Church and State blog: The University of Michigan Welcomes Passage of Proposal 2

Wednesday, November 05, 2008

The University of Michigan Welcomes Passage of Proposal 2

Early yesterday morning, as Declan began selling The Big Issue - a magazine sold by homeless people on registered street pitches - a homeless begged alongside him; provocatively, I might add, like he wanted Declan to say something to him. After Declan left him to the pitch, we were not sure if the incident would prove the highlight of the day: Declan walks a round trip of two hours to the Catholic Manna Centre every weekday to be guaranteed a bite to eat for lunch, where he was assaulted on 19 June (see blog of 19 June “Declan assaulted in the Manna Centre”); and only the day before yesterday at 5.00am, as were about to leave the place we sleep in at night, a cleaner hosed where we bed down (see previous blog).

The vast majority of emails I send to scientists and academics inviting them to sign Declan’s petition to the UN on research cloning of embryos and stem cells end up in spam boxes (or in cyberspace, see blog of 4 September “Obama: Yes to stem cells, funding”), so it doesn’t really count as a highlight. Still, the number of out-of-office autoreplies I received yesterday afternoon was amongst the lowest I have received in months: four from a total of 264 emails. For example, 86 emails to University College London Neuroscience yielded one autoreply; 60 to the Faculty of Medicine at Imperial College London, one - the first email; and 78 to the School of Medicine of University of Southern California, two. (On Monday, it was eight autoreplies from 109 emails to University College London Neuroscience and 118 emails to the School of Medicine of University of Southern California; and two signatures.)

University of Michigan executive officers and faculty issued statements this morning regarding the passage of Proposal 2, the amendment to the Michigan Constitution that allows new embryonic stem cell lines to be derived from embryos that have been created for fertility treatment purposes. The embryos affected by the amendment would otherwise be discarded, unless donated with informed consent.

Proposal 2, approved by voters in yesterday’s general election, overturns a 1978 Michigan law that prohibited creation of new stem cell lines from discarded embryos – the vote was 2,143,101 in favor to 1,945,035 against. Prior to passage of Proposal 2, Michigan has been one of the most restrictive states in the country with respect to embryonic stem cell research.

The proposal pitted the state’s powerful public and private biological research centers against large, conservative Catholic and evangelical populations who equated destroying fertilised eggs with murder (see previous blog). “This is a great night for the state of Michigan,” said Sean Morrison, director of the University of Michigan Center for Stem Cell Biology and a vocal supporter of the proposal. “Clearly the voters saw through the misinformation and fear that the opposition were spreading.

“I can tell you this: We’ll be meeting within the next week ... to expand our embryonic research program. We expect in the short-term millions of new dollars of grants to come from the federal government and private foundations to support the expanded research.”

Proposal 2’s strongest support came from college graduates and people who have done postgraduate work. High school graduates and dropouts were inclined to oppose it, said The Associated Press.

Elsewhere, voters in Colorado rejected a measure defining a person to “include any human being from the moment of fertilization”, which would have applied to sections of the Colorado Constitution that protect “natural and essential rights of persons”, said CNN.

Although, like most people, we expected Democratic candidate Barack Obama to win the general election, we were nonetheless quite pessimistic about Proposal 2 – according to pre-election polls, Michigan voters were split down the middle. All in all, it was a great night for Declan’s petition to the UN and our campaign in support of embryonic stem cell research and therapeutic cloning, also known as somatic-cell nuclear transfer (SCNT).

For the record, below is Declan’s email letter yesterday afternoon to the chair of The Big Issue Foundation, Steven Round. The Big Issue has informed us that from this coming Monday we will no longer be able to have a registered pitch, after almost two years surviving on the streets of London by selling the magazine from the same registered pitches; an extremely serious situation for me in particular, in that I am facing possible prosecution for begging, an illegal activity in England. In a reply email yesterday evening, Round informed Declan that he would make sure we receive a response.

