanent and temporary inhabitant of the U.S. would be issued an identification card containing their personal identification number, barcode, and photograph. The personal identification number and barcode in the PPIS would be used on driver’s licenses, credit cards, telephone accounts, bank accounts, and other forms of identification, and would be used by the public, businesses, and governments to verify the identity of the people they are doing business with and to prevent fraudulent and unlawful transactions. Whenever a question arises about a person’s identity, their fingerprints would link them to the PFID, which would verify their identity. This means that a person would not need to have their identification card with them to verify their identity and citizenship status. The PFID would also be used to provide online fingerprint signatures for financial transactions and other documents.
To implement the PPIS, the Census Bureau would have to work with state and local governments, local law enforcement agencies, prisons and jails, mental institutions and other state agencies to identify and determine the status of all persons who are residing in each state and obtain a fresh set of fingerprints and a photograph using modern technology where possible, because some of the fingerprints and photographs in the existing FBI databases may be of impostors. Since this identification process would involve obtaining the fingerprints of every U.S. inhabitant, it would eventually locate lost persons, fugitives from justice, illegal aliens, and may provide additional evidence that helps to solve many cold law enforcement cases.
To help gain full public participation in the PPIS program and reduce conflicts with fugitives, incentives would be included to help people restore their lives from past unlawful conduct, which would include the following:
1. Persons who have been arrested, dishonorably discharged, or convicted of a felony crime involving jail time or prison time in their past, who show no evidence of having been involved in any criminal activity, domestic violence, or serious mental illness in the past 10 years, would be considered for removed from the FBI’s criminal file, but their criminal history would remain in their personal file.
2. Immigrants who are residing in the U.S. illegally would be given a deadline date to report to immigration authorities and document the circumstances surrounding their illegal status, and they would be forgiven of the first offense of being in the U.S. illegally and would be evaluated according to the INA principles for possible legal permanent residency (LPR). Special consideration would be given to immigrants who qualify for DACA and DAPA. The undocumented illegal immigrants identified after the deadline date would be candidates for immediate deportation or prosecution.
3. Fugitives from justice for a felony would be given the option to turn themselves in to law enforcement authorities and confess their crimes, or hire or be assigned an attorney to help prove their innocence, with the prospect that if they are convicted they would receive a lesser sentence, dependent on the severity of their crimes.
4. Persons would not ordinarily be declared mentally ill unless they have been involuntarily committed to a mental institution or have been adjudicated to be mentally incompetent.
Once the PPIS information from all of the states has been integrated into all of the FBI databases, using the above criteria, the NICS criminal database at the FBI would no longer include most persons with no criminal history within the past 10 years and it would include additional information on persons involuntarily committed to mental institutions and persons who have been adjudicated to be mentally incompetent. Consequently, the background checks supplied from this database would now include all of the states and the information would be supplied instantly based on the requester’s fingerprint information.
The Census Bureau would keep the PPIS database current and updated by mandating that new births, new LPRs, and persons with temporary visas be added to the database and deaths, deportations, and persons on temporary visas leaving the U.S. be removed from the database. Some method would need to be devised to obtain the DNA or some other form of identification for newborn babies until they are old enough to be fingerprinted. Citizens would be required to report when they permanently change addresses to enable the PPIS to track the relocation of households within the nation and provide the population data needed to accomplish the reapportionment of the House of Representatives every 10 years.
The PFID at the FBI would be continuously updated by the PPIS and would be used by federal, state, and local agencies, banks, credit card companies, credit bureaus, and social media to verify their databases and prevent fraudulent transactions. Computer manufacturers and smartphone manufacturers could use the PFID to support fingerprint device scanners for personal data protection instead of passwords, and the fingerprint scanners would also help consumers and law enforcement in identifying scammers, hackers, and identity thieves. The PFID would also continuously send and receive information through instant communication links to all federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies and it would send selective criminal information to the PPIS to alert the public of “most wanted” criminals and terrorists and potential criminal activity.
The PPIS through its link to the PFID would allow fingerprint scanning equipment to be used by federal, state, and local agencies, companies, airports, hospitals, insurance companies, sporting facilities, theaters, etc. to eliminate long lines, expedite the entry process and quickly identify suspicious individuals who have been flagged by law enforcement. The public would use the database to identify persons who are contacting them for any purpose and to support law enforcement in identifying fugitives from justice, identity thieves, human traffickers, hackers, scammers, illegal aliens and other criminals. Citizens would be able to use their cell phones to immediately notify law enforcement of any suspicious activity and notify first responders of family emergencies or other family conflicts. The proliferation of fingerprint scanning equipment, along with the input of over 300 million sets of eyes and ears, would make it very difficult for most criminal activity to thrive for very long in any community. This system would provide added protection and security for all of our public and private K-12 schools and colleges and universities.
To control the flow of guns and assault weapons, everyone would be required to register any military-style assault weapons they own and to report when the weapons have been stolen or are missing, and anyone purchasing a hand gun, long gun, or assault weapon would be required to submit to an instant NICS fingerprint background check, which would be included in the purchase transaction by the merchant. Merchants at gun shops, gun shows, and retail establishments that sell guns and/or ammunition could use the fingerprint scanners on their smartphones or computers to accomplish the NICS fingerprint background checks. The NICS database would now have been updated by PPIS with current criminal and mental information from all the states, so the system would be able to deliver instant background checks when the gun purchaser’s fingerprints are scanned into the system.
National and international monetary transactions would go through an extra level of security to make sure the parties to the transactions are in agreement and that the money entering the proposed new Asset/Capital-Based Monetary System from an outside source and money leaving this new system to an outside destination are backed by labor, materials, assets or capital. To insure that all transactions entering and leaving the Asset/Capital-Based Monetary System are properly supported, the deposits in all banking institutions would be backed by labor, or sales of tangible and legal products and services, or commodities that have an established monetary value such as gold, silver, copper, crude oil, agricultural products, and the excess recycled products. The PPIS would provide public access for anyone to report illegal transactions.
The PPIS would also be able to provide additional services for citizens and the medical community. For example, the PPIS would be able to allow citizens to cast their votes online by matching their PPIS ID with their voter registration ID and fingerprints. It could print out a completed ballot for the voter and provide a printout at the voter’s precinct, which could be used to verify the electronic election results with the printed election results. Since PPIS is linked to the cell phones and transactions of every inhabitant, it could also be used by the medical community to track a pandemic virus like Covid-19 to help manage national recovery efforts.

The current practice of the National Security Agency/Central Security Service (NSA/CSS) of indiscriminately storing billions of records per day of the phone calls and raw internet traffic of U.S. citizens would be discontinued immediately, and NSA/CSS would be reassigned the task of continuously monitoring the transactions associated with the PPIS and the PFID for evidence of potential criminal or terrorist activity. For example, if an adult or a student in the PPIS begins to accumulate high-powered assault weapons and ammunition or if a friend or relative of that person uses their cell phone to report suspicious activity, this would be evidence of a possible future terrorist attack and the PPIS would notify law enforcement officials for immediate investigation of that person. The NSA/CSS would also be responsible for working with other government agencies to develop leading-edge technologies to protect U.S. citizens from foreign and domestic cyber-attacks. Local and federal law enforcement would be required to obtain court orders for high levels of surveillance of suspicious activities. And any citizen would be able to obtain a court order to review and correct any information that is maintained on them by any public or private database, such as credit bureaus and credit card companies.

