From : http://permanenttourist.com/4paths/fly-without-id.htmlIt's
Easy If You Know How!
In the last two years, everyone flying on a
commercial airline has
stepped up to an airline's ticket counter and heard
the agent recite
a familiar litany. The monologue goes, "has your bag been
unattended;
have you accepted gifts from a stranger; can I see
your
identification please?" The traveler docilely murmurs answers,
and
produces a driver's license or some equivalent.
As a die-hard
Constitutionalist, I believe that we still have an
absolute, unfettered,
God-given right to travel from point A to point
B without permission from
the state -- in the air, as well as on
land. This Nazi procedure of "your
papers, please" has never been
appropriate for our country. I have had
occasion to travel a good
deal in the last several months, and on those
trips I decided to
research and test this issue about the necessity for
producing
identification. I have talked with agents, and their supervisors,
of
several major airlines in cities across America, and have
gradually
pieced together a rather complete picture of the real legal
situation
regarding our right to travel.
Next, I tested this finding
with several airlines. When asked for
identification, I produced only my
Sam's Club card, or my travel
agent's ID card, or a Costco card. These are
all picture ID's, but
they are privately issued, and do not even have a
signature on them.
The airline agents just freaked out, and demanded to see
some
state-issued ID. They routinely told me that "it was federal
law!"
The government absolutely required me to cough up an "official"
ID
card, without which the agent couldn't even THINK of letting me
on
the plane.
I told the agents that I could not find any federal
regulation
mandating that type of identification, and then asked them to
cure my
ignorance and please cite the regulation. Now, at this
point,
individual airline agents have reacted differently. Some called
in
their supervisor. Alaska Air employees were the most
gracious;
Northwest agents were the worst -- they were rude, belligerent
and
hostile brats. But they all folded, every time. A particularly
nasty
Northwest employee marched me all the way back to the
electronic
detection equipment, made me pass through it a second time, and
had
the guard thoroughly search my carry-on bag. The same
airline
agent-from-hell actually made rude and demeaning remarks to me as
we
trudged back to the counter -- and then she let me on the
plane.
Alaska Air was much more reasonable -- the agent just issued my
seat
pass, and commented that some people seem tenaciously to hold
the
thought that they have the right to travel without
producing
government ID -- to which I responded, "yes, amazing, isn't it --
and
I'm one of them." In Seattle, an agent said AS HE HANDED ME
MY
TICKET, "you know, if you don't show me any government-issued ID,
I
can't let you board the plane." I replied, Yes, I understand. But
I
didn't, and you are. With a smile, he just said, "have a nice
trip."
So I have flown several times using only my meager privately
issued
picture ID cards.
Every time I used this strategy, I noticed
that the agent put an
orange sticker on my checked bags, and also on my
seat pass on the
ticket. Several agents divulged that this is the policy
they are
supposed to follow when a person does not show government ID.
The
bags simply wait in the baggage room until the person presents
the
matching seat pass as he/she actually boards the plane; then the
bags
go on board.
On my next trip, I decided to push the envelope
even further. When
the Alaska Air agent made the usual perfunctory request
for
identification, I put on my best face, smiled sweetly, and
said,
"Gee, I'm so sorry, but I just don't have any ID I could show
you."
To my speechless astonishment, the agent just said, "no problem
--
just fill out this simple form, and present it to the counter at
the
airplane gate." I watched as the familiar orange sticker again
went
on my bag. I repeated the same scenario with Horizon Air on
another
trip. I have now flown twice without producing any
identification
whatsoever.
Northwest was actually instrumental in
advancing my education about
this issue. I was so aggravated by the
insolent and hostile treatment
that their employee gave me, (hopefully
former employee, after the
blistering letter I sent to the company
president), that I demanded
to see a supervisor on the spot. I then
demanded that he produce the
relevant federal regulations RIGHT NOW, or
face personal liability
for authorizing an unreasonable search and seizure,
dereliction of
duty, fraud, conspiracy, civil rights deprivation and any
other legal
buzz words I could think of at that moment which would justify
a
lawsuit against him personally, as well as his employer. Like
everyone
else, he couldn't show me any statute or regulations. He
even admitted that
there are none.
However, he did produce a copy of Security Directive
96-05, which the
Federal Aviation Agency issued to all airlines in August
of 1996. Its
wording is very instructive; it reads as follows:
1.
IDENTIFY THE PASSENGER -
A. ALL PASSENGERS WHO APPEAR TO BE 18 YEARS OF
AGE WILL PRESENT A GOVERNMENT ISSUED PICTURE ID, OR TWO OTHER FORMS OF ID, AT
LEAST ONE OF WHICH MUST BE ISSUED BY A GOVERNMENT AUTHORITY.
