Need legal help in Maine

Hello, my name is Anthony Dougherty and my wife is Mona Dougherty. My wife purchased a house in Old Town, ME in 2022, where we have lived, we have two cats and two rabbits, and I have 4 chickens. These Chickens are why I am reaching out to you today.

Under a constitutional government, the people have all the rights and powers and we lend them to the various governments as we see fit. At one point in time, this included allowing local governments like town councils to limit our rights to produce our own food. Since July 2nd, 2021 however the citizens of the state of Maine took back this power from all forms of government through our constitutional amendment process.

Constitution, Art. I, §25 is enacted to read:
Section 25. Right to food. All individuals have a natural, inherent and unalienable right to save and exchange seeds and the right to grow, raise, harvest, produce and consume the food of their own choosing for their own nourishment, sustenance, bodily health and well-being, as long as an individual does not commit trespassing, theft, poaching or other abuses of private property rights, public lands or natural resources in the harvesting, production or acquisition of food.

On October 16th, 2023 the town of Old Town served my wife with a lawsuit concerning our chickens. According to their zoning ordinances, they are attempting to claim we have no right to keep livestock. The amendment calls this an unalienable right which infers that it is not transferable under any circumstance, and is a right that would be retained under any contract.

I am reaching out as we do not have the financial means to gain representation for this lawsuit, my wife is from Pakistan and is unfamiliar with the American system of Government and this is causing undue stress and fear for her, we have worked amicably with the town and were promised to be notified after I presented the amendment if we were still in violation, that was over a year ago with no notification from the town until this lawsuit. We are trying to find legal representation or financial support to get representation please share this with anyone who may be willing to assist us in defending the rights of Maine citizens to keep our food sovereignty.

gf.me/u/44ka4u

Anthony Dougherty 2073327226
anthony.r.dougherty@gmail.com

Hi Anthony;
I am certainly not a lawyer, but here is my take on your problem.
The amendment that you shared is a good thing to be a law in your state or better yet in every state!

However, I did not read it to directly mention livestock.
As I understand it, towns can have rules prohibiting cattle, pigs, goats, chickens, or any "livestock" within the city limits for sure and possibly throughout the entire county.
Seems they (city folk) do not want  "farm" sounds (roosters, cattle mooing} or even heaven forbid "farm" smells!  We like our burgers but we do not like smelling cow poop!

I suspect that you will not be able to fight this.

thomas rubino wrote:Hi Anthony;
I am certainly not a lawyer, but here is my take on your problem.
The amendment that you shared is a good thing to be a law in your state or better yet in every state!

However, I did not read it to directly mention livestock.
As I understand it, towns can have rules prohibiting cattle, pigs, goats, chickens, or any "livestock" within the city limits for sure and possibly throughout the entire county.
Seems they (city folk) do not want  "farm" sounds (roosters, cattle mooing} or even heaven forbid "farm" smells!  We like our burgers but we do not like smelling cow poop!

I suspect that you will not be able to fight this.

Raising of food would typically refer to raising of livestock, the amendment also signs these rights are to "any food of our choosing" sorry I posted the proposal, not the resolved amendment!

We have had people succeed in changing their local town rules, but it looks like it is a lengthy and uncertain process.
See these threads that may be of help:

https://permies.com/t/180511/people-helped-town-change-chicken
https://permies.com/t/157994/City-ordinances-holding#1238004
https://permies.com/t/155547/sleeping-CC-Rs-lie
https://permies.com/t/41427/City-ordinance-poultry-convincing-HOA#324056

Sorry not to be of more use....

I am sorry to hear of your troubles.

I am in agreement with Thomas.

If I wanted to have chickens I would try talking with other folks in town who want chickens.

Then as a group, we could draft an amendment or an ordinance to present to the Town Council.

I doubt that the Town Council would even consider allowing roosters so I would make my draft exclude them.

Best wishes for your chickens.

Anne Miller wrote:I am sorry to hear of your troubles.

I am in agreement with Thomas.

If I wanted to have chickens I would try talking with other folks in town who want chickens.

Then as a group, we could draft an amendment or an ordinance to present to the Town Council.

I doubt that the Town Council would even consider allowing roosters so I would make my draft exclude them.

Best wishes for your chickens.

That wouldn't be relevant as we as a state made this amendment, the state construction trumps the town ordinances. We are just trying to get legal representation.

With it being a state related issue, you would have to have a lawyer who is part of the BAR in Maine. I am not familiar with the area, but where I live there are legal clinics that pop up that provide free/low cost representation for specific types of law.

Law is interpreted by the Legal Branch. What you might read and believe is true is not necessarily how the law would be read by a judge. The words and the punctuation matter a LOT. I studied constitutional law for my Bachelors and what is written seems like a wide open grey area. It is going to take cases and proceedings to really flesh out what is allowed and not allowed.

