[SEL] OT-Amish Restraint Laws

[Richard Allen]

Boy, that is a new one on me! I don’t know too much about the Amish,
but from what I do know and from what other people have told me, they
are a rather admirable bunch of folks and normally not a detriment to
the community, except when they don’t hang lamps on the backs of their
buggies at night and cause traffic accidents by being rear-ended. 

About the anti-Amish work laws, personally, I think it is a disgrace!
It is clearly an infringement of their Constitutional rights to be free
of persecution based on religion. I know that the laws get around that
by using the excuse of “inferior materials and construction methods”,
but as has been quite adequately explained already, the “proof is in
the pudding”! There are plenty of 150-year-old Amish structures around
as examples of their “inferior craft”. Unscrupulous people do take
advantage of the Amish all the time because they take quite seriously
the Biblical admonition of “turning the other cheek” and they will not
defend themselves, and it looks like the anti-Amish laws will go
unchallenged from the Amish quarter and it will take a non-Amish
advocate to challenge the laws on their behalf.

In the 1994 Northridge Quake here in Southern California, there were
tens of thousands of badly damaged and destroyed homes throughout the
area. The Amish came here as fast they could by whatever antiquated
means they found acceptable for the long distances they had to travel.
Then they went through the quake-ravaged neighborhoods performing the
antiquated but time-honored activity of house-raising bees rebuilding
and repairing the homes of low income and elderly folks for free. Under
those circumstances, if anyone had complained about the Amish being
here, the complainers would have stood a very good chance of getting
treated to another time-honored antiquated activity - - - they would
have been tarred, feathered, and ridden out of town on a rail!

Work and play safely,

Rich Allen