Appendix 13 is an organization chart of the proposed Public Personal Identification System (PPIS) which would be maintained by the Census Bureau as a separate database accessible by the public. The PPIS would contain very basic personal identification on every person residing in the U.S. on a temporary or permanent basis, and would include each person’s name, gender, birth date, national origin, race, status of citizenship, a personal ID Number/Barcode, and a current photograph. The ID Number/Barcode in PPIS would be used on driver’s licenses, credit cards, telephone accounts, bank accounts, and other forms of identification, and would be used by the public, businesses, and governments to verify the identity of the people they are doing business with and to prevent fraudulent and unlawful transactions. The PPIS database would be securely linked to the Personal Fingerprint Identification Database (PFID) located at the FBI in the Department of Justice. Whenever a question arises about a person’s identity, a scan of their fingerprints would link them to PFID, which would verify or deny their identity.

4Book Appendix 13 - Proposed Public Personal Identification System (PPIS).pdf

Detailed Discussion of the Crime and Prisons Issues

Appendix 11C is a detailed breakdown of Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) crime statistics for the year 2016 by region and state. Appendix 11D1 is a history of U.S. incarceration and community supervision statistics from 1980 to 2015. Appendix 11D2 is a detailed breakdown of incarceration and community supervision statistics for the year 2015 by state. Appendix 11E1 is a comparison of annual U.S. prison costs per inmate for 2015 versus annual U.S. public education costs per student for K-12 through college for 2018-2019 by state. Appendix 11E2 is a detailed breakdown of U.S. mass incarcerations obtained from a 2019 report by the Prison Policy Initiative compared to the average 2016 FBI crime statistics. These crime and incarceration statistics provide a baseline for addressing the problems of crime and mass incarcerations in the U.S., which has the highest incarceration rate in the world.

According to the FBI crime statistics for 2016, a total of 1,378,788 violent crimes were committed in the U.S., of which 17,250 or 1.25% were murder/manslaughter; 226,333 or 16.42% were rape/sexual assault; 332,198 or 24.09% were robbery; and 803,007 or 58.24% were aggravated assault. A total of 7,919,035 property crimes were committed, of which 1,515,096 or 19.13% were burglary; 5,638,455 or 71.20% were larceny/theft, and 765,484 or 9.67% were motor vehicle theft.

A 2019 report by the Prison Policy Initiative at, https://www.prisonpolicy.org/reports/pie2019.html (82), provides a pie chart that points out all of the sources of mass incarceration in America. About 76% or 462,000 of the 612,000 people incarcerated in local jails during the study had not been convicted of any crimes, which were broken down as follows: 146,000 or 31.60% for violent crime; 114,000 or 24.68% for property crime; 117,000 or 25.32% for drug related crime; 82,000 or 17.75% for public order and other violations, and 3,000 or 0.65% for immigration violations. Based on the summary data in the report, about 9,500 people with immigration violations are mixed in with the other categories.

By contrast, only about 23.08% or 51,000 of the 221,000 people incarcerated in Federal prisons and jails had not been convicted of any crimes, which were broken down as follows: 16,000 or 31.37% for drug related crimes; 24,000 or 47.06% for public order and other violations; and 11,000 or 21.57% for immigration violations. Additional people were added to these not convicted numbers from the following sources: 15,000 for youth, 9,000 for mental issues, and 1,100 from Indian Country for a total of almost 540,000 people who are incarcerated in America without convictions. The reason for many of these non-convicted detainees is that they could not afford to pay the bail set for their release.

According to the Prison Policy Initiative report, there are five myths concerning mass incarceration in America. The first myth is that releasing “nonviolent drug offenders” would end mass incarceration. Although drug offenses account for almost 500,000 incarcerations, and drug arrests in over-policed neighborhoods create criminal records that hurt prospects for gainful employment and contribute to additional offenses, a much larger number of incarcerations come from violent and property offenses.

A second myth is that private prisons are the corrupt heart of mass incarceration, but private prisons account for less than 8% of all incarcerated people. A third myth is that prisons are “factories behind fences” that exist to provide companies with a huge slave labor force. However, only about 5,000, or less than 1%, of the people in prison are employed through the federal PIECP program, which requires companies to pay at least minimum wage before deductions. And only about 6% of people incarcerated in state prisons work for state-owned “correctional industries,” which pay much less than minimum wage.

A fourth myth is that expanding community supervision is the best way to reduce incarceration. While community supervision, which includes probation, parole, and pretrial supervision, is preferable to being incarcerated, the conditions imposed on those being supervised are often so restrictive that they set people up for failure, and many people are returned to prison for “technical violations” of parole or probation. The fifth myth is that people in prison for violent or sexual crimes are too dangerous to be released. Historical data supports the fact that people convicted of homicide are the least likely to be re-arrested, and the re-arrest rates of those convicted of rape or sexual assault are about 30-50% lower than people convicted of larceny or motor vehicle theft.

In addition to identifying where the mass incarceration system impacts the most people, the report also focused on the people who are impacted the most by the system and the people who are left behind by the system. One of the main contributors to mass incarceration is poverty, because the people in prison and jail are disproportionately poor compared to the overall population of the U.S. This occurs due to the high price of bail, which the poor are unable to pay and requires them to spend time in jail before they are convicted of any crime. When the poor have spent time in prison and have a criminal record, it destroys their career opportunities for the future. Since Black and Latino Americans have higher rates of poverty, they are dramatically overrepresented in the nation’s prisons and jails. For example, Black Americans are only about 13% of U.S. residents, but they make up 40% of the incarcerated population. Poverty is also having an adverse impact on women, whose incarceration rates have been growing faster than those of men for several decades.

After analyzing the sources of mass incarceration in America, the Prison Policy Initiative makes the following recommendations as to where policymakers can focus to reduce mass incarceration:

Consider ways to avoid prison sentences for nonviolent drug offenders and rehabilitate prison inmates who are incarcerated for violent offenses.
Consider alternatives to money bail to reduce pretrial detention rates and redirect public spending to reduce the causes of crime, such as community-based drug treatment and job training programs.
Although the federal government is a small piece of the mass incarceration pie, the federal government can use its financial and ideological power to create a better environment for future progress, and local criminal justice officials can consider ways to reduce the flow of people into the criminal justice system.
Consider ending contracts with service providers, who contract with public institutions, when they squeeze money from people who are incarcerated.
Implement reforms that reduce the number of people incarcerated in America due to the well-known racial and ethnic disparities in the criminal justice system.

Appendix 11E1 shows that the average annual cost per prison inmate back in 2015 is greater than the average annual cost per student to publicly educate a child from K-12 through college in 2018 and 2019. Although the average annual costs per prison inmate and student vary widely among the states, the average annual cost per prison inmate for all 50 states was $32,905, and the average annual cost per student from K-12 through college was $31,899. That average cost per prison inmate in 2015 would be much higher in 2018 and 2019. If America could reduce the number of people incarcerated in state and federal prisons by one-third, or about 492,000 people, it is possible that the nation could save up to $16.2 billion, which could be used to improve educational facilities, improve teacher benefits, and implement programs to help people repair their lives and become more productive and law-abiding citizens.