Subject: The Big Issue

Dear Mr Round

I am writing to you in your capacity as chair of The Big Issue Foundation. Please find below a copy of my email letter of 7 October to the founder and Editor-in-Chief of The Big Issue, Mr John Bird MBE, to which I have not received a reply. As a seller of The Big Issue magazine, I wish to complain that if my wife and I have not purchased a minimum of 40 magazines each week for four weeks commenced 6 October, from 10 November we will no longer be able to have a registered pitch - we “will be allowed to carry on selling but not have priority on any pitch”.

I can confirm that on 13, 14, 15 and 16 October I emailed The Big Issue with respect to my wife's new badge (1170), which, being unavailable for collection at Head Office on Monday, 13 October, did not become available for her to pick up until 1.00pm on Thursday, 16 October. The same Monday at Head Office - following my own rebadging to the end of February 2009 and the validation of our pitch authorisation slips until the end of Tuesday of the following week - I was advised by Office staff that my wife could not purchase or sell The Big Issue without her new badge.

I can also confirm that the first two working weeks of October culminated in the so-called "Black Friday" financial crash; shares around the world have continued their downward trend, particularly in London; and our pitches are located in the heart of London's financial district. Further, last week temperatures plummeted – the first time London has seen snow in October for 70 years.

Please would you acknowledge receipt.

Yours sincerely
Declan Heavey
Badge no. 1163

---------------------------

Subject: The Big Issue

Dear Mr Bird

As the founder and Editor-in-Chief of The Big Issue, please find enclosed copy of an email I received yesterday, 6 October, from your Outreach Manager for London, Mr Paul Joseph. On 10 September 2007 you wrote to me, stating:

I have employed many people over the years to do jobs related to the running of The Big Issue. I have never employed them to do my job; likewise I do not do their job. Please bear this in mind when you are composing your letters. You do not need to address your letters to me, as it is not my job. I would only get involved if you were utterly and totally let down by those whose job it is in The Big Issue. I hope this assists in your deliberations in pursuit of your claims.

I wish to complain that if my wife and I do not purchase a minimum of 40 magazines each week for the next four weeks, from 10 November we will no longer be able to have a registered pitch - we "will be allowed to carry on selling but not have priority on any pitch".

Yesterday we were only able to afford to buy two Big Issues for resale, and today will only be able to afford to buy another two magazines. Moreover, I wrote to the Registrar of the European Court of Human Rights on 21 August further to my second application for priority under Rule 41 of the Rules of Court, stating:

As explained in previous applications, my wife and I survive on the streets of London by selling The Big Issue, a magazine sold by homeless people on registered street pitches, and I have lodged numerous written complaints with The Big Issue Head Office in respect of my wife and myself being walked off our respective pitch by other street traders, including, inter alia, Big Issue vendors. You will note from my email and attachments to Court of 16 August that not only may my wife be forced into begging (a criminal offence in England), but she has been threatened by The Big Issue with debadging for so doing.

Please would you acknowledge receipt.

Yours sincerely
Declan Heavey
Badge no. 1163

cc Mr Steven Round, Chair of The Big Issue Foundation

Church and State

MAYOR OF LONDON RSI PROPERTY
DAY 406 IN A WEEKLY PERIODIC TENANCY
SUBJECT TO A SECTION 21 NOTICE

(SEE PARA. 3 BELOW)

1. Our 308 Honorary Associates include 20 Nobel Prize laureates. Declan and I are engaged in a project that deals with the publication of issues significant to social policy in a number of key areas, e.g., climate change, population, futurism, atheism, and free speech. Established as Network for Church Monitoring, a non-profit company limited by guarantee, our main publication, found at the website, Church and State, calls attention to subjects, not the least which have been critical of the interaction between religious and secular institutions. We have been the target of numerous threats and actions, e.g., the former resulting in threats to Declan's life, and the latter, which have led to vandalism. The various incidents are on record with the police and other official agencies.