B. THE
AGENT MUST RECONCILE THE NAME ON THE ID AND THE NAME ON THE TICKET -- EXCEPT
AS NOTED BELOW.
C. IF THE PASSENGER CANNOT PRODUCE IDENTIFICATION, OR
IT CANNOT BE RECONCILED TO MATCH THE TICKET, THE PASSENGER BECOMES A
"SELECTEE." CLEAR ALL OF THEIR LUGGAGE AS NOTED IN SECTION 6,
BELOW.
6. CLEAR SELECTEE'S CHECKED AND CARRY-ON LUGGAGE, AND SUSPICIOUS
ARTICLES DISCOVERED BY THE QUESTIONS ASKED;
A. IF THE SELECTEE IS ON A
FLIGHT WITHIN THE 48 CONTINENTAL US
STATES, OR TO MEXICO, OR TO CANADA,
ITEMS CAN BE CLEARED BY EITHER OF THE FOLLOWING METHODS:
1. EMPTY THE
LUGGAGE OR ITEM AND PHYSICALLY SEARCH ITS CONTENTS BY A QUALIFIED SCREENER,
OR;
2. BAG-MATCH -- ENSURE THE BAG IS NOT TRANSPORTED ON THE AIRCRAFT
IF THE PASSENGER DOES NOT BOARD.
B. IF THE SELECTEE IS ON AN
INTERNATIONAL FLIGHT -- CHECKED LUGGAGE, CARRY-ON LUGGAGE, AND SUSPECT ITEMS
CAN BE CLEARED ONLY BY THE FOLLOWING METHOD; EMPTY THE LUGGAGE OR ITEM AND
PHYSICALLY SEARCH ITS CONTENTS BY QUALIFIED SCREENERS.
This document
apparently goes on for ten more pages; the Northwest
supervisor gave me
only the first page, which contains the information printed above.
The
next time I refused to produce ID and the agent freaked, I told
her, "just
tap up Sec-Dec 96-5 on your computer, and go to Paragraph
1, Section C.
Designate me as a 'selectee,' and proceed accordingly.
She apparently
thought I was an FAA undercover employee, because she
said that she was
"tired of you federal guys coming around" and
literally spying on airline
agents, "coercing us into lying to
people, and essentially being the 'bag
man' for an activity which has
no legal requirement." I told her that I
could not agree more.
Another airline employee later confirmed that FAA
agents often engage
in such entrapment activities, to make sure that
airline agents
parrot the government party line about state-issued ID. I
also hit
pay dirt in a discussion with another, much nicer Northwest agent
on
the East coast. In a candid conversation, he told me that
FAA
personnel had held training sessions with all airline agents in
the
fall of 1996. Agents were informed directly by the FAA that
they
absolutely could not bar an American citizen from boarding a
plane,
even if a passenger refused to produce any identification at all!
I
understand Delta Airline is facing two large lawsuits
because
employees twice denied this reality, and actually twice kept off
a
plane a passenger who had only private ID to show. Anyone want to
own
an airline, courtesy of a judge? I have personally flown Delta
with
only a private travel card, so I guess they already had their
hand
slapped.
Yet another agent in the Midwest admitted that airline
personnel were
deliberately and knowingly coercing people into showing
government ID
by saying "it's the law." According to him the reality is
that the
companies are simply tired of people selling their
frequent-flyer
tickets. The airlines wanted to stem this practice by
checking
everyone's ID, but knew there would be BIG problems if
they
instituted this procedure as a private corporate policy. It was
so
much more convenient to say it was federal law and make
the
government the scapegoat. So this policy meets the airlines'
private
financial goals, and the government's goal of ever-increasing
social
control.
If no one complains or asserts their rights
regarding travel, then
another freedom is "poof" gone. Our children watch
this happen, and
grow up thinking that the state has both the right to
define our
identity by issuing documents saying who we are, and also the
right
to require us to produce them on demand.
Reprinted from "The
American's Bulletin," 3536 N Pacific Hwy,
Medford, OR 97501,
1-541-779-7709
(ambassador: Todd Michael; Haus Von Weisser)
old
Webpage:
http://www.angelfire.com/sd2/rdm
fax: 702-921-7986
Redemptive Dominion Missions
c/o
temporary post location: 6834 South University, #414
from without
Centennial [80122] Colorado
within the Commonwealth of
Yishra'el. 