To assure that the people who are leaving the prison systems can find jobs and opportunities for entrepreneurship, there must be an improvement in the economic growth of the American economy. The main obstacle to economic growth in America is the public debt, which is keeping our government from investing in programs that will improve the safety, mobility, and prosperity of the American people. By fixing the public debt problem with the proposed Asset/Capital-Based Monetary System, America can begin investing in the $2.1 trillion needed to repair and upgrade our infrastructure and begin establishing programs to fix our environment. These new investments, along with competitive tax incentives to recapture American jobs that have been outsourced to other countries, will provide jobs and entrepreneurial opportunities for all Americans who are willing and able to work.

Instead of our prison systems being very expensive places to store and punish people, they can become places where people can restore their lives and become productive, law-abiding, and tax-paying citizens. Investing in the following reforms can help make this happen:

Establish community-based drug rehab programs to reduce drug-related crimes.
Provide ways to avoid prison sentences for nonviolent drug offenders.
Implement the PPIS to provide alternatives to money bail to reduce pretrial detention rates and to enable citizens to partner with law enforcement in eradicating crime from communities.
Provide counseling to inmates to help them overcome emotional and relationship problems.
Provide prison inmates with access to high school and college training programs.
Provide potential employers with the rehabilitation history of convicted felons.
Establish a time limit on the classification of persons as criminals when they show clear evidence of rehabilitation.

Detailed Discussion of the Prostitution and Human Trafficking Issues

The National Hotline at https://humantraffickinghotline.org/states (83) is a non-profit, non-governmental organization that compiles human trafficking statistics based on the calls received on their hotline. The mission of The National Hotline, which has been in operation since December 7, 2007, is to provide human trafficking victims and survivors with access to critical support and services to obtain help and remain safe, and to provide the anti-trafficking community with tools to effectively fight all forms of human trafficking. Their toll-free hotline is available to answer calls from anywhere in the country, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, and 365 days a year in more than 200 languages. They offer a safe place to report tips, seek services, and ask for help, and they provide information, statistics, and resources on a wide range of topics related to human trafficking.

Appendix 11F shows that during the 5-year period from 2014 to 2018 the total calls to the national hotline increased by 14,840 from 26,248 to 41,088, or 56.5%, but during the 1-year period from 2017 to 2018 the calls increased by 7,194 from 33894 to 41088, or 21.2%. During that same 5-year period, the total number of human cases reported increased by 5,798 from 5,151 to 10,949, or 112.6%, but during the 1-year period from 2017 to 2018 the number of human cases increased by 2,176, or 24.8%. This is an indication that the human trafficking problem is getting worse in this country. In 2018 the breakdown of human trafficking cases between sex trafficking and labor trafficking shows that sex trafficking was 71.8%, labor trafficking was 11.4%, the combination of sex and labor trafficking was 5.8%, and unspecified trafficking was 11.0%. The breakdown in 2018 between the genders of the victims shows that females were 85.4%, males were 13.6%, and gender minorities were 0.9%. The breakdown in 2018 between the ages of the victims shows that adults were 68.1% and minors under the age of 18 were 31.9%.

According to The National Hotline overview, “human trafficking is a crime involving the exploitation of someone for the purposes of compelled labor or a commercial sex act through the use of force, fraud, or coercion. “Sex trafficking is the recruitment, harboring, transportation, provision, obtaining, patronizing, or soliciting of a person for the purposes of a commercial sex act, in which the commercial sex act is induced by force, fraud, or coercion, or in which the person induced to perform such an act has not attained 18 years of age.” “Labor trafficking is the recruitment, harboring, transportation, provision, or obtaining of a person for labor or services, through the use of force, fraud, or coercion for the purpose of subjection to involuntary servitude, peonage, debt bondage, or slavery.”

The overview goes on to introduce the Action-Means-Purpose Model that can be used to describe the three elements of human trafficking, which determine the severity of human trafficking offenses, and they are:

“Action, which may be the recruiting, harboring, transporting, providing, or obtaining of an individual. Additional actions that constitute sex trafficking, but not labor trafficking, include patronizing, soliciting, and advertising an individual.”
“Through the Means of force, fraud, or coercion. Examples of force include physical abuse or assault, sexual abuse or assault, or confinement. Examples of fraud include false promises of work/living conditions, withholding promised wages, or contract fraud. Coercion may include threats of harm to self or others, debt bondage, psychological manipulation, or document confiscation.”
“For a specific Purpose, either of compelled labor or services or commercial sex act(s).”

In sex trafficking cases involving children under the age of 18, it is not necessary to demonstrate force, fraud, or coercion.

The National Hotline overview further explains that human trafficking, like drugs and arms trafficking, is a market-driven criminal industry which is based on the principles of supply and demand. The industry is powered by the demand for cheap labor, services, and for commercial sex, and human traffickers are willing to use force, fraud, and coercion to victimize others in their desire to profit from this demand. They are able to survive and thrive because:

They perceive that there is very little risk and very few deterrents to affect their criminal operations due to factors that include: lack of government and law enforcement training, low community awareness, ineffective or unused laws, lack of law enforcement investigation, scarce resources for victim recovery services, and social blaming of the victims.
They enjoy high profits when individuals are willing to buy commercial sex, which creates a profitable market place for them to use to exploit children and adults to obtain those profits.

In order to eliminate human trafficking from our communities, there needs to be a system (which will be discussed later) that will make it very difficult for human traffickers to exist without detection. If all the citizens in the community are able to come together and identify and rescue the victims of force, fraud, and coercion, then the human traffickers will be put out of business.

UP-5 concerning the sacredness of all human life and treating other people the way we want to be treated covers the issues associated with prostitution and human trafficking. The following Old Testament scriptures help to establish the moral foundations to address the issues relating to prostitution and human trafficking: “Thou shalt not commit adultery” (Ex. 20:14); “But whoso committeth adultery with a woman lacketh understanding: he that doeth it destroyeth his own soul” (Prov. 6:32); “Do not prostitute thy daughter, to cause her to be a whore; lest the land fall to whoredom, and the land become full of wickedness” (Lev. 19:29); and “There shall be no whore of the daughters of Israel, nor a sodomite of the sons of Israel” (Deut. 23:17).

These Old Testament scriptures define adultery and prostitution as “sinful conduct” from a biblical point of view. However, as mentioned earlier, the New Testament teaches the spiritual controls embodied in the redemptive process of conviction, confession, repentance, and forgiveness, which can be used by law enforcement officials, attorneys, prosecutors, and judges to determine the corrective actions necessary to help those who have been convicted of unlawful conduct to permanently change their unlawful behavior and become productive, law-abiding citizens. God has also given humanity the free will to choose whether their responses to the conditions of life will be righteous or sinful. Human government, as God’s representative on earth, can ensure that the “sinful conduct” of a person, couple, or group does not impinge on the free will and civil rights of other people.

The first step in correcting the unlawful conduct of human traffickers and any other unlawful conduct is to shine a light on it and make it very difficult for the offender to go undetected. This will help ensure that the unlawful or improper conduct is corrected in the early stages before it becomes a major problem. The proposed Public Personal Identification System (PPIS), which will be described elsewhere, would enable every citizen in the community to get involved and partner with law enforcement in identifying and apprehending those who are involved in criminal or unlawful activities. After a person has been convicted of unlawful conduct, if that person shows by their “actual conduct” that they confess of their unlawful conduct, agrees to compensate the victims of their unlawful conduct, repents and asks the victims for forgiveness for their unlawful conduct, and forgives the others who may have been involved in that unlawful conduct with them, then this is evidence that the person has begun to make a permanent change in their behavior, and the criminal justice system should provide a process for that person to regain their full citizenship rights.