In the short term, I don't know if this is a fight you will want to take on if it is causing your wife so much stress. I'd try and work at the local level to get poultry allowed in your township. IMO

Since this is a fairly new amendment, its precise meaning has likely has not been hashed out in court yet. While you might be right, you are likely facing a long drawn-out expensive legal fight. The expression "is this the hill you want to die on?" seems appropriate in this situation.

John Wolfram wrote:Since this is a fairly new amendment, its precise meaning has likely has not been hashed out in court yet. While you might be right, you are likely facing a long drawn-out expensive legal fight. The expression "is this the hill you want to die on?" seems appropriate in this situation.

If we can get the funds to get a lawyer yes, as this is literal tyranny, "all just powers of government are given by consent of the governed" the governed here reserved our right. I just need the finances to pay for a lawyer

Anthony Dougherty wrote:That wouldn't be relevant as we as a state made this amendment, the state construction trumps the town ordinances. We are just trying to get legal representation.

Are you making your fight on a State level?

I see your wife, Mona is being sued by Old Town, Maine for having a loud rooster.

https://www.bangordailynews.com/2023/10/17/news/bangor/old-town-sues-owner-loud-rooster/

I didn't get to read the article due to that Ad Blocker thingy.

The City of Bangor, Maine Charter now allows families to keep farm animals:

https://www.newscentermaine.com/article/news/bangor-family-wins-fight-to-keep-emotional-support-chickens-in-their-backyard/97-bee0514b-61f7-42b5-b981-2b68b6d303e2

Anne Miller wrote:

Anthony Dougherty wrote:That wouldn't be relevant as we as a state made this amendment, the state construction trumps the town ordinances. We are just trying to get legal representation.

Are you making your fight on a State level?

I see your wife, Mona is being sued by Old Town, Maine for having a loud rooster.

https://www.bangordailynews.com/2023/10/17/news/bangor/old-town-sues-owner-loud-rooster/

I didn't get to read the article due to that Ad Blocker thingy.

The City of Bangor, Maine Charter now allows families to keep farm animals:

https://www.newscentermaine.com/article/news/bangor-family-wins-fight-to-keep-emotional-support-chickens-in-their-backyard/97-bee0514b-61f7-42b5-b981-2b68b6d303e2

They are pointing to the loud roster, however the lawsuit is actually over zoning ordinance of livestock in a residential zone. It is presently only at the district level.

Most cities/town that allow their citizens to raise chicken will specifically say no roosters allowed and a certain amount of setback from the fence line.

As with most things, the city only comes out if a neightbor calls and complaints and say you are causing problems to them, aka playing your music too loud, "playing your rooster too loud/etc".  You can try bribing your neighbors with eggs and maybe switching over to ducks and be more selective of the people that you tell your endeavers too, who might then report you.

Whats its like for me in Boston, MA
https://chickenlaws.com/massachusetts/boston-chicken-laws/

S Bengi wrote:Most cities/town that allow their citizens to raise chicken will specifically say no roosters allowed and a certain amount of setback from the fence line.

As with most things, the city only comes out if a neightbor calls and complaints and say you are causing problems to them, aka playing your music too loud, "playing your rooster too loud/etc".  You can try bribing your neighbors with eggs and maybe switching over to ducks and be more selective of the people that you tell your endeavers too, who might then report you.

Whats its like for me in Boston, MA
https://chickenlaws.com/massachusetts/boston-chicken-laws/

Yeah no as I said this is an unalienable constitutional right here, towns can't "allow" anything. Regardless there's clearly no help coming from here so I'd like to disable this forum if possible.

Man, there is so much learned helplesness in these responses. I get it, the system feels unstoppable (and probably is - don’t fight it, make it obsolete.)

However, this fellow is willing to fight it!!! If you have the energy to fight it, sir, I commend you and offer a deep bow of respect.

One option for funding is GoFundMe crowdsourcing. It looks from your last post you may not be using this forum any longer, but I wonder how the fight went?

Wuthe Puck wrote:Man, there is so much learned helplesness in these responses. I get it, the system feels unstoppable (and probably is - don’t fight it, make it obsolete.)

However, this fellow is willing to fight it!!! If you have the energy to fight it, sir, I commend you and offer a deep bow of respect.

One option for funding is GoFundMe crowdsourcing. It looks from your last post you may not be using this forum any longer, but I wonder how the fight went?

We worked with the town as my wife is not from here and that house is in her name, the chickens were moved and I brought to the town meetings the issues. They have said they understand but it will be to be litigated, so I will be opening another lawsuit as the town does not have the power to override neither the Constitution nor an unalienable right.