I have recieved quite a few hits so far today for the "Right to Petition For Redress of Grievance" so I figured I would add some more info on this site. Either there was a news article or broadcast I am not yet aware of, or Google moved me to the top of the search. Whatever the reason, I am posting a primer on the Right to Petition lawsuit.
The group leading the way is We the People. Spokesman Bob Schulz is a man dedicated to fighting to keep Government at all levels to their Constitutional bounds. Schulz has and is still fighting his local government and is a pro se litigant in the current RTP lawsuit at the Federal level. There are 1700+ other named litigants and literally thousands unnamed.
On November 8th, 2002, every single member of both the House and the Senate were served with four (4) Petitions For Redress of Grievance. On Nov. 12th the President (G.W. Bush) was served with these same four (4) Petitions. The Petitions address specific constitutional grievances relating to: 1) the War Powers Clauses of the Constitution and the Iraq Resolution; 2) the privacy, due process and free speech clauses of the Constitution and the USA Patriot Act; 3) the money clauses of the Constitution and the Federal Reserve System; and 4) the tax-related clauses of the Constitution and the federal Income Tax system.
As no substantive response has been recieved to date, the Petition that was furthest along, the Federal Income Tax Petition, has gone forward in the Courts. As of this writing this Petition is before the U.S. District Court of Appeals as case #04CV01211 (this was the case# at the District Court, I am assuming it stays the same for the Appeal.) WTP has already filed its Brief and the Department of Justice, representing the Government, has until March 24th to respond to the Brief. WTP will then have until April 7th to file a Reply Brief. From there the case will go forward. Regardless of who wins this case it will be appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court so a resolution is still a ways off yet.
The four (4) petitions can be read and signed here
Here are the 537 Questions that the Goverment has refused to answer. (PDF File)
Full color full page ads that have been placed in both the New York Times and USA Today can be found here. As a bonus if you had the money and wanted to take action you could submit them to your local paper.