If a person or group decides by their own free will to become involved in the “sinful” business of prostitution, and there is no coercion, violence, abuse, or exploitation involved in their relationships with their partners or clients, then human government can utilize the Universal Principles to help determine if these “sinful” business relationships are impinging on the free will and civil rights of other innocent persons or groups. For example, if the prostitute or one of their clients have contracted a sexually transmittable disease, such as AIDS, that disease could be transmitted to many other innocent persons who were not involved or knowledgeable of the client’s relationship with the prostitute. Or the prostitute’s business could be located near a school or church, which could encourage troubled young people and adults to be drawn into the human trafficking business.

If it can be determined that the “sinful conduct” of a prostitute or their client is not impinging on the free will and civil rights of another person or group, then the ultimate judgment of the prostitute and their client should be in accordance with their relationship with God, and we cannot be certain what God’s judgment will be, because God knows the heart and character of every person, and His judgment will be based on His grace and mercy and the conditions surrounding the conduct. And even though the sinner may be forgiven of their sinful conduct by God, they may still have to suffer the consequences of their sin.

4Book Appendix 11F - U.S. Human Trafficking Statistics by State.pdf

Detailed Discussion of the Illegal Immigration and Drug Trafficking Issues

Appendix 12D provides U.S. historical immigration statistics from 2008 to 2017 from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security at: https://www.dhs.gov/immigration-statistics (88). From 2008 to 2017 the number of persons obtaining legal permanent residency (LPR) in the U.S. has been very stable with an average of 1,074,301 LPRs per year and a total of 1,127,167 LPRs in 2017. The total of 1,127,167 LPRs in 2017 were broken down as follows: 45.8% or 516,508 immediate relatives of U.S. citizens, 20.6% or 232,238 family-sponsored preferences, 12.2% or 137,855 employment-based preferences, 4.6% or 51,592 diversity visas, 13.0% or 146,003 refugees and asylees, and 3.8% or 42,971 other visas. This is evidence that the legal aspects of the INA are working as designed.

The total number of refugees admitted to the U.S. in 2017 was 53,691 with a breakdown as follows: 37.7%% or 20,248 from Africa, 49.6% or 26,648 from Asia, 9.4% or 5,026 from Europe, 2.7% or 1,455 from North America, 0.4% or 233 from South America, and 0.2% or 81 were unknown. The average number of refugees over the 10-year period was 67,105 with the following breakdown: 23.6% or 15,814 from Africa, 68.4% or 45,891 from Asia, 2.8% or 1,905 from Europe, 4.6% or 3,078 from North America, 0.3% or 223 from South America, and 0.3% or 195 were unknown. The total number of nonimmigrant temporary admissions into the U.S. each year since 2008 almost doubled from 39.38 million in 2008 to 77.64 million in 2017. The 77.64 million nonimmigrant temporary admissions for 2017 were broken down as follows: 30.4% or 23.64 million were tourists and business travelers with visa waivers, 59.8% or 46.42 million were tourists and business travelers with other visas, 3.3% or 2.53 million were students and exchange visitors, 5.1% or 3.97 million were temporary workers and families, 0.6% or 450,457 were diplomats and other representatives, 0.7% or 575,214 were all other classes, and 0.1% or 57,707 were unknown.

The total number of illegal aliens in the U.S. has been very stable over the 8-year period from 2008 to 2015 with an estimated total in 2008 of 11.60 million and 11.96 million in 2015, and an average of 11.36 million over the 8-year period. This is strong evidence that the vast majority of illegal aliens have been living in the U.S. for over ten years and are already connected to family members who have a legal immigration status in the U.S. Over this 8-year period there has been a significant reduction in the number of illegal aliens from Mexico and a significant increase in the number of illegal aliens from El Salvador, Guatemala, India, Honduras, Philippines, and China.

The 2015 total of 11.96 million illegal aliens were broken down by country as follows: 55.0% or 6.58 million from Mexico, 6.3% or 750,000 from El Salvador, 5.2% or 620,000 from Guatemala, 3.9% or 470,000 from India, 3.7% or 440,000 from Honduras, 3.1% or 370,000 from the Philippines, 2.7% or 320,000 from China, 1.9% or 230,000 from Korea, 1.4% or 170,000 from Vietnam, 1.3% or 150,000 from Ecuador, and 15.6% or 1.87 million from all other countries. This shows that 84.4% of the illegal aliens in 2015 came from ten (10) countries. The 2015 total of 11.96 million illegal aliens were broken down by state as follows: 24.1% or 2.88 million in California, 16.2% or 1.94 million in Texas, 6.8% or 810,000 in Florida, 4.9% or 590,000 in New York, 3.8% or 450,000 in Illinois, 3.7% or 440,000 in New Jersey, 3.3% or 390,000 in Georgia, 3.3% or 390,000 in North Carolina, 3.2% or 380,000 in Arizona, 2.6% or 310,000 in Virginia, and 28.3% or 3.39 million from all the other states. This shows that 71.7% of the illegal aliens in 2015 resided in ten (10) states.

The issues relating to illegal immigration can get their moral foundations from UP-5 concerning the sacredness of all human life and treating other people the way we want to be treated. There is one scripture that might be appropriate for issues relating to immigration, “And if a stranger sojourn with thee in your land, ye shall not vex him. But the stranger that dwelleth with you shall be unto you as one born among you, and thou shalt love him as thyself; for ye were strangers in the land of Egypt: I am the Lord your God” (Lev. 19:33-34). The same INA immigration principles concerning the reunification of families, admitting immigrants with skills that are valuable to the U.S. economy, protecting refugees, and promoting diversity should also be applied to the illegal immigrant population, but a system must be developed to control the flow of illegal immigrants into the country. One of the major causes of illegal immigration into the country from Mexico and Central America is the violence and corruption associated with the trafficking of illegal drugs into the U.S. from these two areas.

The proposed national Public Personal Identification System (PPIS) would make it possible for American citizens to partner with local, state, and national law enforcement authorities to eradicate major sources of crime and control immigration across all borders of the U.S. Once this system is in place, the spiritual controls embodied in the redemptive process of conviction, confession, repentance, and forgiveness, along with the INA principles, can be utilized to evaluate the illegal immigrants that are currently residing in the country. Before beginning this evaluation process, the federal government would need to establish agreements with Mexico and other countries for the humane treatment of illegal immigrants who must be deported from the U.S., and work with these countries to provide safe deportation facilities until the deportees can be reunited with their families. America should also work with all of the countries in North and South America to improve political and economic relationships, so that their citizens will have a stable and relatively secure social and economic environment within their own countries.

The evaluation process would begin by setting a deadline date for all illegal immigrants to report to immigration authorities and document the circumstances surrounding their illegal status. Any undocumented illegal immigrants discovered after the deadline date would be candidates for immediate deportation, and anyone harboring these undocumented illegal immigrants would be subject to a fine or other penalty. The documented illegal immigrants would be forgiven for the first offense of being in the U.S. illegally and would be evaluated according to the INA principles. The INA principle concerning the reunification of families would give special consideration to immigrants who qualify for DACA and DAFA. These evaluations should provide a pathway to citizenship for those illegal immigrants who qualify under the INA principles and guidelines. Once the illegal immigrants have been processed and the flow of illegal immigrants has been stopped by the proposed PPIS, the existing immigration process would continue to work as designed.

