This has been very informative reading so far. I’ve also gotten a bunch of email from people who would rather not go on the record in the blog. I’m glad to see so many people putting a lot of thought into their answers without just shooting from the hip about how they would resist to the death.

As I see it, the main problem Americans will face if we get a dictatorial government (which I think will begin in earnest with gun confiscation) is that our own personal resistance may lead to arrest for our friends and relatives. Even if some of us would “resist to the death,” would we resist if it meant prison for our surviving family and friends?

People get kind of sick of the Nazis always being brought up to show how bad things can get, but this is an appropriate discussion to examine what the Nazis did to squelch resistance among the German populace. The Nazis didn’t just arrest the resistor, but they arrested the resistor’s family members all the way out to cousins. They sometimes arrested the resistor’s friends and neighbors. The Nazi’s also liked to arrive in the middle of the night to do their arrests. Such tactics had a chilling effect on the individual German’s willingness to resist. During the Nazi reign, German neighbors often turned in their own “suspicious” neighbors to Nazi authorities in order to protect themselves from guilt by association.

So let me expand on my original question: Even if your are willing to resist, how do you do it if it means endangering your children, your wife, your aunts and uncles, your closest friends? What is the strategy individual people can employ if we are to save freedom for America?

Here’s a hypothetical question:

What will you do, personally, if Government agents come to your door and ask you to give them your guns?

If you don’t want to go public with your answer by commenting on this blog, please send me an email to dave at backwoodshome dot com.

I’m writing a column on this subject for the next issue of Backwoods Home Magazine, and I’d like some input from others. I’ve already asked some neighbors and friends.

If you don’t feel comfortable sending me a comment, please think about what your actions would be. Let’s assume the visit from the Government agents will not be a surprise, as it will have been well advertised in the media, after Congress passes sweeping federal gun control legislation.

A word of caution: Consider your answer without bravado. Remember the story of Bradford Metcalf who went to prison for 40 years for possessing illegal guns and talking about resisting Big Government. It’s serious business when you resist Government and guns are involved, so consider what you would “actually” do, not what you’d like to do.

Following is an email from LD Shannon of Peyton, Colorado. I think it’s a glimpse into a world into which America is now going — a world in which Big Government bureaucrats control everything. I’m glad BHM was helpful in this case.

We are recent subscribers & now ardent fans!  The advice in Backwoods has, literally, saved our lives as we had a major shock hit us this week.

We received a letter from the State of Absurdity (names changed to protect the guilty) that they had placed liens on all of our accounts because we had not paid enough in taxes to the tune of $81,000.  Problem is - we have not lived in that state for four years and their information was flat dead wrong!

Correcting faulty information would be simple enough …  if a ‘police’ state followed due process and had actually NOTIFIED us prior to these illegal seizures.  We had NEVER heard a peep from these bureaucrats before in our lives!

I am a disabled vet and have days where I can barely get out of bed.  We have four children, one  a son with down syndrome who requires plenty of extra care, ie, we have enough on our plate without this brand of bs dropping out of the sky!

Now comes the good part.

After our initial shock, after our calling these nut-cases in the state of absurdity with no success at all in explaining their irrationality, well … after all that my wife and myself looked at each other and began to laugh!

That is because we have built a heck of a pantry to feed our family.  We have chickens laying near a dozen eggs a day.  I am pretty handy with a rifle and have put down a deer and in the next few weeks expect to harvest a buffalo and two elk.  We have gallons of homemade wine.  And finally, and most importantly, we have cash.  Not in the bank … cash in hand!

We’ll straighten out the nut-cases.  And yes, we’ll probably have to pay some lawyer to prove our innocence and never get an apology or that fee refunded when we prove them wrong.

But because we have read and followed the great advice from all of you at BHM we have the best sleep-at-night insurance one can buy - self reliance!

This illegal seizure of property is a sign of the times, Dave.  The Federal government created this mess and is now taxing the bejesus out of us all to try and bail out a sinking ship.  State Governments are feeling the trickle down choke and are deciding to take it out on the citizenry.  And this is just the beginning of this g## damn mess.

Thank you for showing the way, Dave … thank you and all your writers and staff for helping all of us build our ‘ark’ so we can survive and thrive these coming bad times.

God bless you and all the staff of BHM, Dave.

LD Shannon
Peyton, CO