2. There are no less than 63 Nobel Prize laureates on the Church and State website from 20 Honorary Associates, eight articles, nine book excerpts and 33 petition signatories. (For example, one Nobel laureate signed our Nobel petition in support of human embryonic stem cell research and gave us permission to excerpt from one of his books.) Our list of associates also includes 18 US National Medal laureates, and six Turing Award laureates (the equivalent of the Nobel Prize in computer science). We have published one article and excerpted from the books of seven members of the British House of Lords. And there are 31 knighted professors on the site from 13 Honorary Associates, one book excerpt and 21 petition signatories. These figures are despite the never-ending assault on our email (this link reveals the targeting of our emails to, among others, a close colleague in Washington, DC as well as space advocates and Nobel laureates).

3. This is Day 406 for us living under the threat to life of a 'no fault' eviction by Peabody Trust.[1] We live in a Mayor of London's Rough Sleepers Initiative (RSI) property. Peabody's appalling new terms of tenancy have forced us into an unstable weekly periodic tenancy that poses a threat to Declan's life and inhibits our ability to exercise our rights. Declan accumulated quite a history with the Housing Ombudsman Service before he received the Ombudsman's decision not to investigate a referral from Lyn Brown MP on jurisdictional grounds. The Ombudsman was asked to consider whether or not our tenancy has been renewed like for like; and whether, if not, it should be in light of the landlord having accused us of not signing a like-for-like agreement. The Equality and Human Rights Commission will not accept a referral of discrimination from Ms Brown, the Commission's helpline (EASS) having grossly distorted the complaint against Peabody. We no longer have pro se access to the courts (see next paragraph).

4. This eviction matter came before District Judge Ruth Fine at the Central London County Court on 30 June 2020, when both counsel for St Mungo's (the charity in effective control of our tenancy) and Declan presented their positions. Declan lost the case and was ordered to pay £1,850 in costs. A publishing colleague in America cleared these costs within 24 hours of my blog post about this hearing for strike out on a related issue that was the essence of the claim, i.e., that St Mungo's would take a phone call to confirm that we are clients of the Mayor of London's RSI programme. Within a week of the hearing, St Mungo's had agreed to take this phone call for us both, the Court having ruled that they were not obliged to do so despite our circumstances. This time we escaped bankruptcy (counsel for St Mungo's asked for £3,407.50 in costs), but consider that to seek pro se access to justice in the courts has become far too dangerous for us. Declan currently has before the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman the decision of the Information Commissioner that allows St Mungo's to continue processing coercive support plans without our knowledge or consent and that also poses a threat to his life.

5. When it comes to traffic, we have had 10.7 million hits in the past three years on Facebook; however, I left the platform on 13 March 2021 for one year rather than risk being banned for life. It is indisputable that with any sort of level playing field Church and State would have far exceeded 2.5 million hits last year. In addition to a large variety of blocks without explanation, Facebook had so severely restricted our Page's distribution by October 2020 that it was almost as good as an unpublished page.[2] Currently, we are up to their 85th block since 1 December 2015, and as usual without an explanation. This block records as one half of their 3rd double block in the first five weeks of this year that lasted 60 days. Our traffic has also been curtailed by over 2.5K blocks on access to Church and State since 26 July 2016, including 29 full distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks since 17 May 2019 that have lasted for as long as 54 hours at a time.[3] About 70% of our hits are from Americans.

"This is precisely the hard hitting kind of response needed to clarify the unfair way Facebook is treating your highly reputable site." Don Collins, Founder, International Services Assistance Fund, Washington DC

Last updated: 26/06/21

_________________________

[1] Once a fixed term has elapsed, the landlord has the option to seek eviction even if the tenant has upheld their obligations in full (though of course the landlord must still apply for and obtain a county court order).

[2] 17/10/20: We have permission to publish this ISAF letter of 30 September to Facebook COO Sheryl Samberg. Facebook has so severely restricted our Page's distribution since 4 September that it's almost as good as an unpublished page

[3] Since October 2019, we have been defining a full DDoS attack as having such a high volume of up to 4-minute blocks on access to Church and State that we don't bother recording them all.

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Wednesday, November 05, 2008

The University of Michigan Welcomes Passage of Proposal 2

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