The moral foundations that can be used to address the issues related to drug trafficking are also covered under UP-5 concerning the sacredness of human life and treating other people the way we want to be treated. No scriptures could be found that specifically addressed drug trafficking. However, many of the issues and proposals offered about crime and prisons also apply to drug trafficking. The spiritual controls embodied in the redemptive process of conviction, confession, repentance, and forgiveness can be used to address the nonviolent drug users and low-level drug dealers, as well as the higher-lever drug dealers, middlemen, and drug producers. Instead of locking up nonviolent drug users and low-level drug dealers and punishing them socially and financially for the rest of their lives, the spiritual controls involved in the redemptive process can be used to help them restore their lives and become productive, law-abiding citizens. As an alternative to prison, it is recommended that convicted nonviolent drug users and lower-level drug dealers be required to complete drug rehabilitation programs that include mental health counselling and training for higher level employment. The goal would be to systematically reduce the U.S. demand for illegal drugs while, at the same time, rekindling the drug offender’s desire to restore their lives and achieve worthwhile personal life goals.

The proposed Public Personal Identification System (PPIS) would also be able to track the flow of weapons and money crossing the U.S. borders. As the demand for illegal drugs is reduced as a result of the U.S. drug rehabilitation programs, U.S. drug enforcement authorities would be able to use the PPIS to track weapons and money and move up the supply chain to the higher-level drug dealers, middlemen and drug producers, but they would need to establish close working relationships with the drug enforcement authorities in Mexico and other countries to gather the evidence necessary to obtain convictions. Drug enforcement authorities in the U.S. and the other countries where the drug traffickers might reside would give the drug traffickers the option to turn themselves in to authorities, confess to their crimes and show repentance for the harm they may have caused by contributing to the rehabilitation of the victims of their unlawful conduct through fines based on the size of their operations, and in return the authorities would reduce their potential prison sentences and make it possible for them to eventually obtain their freedom. The countries involved in pursuing and gathering evidence on the drug traffickers would share in the fines imposed on the drug traffickers to support their own drug rehabilitation programs.

It is recommended that the production, sale, and use of marijuana be legalized in the U.S. as a prescription drug for medical purposes and be regulated by the Food and Drug Administration. If it is determined that the side effects of medical marijuana, when used as prescribed, is causing more damage to some patients than the illness that is being treated, then the drug manufacturer and the prescribing doctor would work together to treat the side effects of those patients, and the patient or the patient’s insurance carrier would be reimbursed for those treatments by the drug manufacturer. When a large percentage of patients begin to suffer side effects more damaging than the illness being treated, then the drug would be taken off the market for that illness. This would be the case for all prescription drugs, including opioids.

Although the proponents for legalizing the recreational use of marijuana point to the governmental tax benefits, they seem to ignore the potential health problems and social problems that marijuana can cause, which are similar to the problems caused by the smoking of tobacco. Of particular concern is the negative impact that marijuana may have on children who might start using it at an early age and the impact that the secondhand smoke form marijuana will have on children and adults. Therefore, it is recommended that the U.S. decriminalize marijuana and place some restrictions on its use for recreational purposes which include the following:

Restrict the amount of marijuana a recreational user may possess at one time.
Restrict the number of marijuana plants that a recreational user may grow.
Prohibit the sale of recreational marijuana, except as prescribed by state laws.
Prohibit the use of recreational marijuana around children under a certain age.
Allow recreational users to grow their own plants to reduce the impact of the black market.
Allow organizations to prohibit marijuana use in their facilities if they desire.
Set up guidelines for smoking marijuana similar to the guidelines for smoking tobacco.
Impose stiff fines and penalties on those who violate marijuana recreational use guidelines.

4Book Appendix 12D - U.S. Immigration Statistics 2008-2017.pdf

Detailed Discussion of Mental Health and Homelessness Issues

Appendix 12E contains three sets of statistics that relate to U.S. mental health problems in all the states. The first set of statistics contains 2015 Center for Disease Control (CDC) survey data about the percentage of adults over the age of 17 who reported having depressive disorder, poor mental health (stress, depression, and problems with emotions), and binge drinking in each state. The second set of statistics show the total number of suicides in each state during 2017 and the average number of suicides per 100,000 people in each state in that same year. The third set of statistics show the total number of overdose deaths in each state in 2017, the total number of opioid-involved deaths per 100,000 people in each state in 2017, and the total number of opioid prescriptions per 100 people in each state.

The top five states with adults who had been diagnosed for depressive disorder with percentages of 27.0% to 23.1% were Oregon, Maine, Arkansas, West Virginia, and Vermont. The low five states with adults who had been diagnosed for depressive disorder with percentages of 11.7% to 15.7% were Hawaii, New Jersey, California, Illinois, and New York. The top five states that reported over 14 days of poor mental health with percentages of 15.8% to 14.1% were West Virginia, Arkansas, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Alabama/Tennessee. The low five states that reported over 14 days of poor mental health with percentages of 7.3% to 9.4% were South Dakota, Minnesota, Hawaii, Nebraska, and North Dakota. The top five states that reported binge drinking during the past 30 days with percentages of 26.0% to 21.4% were District of Columbia, North Dakota, Wisconsin, Montana, and Iowa. The low five states that reported binge drinking during the past 30 days with percentages of 11.2% to 12.6% were Tennessee, Utah, West Virginia, Alabama, and Mississippi.

The top five states with the highest number of suicides per 100,000 people with a range of 28.9 to 23.2 were Montana, Alaska, Wyoming, New Mexico, and Idaho. The low five states with the lowest number of suicides per 100,000 people with a range of 6.6 to 9.8 were District of Columbia, New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, and Maryland. The top five states with the highest number of opioid-involved overdose deaths per 100,000 people, for those who reported, with a range of 49.6 to 32.2 were West Virginia, Ohio, District of Columbia, New Hampshire, and Maryland. The low five states with the lowest number of opioid-involved overdose deaths per 100,000 people with a range of 3.4 to 7.8 were Hawaii, Texas, California, Iowa, and Minnesota. The data for 16 states was not included, because they did not meet inclusion criteria. The top five states with the highest number of opioid prescriptions per 100 people with a range of 107.2 to 89.5 were Alabama, Arkansas, Tennessee, Mississippi, and Louisiana. A number greater than 100 means that the total number of opioid prescriptions issued in that state were greater than the total population of that state. The low five states with the lowest number of opioid prescriptions per 100 people with a range of 28.5 to 40.1 were District of Columbia, Hawaii, New York, California, and Massachusetts.

Appendix 12F is a summary of U.S. homelessness from 2007 to 2018 from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, Office of Community Planning and Development at the website: https://www.hudexchange.info/resource/5783/2018-ahar-part-1-pit-estimates-of-homelessness-in-the-us/ (94). Over the 12-year period from 2007 to 2018 homelessness in the U.S. declined by 14.7%. During the period from 2010 to 2016 there was a steady decline in homelessness, but in 2017 and 2018 homelessness began to increase by 1,482 and 1,698, respectively. Of the 547,264 homeless people in the U.S. in 2018, 65.3% or 357,365 were in shelters of some kind, and 34.7% or 189,899 were unsheltered. Veterans comprised 6.9% of the homeless. The top five states with the highest number of unsheltered homeless people with a range of 89,543 to 8,925 were California, Florida, Washington, Texas, and Oregon, which comprised 70.0% of the unsheltered homeless. The top five states with the highest number of homeless veterans with a range of 10,836 to 1,363 were California, Florida, Texas, Washington, and Oregon, which comprised 48.5% of the homeless veterans.

The common theme among all of these mental health facts and statistics is that mental illness is a factor that influences the conduct of people in many different areas, which include their ability to learn and become educated, their propensity to participate in unlawful activity, their abuse of drugs, and their desire to commit suicide. It is also evident from the facts given, that mental illness is prevalent in places where learning and rehabilitation is already taking place such as schools, prisons and jails, drug rehabilitation facilities, and homeless shelters. Although there are no biblical scriptures that deal directly with the mental illness and homelessness issues, UP-5 concerning the sacredness of human life and treating other people the way we want to be treated can be used to establish the moral foundations for addressing the mental illness and homelessness issues. The spiritual controls embodied in the redemptive process of conviction, confession, repentance, and forgiveness can be used by those in authority to help those suffering from mental illness and homelessness to begin to acknowledge and understand their situations and make adjustments to improve their lives and become productive citizens.

The conclusion of this analysis of mental illness is that most of the people who are experiencing serious mental health problems have already been identified among groups who are encountering other behavioral problems. Therefore, it is recommended that, to significantly reduce the stigma associated with dedicated mental health counseling, include mental health counseling as an integral part of the general counseling programs for improper conduct at schools, prisons and jails, drug rehabilitation centers, and homeless shelters. In this environment, everyone receiving counseling for improper conduct would also get mental health counseling, but only those individuals who exhibit serious symptoms of a mental illness would be referred to dedicated mental health facilities for mental health counseling and treatment. To prevent those who have been retrained and rehabilitated from reverting to old patterns of behavior, there must be opportunities for them to obtain meaningful employment and become productive, tax-paying citizens. That is what the American Recovery Plan (ARP) is designed to do; create an American economy that can sustain full employment for all who are willing and able to work.

Detailed Discussion of Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid Issues

Social Security and Medicare are supported by four different trust funds that are maintained by the Department of the Treasury: The Old-Age and Survivors Insurance (OASI) Trust Fund, the Disability Insurance (DI) Trust Fund, the Medicare Hospital Insurance (HI) Trust Fund, and the Medicare Supplementary Medical Insurance (SMI) Trust Fund. The OASI Trust Fund pays retirement and survivors benefits, and the DI Trust Fund pays disability benefits. The Medicare HI Trust Fund pays for inpatient hospital and related care. The Medicare SMI Trust Fund is comprised of two accounts: The Part B Account, which pays for physician and outpatient services, and the Part D Account, which covers prescription drug benefits. The only disbursements permitted from the funds are benefit payments and administrative expenses. Federal law requires that all excess funds be invested in interest-bearing securities backed by the full faith and credit of the United States. As mentioned above, Medicaid is jointly financed by the states and the federal government with federal matching funds based on a formula that ranges from a minimum of 50% to nearly 75% in the poorest state. Under the ACA, the federal match rate for adults newly eligible was 100% for 2014-2016, phasing down gradually to 90% in 2020 and thereafter.

Appendix 14A1 is a history of OASI retirement trust fund operations from 2008 to 2018. It shows that net contributions to the account have been declining each year as more baby-boomers retire and stop payments into the account. In 2018 net contributions were $22.4 billion less than benefit payments and fund reserves of about $2.8 trillion were being impacted for the first time. This trend will continue unless something is done to increase the number of people paying into the trust fund to offset the impact of the people retiring.
Appendix 14A2 is a history of the DI disability trust fund operations from 2009 to 2018. It shows that deficiencies in the net contributions to the DI Trust Fund from 2009 to 2015 ranged from a low of -$12.2 billion in 2009 to a high of -$32.2 billion in 2013, but from 2016 to 2018 net contributions to the fund reserves have been a positive $64.8 billion. This positive trend could be the result of the computerization and fraud provisions in the ACA and the continued reduction in the unemployment rate since 2015.
Appendix 14A3 is a history of the HI hospital insurance trust fund operations from 2008 to 2018. It shows that from 2010 to 2015 the deficiencies in the net contributions to the fund went from -$32.3 billion in 2010 to -$3.5 billion in 2015, and from 2016 to 2018 the net contributions to the fund show a net positive $6.6 billion in contributions to the fund reserves. This positive trend could be the result of the computerization and fraud provisions in the ACA and the continued reduction in the unemployment rate since 2015.
Appendix 14A4 is a history of the SMI supplemental medical insurance trust fund operations from 2008 to 2018. It shows that from 2008 to 2015 the net contributions to the fund fluctuated from year to year with a high of a positive $17.4 billion in 2008 to a low of -$13.5 billion in 2012, and a net contribution of $0.3 billion in 2015. From 2016 to 2018 the net contributions to the fund show a positive $34.9 billion in contributions to fund reserves. This positive trend could be the result of the computerization and fraud provisions in the ACA and the continued reduction in the unemployment rate since 2015.

Medicaid, as well as Medicare, began as an amendment to the Social Security Act in 1965 during the Johnson Administration. As mentioned above, Medicaid is jointly financed by the states and the federal government with federal matching funds based on a formula that ranges from a minimum of 50% to nearly 75% in the poorest state. Medicaid coverage has evolved over time from only covering families with dependent children, to helping to pay premiums and cost-sharing for low-income Medicare beneficiaries, to the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP), to the Affordable Care Act (ACA) option to expand coverage to nonelderly adults with income up to 138% of the federal poverty level (FPL). Under the ACA, the federal match rate for adults newly eligible was 100% for 2014-2016, phasing down gradually to 90% in 2020 and thereafter.

The website entitled “Medicaid.gov” at https://www.medicaid.gov/state-overviews/scorecard/national-context/enrollment/index.html (105) provides detailed statistics on Medicaid operations. The dollars spent during FY 2017 and the current enrollments in Medicaid in the 50 states reveal that about 72.9 million people are enrolled in Medicaid and CHIP programs, and of this total about 35.3 million are enrolled in CHIP and about 17.0 million are enrolled in the ACA adult expansion program. About 54% of enrollees are female and about 46% are male. The age distribution of enrollees are as follows: 47% are below 21 years of age, 7% are between the ages of 21 and 26, 19% are between the ages of 27 and 45, 17% are between the ages of 46 and 64, and 11% are age 65 and above. Appendix 14A5 shows the distribution of dollars and enrollments among the states and territories of the U.S. As of September 2019, 43 states have expanded ACA coverage to adults.
The moral foundations for the issues associated with Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid are covered by UP-4 concerning the stewardship of all living things, including human beings, UP-5 concerning the sacredness of human life and treating others the way we want to be treated, and UP-6 concerning the care of the human body and mind. In our discussion of UP-4 concerning the stewardship of our fellow human beings, we determined why we have the problems associated with the need for the above social programs and established the ARP to correct these problems, which include the following:
1. Fix our relationships with one another by establishing a set of Universal Principles that can help us all work together toward a safer and much more prosperous America and world community.
2. Fix our democracy and return the power of government to the people by addressing the four tools that special interest groups and power brokers use to control our electoral and legislative processes through immediate legislation.
3. Fix our money and control our public and private debt by replacing our Debt/Credit-Based Monetary System with an Asset/Capital-Based Monetary System and by balancing the federal budget.
4. Fix our infrastructure by addressing the approximately $2.1 trillion in infrastructural deficiencies that have already been identified by the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE).
5. Fix our environment by beginning to address the ten ways humans are negatively impacting the environment and our natural resources as identified by the website entitled “Interesting Engineering” at https://interestingengineering.com/10-ways-humans-impact-the-environment (66).
6. Address all of the above issues by implementing a Comprehensive 8-year American Recovery Plan (ARP).

Detailed Discussion of the Abortion Issue

There is only one biblical law that talks about abortion, which could serve as the moral foundation for the abortion issue. It is found in Exodus 21:22-25, "If men strive, and hurt a woman with child, so that her fruit depart from her (she has a miscarriage), and yet no mischief follow: he shall be surely punished, according as the woman's husband will lay upon him; and he shall pay as the judges determine. And if any mischief follow, then thou shalt give life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burning for burning, wound for wound, stripe for stripe." This law reveals two things. When there “is no malicious intent” involved in an induced abortion of a woman, the offender should go through a due process judgment and the offended husband (family) should help the judges decide the punishment of the offender. When “malicious intent” is involved in an induced abortion, the offender should go through a due process judgment and the judges should punish the offender in accordance with the severity of the crime. Any due process judgment involving discipline or punishment should be based on the testimony of two or more witnesses (Duet. 19:15), and false witnesses should receive the same punishment intended for the victims of the false witnessing (Deut. 19:16-21).

Abortion is related to UP-1 - Be fruitful and multiply and replenish the earth, and protect innocent children, and UP-5 - Treat the life of every human being as sacred, and treat other people the way we want to be treated. It would appear that the most important biblical issues concerning this law and these two Universal Principles is that we show respect for the reproductive process that God has created to replenish the earth, that we show unconditional love and respect for the human beings that are a part of that reproductive process, and that we show respect for the life of the unborn child as actions are taken to resolve abortion issues.

Appendix 11A1 is an estimated history of legal abortion statistics from 1971 to 2017. In 1971, two years before the Roe vs Wade Supreme Court abortion decision, there were about 486,000 abortions reported in America. In 1974, one year after the 1973 decision, there were about 904,000 reported abortions, almost double. Twelve (12) years of the abortions between 1974 and 1989 are not included in the statistics, but based on the available statistics, 1990 was the year with the highest number of abortions at 1.63 million. Since 1990, abortions have been declining each year to a 2017 annual total of about 851,000. In the 20-year period before 2017, about 22.6 million legal abortions were performed, which were about 6.9% of the 2017 population of 327.9 million people, and an average of about 1.13 million abortions per year. The average number of abortions for all races and for all the years shown is 315 abortions per 1000 live births, or about 31.5%. The breakdown by race is: 230/1000 for Whites or 23.0%, 668/1000 for Blacks or 66.8%, 286/1000 for Hispanics of 28.6%, and 362/1000 for all other races or 36.2%. Appendix 11A2 is a percentage breakdown of abortions by age group and state for the year 2015. The total U.S. breakdown by age group is as follows: <15 = 0.3%, 15-19 = 9.8%, 20-24 = 31.1%, 25-29 = 27.6%, 29-34 = 17.7%, 35-39 = 10.0%, and >40 = 3.5%.

It can probably be concluded, from the sheer volume of the abortions since the Roe vs Wade decision, that “malicious intent” was not involved in the vast majority of these abortions. And it can further be concluded, from a review of the breakdown of the age groups, that the vast majority of the abortions in the age group between 20 and 34 years old (76.4%) probably did not involve “malicious intent,” because in America these are the ages when young people are building a career and are involved in pre-marital sex. This would lead to the conclusion that most of these abortions were either the result of young men and women substituting abortions for contraceptive measures, or the result of two consenting adults not being willing or able to provide the love, nurture, and proper discipline needed for the unborn child. Therefore, from these statistics, we can conclude that the vast majority of legal abortions performed in America do not involve “malicious intent.”

The goals should be to make abortions a rare occurrence, but safe and legal, with guidelines to help protect the sanctity of the life of the unborn child, and to create a loving, nurturing, and secure environment for new-born babies, so that they will grow up to become productive, law-abiding citizens. The website entitled “ProCon.org” at https://abortion.procon.org/ (79), reveals that there is a wide disparity between the views of the Pro Choice Movement and the Pro Life Movement and neither movement is likely to produce a drastic reduction in the abortions performed each year. The Pro-Choice Movement, which is currently in place and gets its support from the Roe vs Wade decision, is not likely to drastically reduce abortions, because the abortion decision is delegated primarily to the woman with support from her doctor, when both the woman and a man were involved in creating the pregnancy. Also, the immediate families, who may be able to offer options other than abortion, are not necessarily included in the decision. The Pro-Life Movement is not likely to drastically reduce abortions, because they would deny women the right to have most abortions and would encourage the government to punish those who participate in abortions, which would push the abortion process back underground, where it probably was before Roe vs Wade.

To address this issue, we must first determine if the pregnancy of the woman was caused by the “malicious intent” of the woman or the man involved, and whether the pregnancy was the result of violence, coercion, abuse, or exploitation by either party. If the pregnancy was the result of “malicious intent,” the woman may be justified in having an abortion, if she desires, and the punishment of the offending party would be based on the severity of the offense that caused the pregnancy. The spiritual controls embodied in the redemptive process of conviction, confession, repentance, and forgiveness would be used to evaluate each situation. Any discipline or punishment associated with the correction of the improper conduct should be based on the testimony of two or more witnesses (Deut. 19:15), and false witnesses should receive the same discipline or punishment intended for the victims of the false witnessing (Deut. 19:16-21). The cost of the abortion should be paid by the offending party. Family planning clinics, health agencies, and schools should be required by law to report suspected criminal activity and sexual abuse to law enforcement agencies.

If the pregnancy of the woman or girl was not caused by “malicious intent” and was the result of a mutual relationship between the woman and man or girl and boy, then the decision concerning an abortion should not necessarily be given to the woman or girl alone. It should be given to the family primary and secondary stakeholders. In the case of independent adults, the primary stakeholders would be the father and mother of the unborn child, and the secondary stakeholders would be the parents of the father and mother of the unborn child. In the case of dependent children, the primary stakeholders would be the parents of the dependent father and mother of the unborn child, and the secondary stakeholders would be the dependent father and mother of the unborn child.

The parents of the father and mother of the unborn child have a stake in the abortion decision, because the unborn child will determine the future health and survival of the family tree of the parents. If there are no objections to the abortion by the primary and secondary stakeholders based on the conditions surrounding the pregnancy, the cost of the abortion should be paid for by the deciding parties. Family planning clinics, health agencies, and schools should be required by law to report the pregnancies of dependent children to their parents or caregivers.

When there is no “malicious intent,” the abortion decision by the stakeholders should be based on issues such as, the health of the mother, the health of the unborn child, the circumstances that created the pregnancy, the family cost of medical care of the unborn child before and after it is born, and the viability of the unborn child to live a productive life after it is born. The judgment that the decision makers will ultimately receive will be based on their relationship with God, and we cannot be certain what God’s judgment will be, because God knows the heart and character of every person, and His judgment will be based on His grace and mercy and the conditions surrounding the abortion. And even though they may be forgiven of a bad decision by God, they may still have to suffer the consequences of their decision. The important thing is that the decision makers consider the ultimate welfare and sacredness of the life of the unborn child. Another indication of “malicious intent” might be a case where a woman or couple has repetitive abortions as a means of contraception without concern for the sacredness of the life of the unborn child.

The role of government, families, religious organizations, and other support agencies in the abortion decision would be to help resolve disputes between the stakeholders, establish adoption networks to receive the babies from unwanted pregnancies, and provide moral leadership to avoid unwanted pregnancies. In addition, since the stakeholders involved in the abortion decision have been identified, these institutions can also establish programs to make it easier for the stakeholders to make better decisions not to have abortions, and to live their lives in a manner that would avoid unwanted pregnancies and the need to have abortions. The unmarried man or boy involved in the pregnancy should have the same responsibility for child support as if they were married to the woman or girl.

There is an article by Sam Corey at the website, https://www.elitedaily.com/news/politics/lower-abortion-clinics/1290840 (81), entitled “3 Ways To Lower Abortion Rates That Are More Effective Than Closing Clinics,” which provides some insight into ways to substantially reduce the number of abortions in America. His suggestion is to: (1) begin sex education for young people at a relatively early age; (2) promote planned parenthood, birth control, and contraceptives among adolescents and adults, and (3) provide universal paid maternity leave, healthcare, child care, and good, consistent K-12 public education for all Americans.

Detailed Discussion of the Same-Sex Marriage and LGBT Issues

Appendix 11B is an estimate of LGBT statistics and gay marriages in America in 2016 by state. It shows that the LGBT population as a percentage of the total adult population in America in 2016 was about 3.8% and that percentage did not change from the 2012 estimate, but the percentages by state changed substantially for some states. The total estimated LGBT population in 2012 was about 9.1 million and in 2016 it was about 9.3 million. Between the years 2000 and 2010 the number of same-sex couple households grew 8.76% from about 594,391 to 646,464. In 2016 the total transgender population was estimated to be about 0.58% of the total adult population in America or about 1.42 Million. As of 2016, about nineteen (19) states had legalized same-sex marriages.

Human governments who legalize same-sex or gay marriages as being compatible with traditional marriages consisting of a man and a woman are violating the moral foundations set by God’s laws concerning the biblical definition of sinful conduct, and they are causing confusion about biblical teachings concerning the relationships between a husband and a wife in marriage and men and women in general. First, according to the following scriptures, they are violating God’s laws concerning sexual intercourse: “Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind: it is abomination” (Lev. 18:22); and “If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them (Lev. 20:13).” Second, they are violating all of God’s laws concerning marriage, which deal with relationships between husbands and wives and men and women in general. These moral foundations from the Old Testament are confirmed in the New Testament in Romans 1:26-27 and 1 Corinthians 6:9-10, however, all sins, including the sins committed in same-sex marriages, can be forgiven if the individuals become involved with the spiritual controls of the redemptive process.

The Bible also acknowledges that marriage is not for everyone, as is revealed in the following scriptures. In Isaiah 56:4-5, “For thus saith the Lord unto the eunuchs that keep my sabbaths, and choose the things that please me, and take hold of my covenant; Even unto them will I give in mine house and within my walls a place and a name better than of sons and of daughters: I will give them an everlasting name, that shall not be cut off.” The words of Jesus in Matthew 19:12, “For there are some eunuchs, which were so born from their mother's womb: and there are some eunuchs, which were made eunuchs of men: and there be eunuchs, which have made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven's sake. He that is able to receive it, let him receive it.” And there is the conversion of a eunuch by Philip in Acts 8:36-38, “And as they went on their way, they came unto a certain water: and the eunuch said, See, here is water; what doth hinder me to be baptized? And Philip said, If thou believest with all thine heart, thou mayest. And he answered and said, I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. And he commanded the chariot to stand still: and they went down both into the water, both Philip and the eunuch; and he baptized him.”

For those who profess to be Christians, Jesus Christ did not come into the world to destroy these Old Testament laws (moral foundations); he came to fulfill them, as he reveals in the following scripture: “Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil. For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled” (Matt. 5:17-19). Although Jesus did not change any of the Old Testament laws, he taught us how to implement those laws in a “spirit” of unconditional love rather than hate for the offender, which means we “love the offender” but we “hate the offensive conduct” and we take measures to correct it when it impinges on the free will or civil rights of others.

The policy of human government to legalize same-sex marriage is in direct opposition to God’s definition of marriage and in direct opposition to God’s will for humanity to “be fruitful and multiply and replenish the earth.” However, the New Testament teaches that the spiritual controls embodied in the redemptive process of conviction, confession, repentance, and forgiveness provides couples who engage in homosexual conduct the same access to forgiveness and redemption as adulterers, murderers, and anyone else who ever violates any of God’s moral foundations, which we all are guilty of as we live our lives.

According to the website, https://gaymarriage.procon.org/ (80), one of the primary justifications for same-sex marriages is to receive the same social and financial benefits as traditional marriages, which include family leave, hospital visitation, family health coverage, joint tax returns, child custody, spousal and child support, inheritance rights, and division of property. Human governments could replace “same-sex marriages” with “same-sex civil unions” and provide these same social and financial benefits to civil unions (and name them “civil unions” instead of “same-sex marriages”), so that the sanctity of the traditional marriage created by God can be maintained. By doing this, the “perceived identity” of the civil union would not necessarily imply that the relationship is sexual in nature or that there is any sinful or unlawful conduct inside the union, because the biblical law pertains to sexual intercourse between same-sex couples and not companionship between same-sex couples or groups. Non-governmental and religious organizations should not be required to perform same-sex marriages against their will and a person who objects to same-sex marriages should not be compelled to take a job that involves the performance of same-sex marriages.

The spiritual controls embodied in the redemptive process can be utilized to correct sinful or unlawful conduct and still display dignity, respect, and unconditional love for the sinner, by separating the sinner or wrongdoer from the sinful or wrongful conduct. When the “actual conduct” of a person or group suggests they may be involved in sinful or unlawful conduct, UP-5 concerning the sanctity of life and the treatment of others can be utilized to help determine if that “actual conduct” is impinging on the free will or civil rights of another person or group as a result of violent, coercive, abusive, or exploitive conduct. Any discipline or punishment associated with the correction of the improper conduct should be based on the testimony of two or more witnesses (Deut. 19:15), and false witnesses should receive the same discipline or punishment intended for the victims of the false witnessing (Deut. 19:16-21).

If the “sinful conduct” of the person, couple or group is the result of their free will and mutual consent, then their ultimate judgment should be in accordance with their relationship with God, and we cannot be certain what God’s judgment will be, because God knows the heart and character of every person, and His judgment will be based on His grace and mercy and the conditions surrounding each situation. And even though the sinner may be forgiven of their sinful conduct by God, they may still have to suffer the consequences of their sin. However, human government should provide the same freedoms and civil rights to people who are “perceived” or “determined” to be sinful as they provide to all other people, as long as they are not impinging on the free will or civil rights of other people through violence, coercion, abuse, or exploitation.

4Book Appendix 11B - U.S. LGBT Statistics by State.pdf

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