AngryMiller

I was paid on a biweekly basis. The state wanted to get paid on a weekly basis. Over the course of the year (thank you computer programmer) they said I was in arrears first for one week then for two week, then caught up at the end of the year.

GUWonder

Your response "'just you wait' is silly" talk is the silly talk here since I did not mean it would happen. What I did suggest was why not also deny passports for other unpaid financial obligations of the sort that also do "tax" society directly and indirectly. The discussion is not moot but when there is an absence of logical consistency and an emotionally-wedded position (like that says "think of the children" in denying passports) then the discussion may not be fruitful for all but it surely highlights the logical inconsistencies intrinsic in the position of the emotionally charged.

Loren Pechtel

Then something's really messed up in their system. I could believe it was stupid about weekly/biweekly but this would have nothing to do with 5-week months.

Now, the first job after college I had would have given them fits: I was paid semi-monthly rather than biweekly. It was more convenient for them and it worked better for me as well as most bills are monthly, not 4-weekly. Having the same income month to month is better than 10 months lower and two higher. I don't think the law allows this anymore, though.

AngryMiller

Yep. Payrolls are funny. Some folks get paid on a weekly basis, others biweekly, others the first and 15th of each month, others get paid monthly. The software folks weren't too concerned since over the course of a year all the payments should even out. Except for the nasty, threatening letters it worked out.

Brewfangrb

I am not emotionally charged and frankly...<sigh> I am trying very hard here, since I know this thread is being monitored strictly and who knows what is and isn't ok...but suffice it to say that I resent your implication that either my position is logically inconsistent or that I am emotionally charged on the issue. When I stated the discussion was moot, I was referring to between you and I. It would seem at this point each our positions are not going to be changed by arguments made by the other, no?

Regardless, I won't bother you anymore on this. We disagree---you see it as needless "but, think of the children" overreaction and I don't (even if you think I do).

the_happiness_store

The right to drive is a privilege.

The right to travel is not. Unless I am being incarcerated for an offense it is not my fault where I was born. As far as I am concerned I can leave for anywhere; I just may not be welcome there.

If you say I can't travel then jail me because that is what you already have done.

desmei

So is it a right or a privilege to have children? Hmm?

Dovster

Technically, by withholding a passport from you the government is not stopping you from traveling -- it is merely not assisting you in being welcomed upon arrival.

If you read your passport, you will see the following:

While airlines, seeking to avoid the expense of returning you if you are refused entry, may ask to see your passport before leaving the US, they are not required to do so by US law. Moreover, you are not required to show it to any US government authority (upon exiting).

Upon arrival back in the US you will also be allowed entry without a passport after you prove that you are an American citizen.

Originally, having a US passport was not a common thing. It was, in fact, a special request from the Secretary of State. Later, it became easier to get a passport but it was still restricted to citizens who the Secretary of State felt would not be either an embarrassment to the US or a problematic visitor to the host country.

If a person is a criminal, or someone who has not met his legal obligations, why should the Secretary of State assist him in gaining entry to another country?

LegalEagle

The right to travel has been found to be a constitutional right. The right to travel with a passport has not. Many countries previously did not require a U.S. passport from a U.S. citizen entering their country, and I suspect some still do not.

Every American citizen has a constitutional right to re-enter the country, although doing so with an expired passport or some other proof of citizenship than a current valid passport may subject the person to some administrative hassles. However, I am fairly confident that a U.S. citizen would not be expelled (Some Hispanic citizens apparently were mistakenly expelled a while back in California but I believe that the ACLU is pursuing a damage action on their behalf).

GUWonder

When one's own state is foremost demanding that passports (also herein read: functional passport-equivalent accepted for purposes of entry and exit) are increasingly needed by its own free citizens for international travel, then the supposedly inviolable right of free citizens to travel (read: domestic and international travel) is infringed upon as long as the ability of non-incarcerated citizens to access a passport is not held to be inviolable.

Originally, a passport issued by the citizen's state (i.e. also read here as home state/country) was not so generally required for international travel to arrive in or depart from one's own home state.

Now, some want to convince gullible people to think of the access to a home country-issued passport (or accepted functional equivalent) as a privilege when the situation requiring free citizens to have a passport to engage in the same sort of travel and enter or exist their home country is rather recent and is more than ever before a creation of one's own state when we talk of the US.

Taking away the ability of non-incarcerated citizens to engage in international movements and/or setting up conditions so as to restrict the international movement of such persons is not a privilege -- rather these government restrictions on non-incarcerated citizens is a sign of the free citizens being subjugated by the state when it comes to international movements and a traditional right being infringed upon.

To be granted or denied the ability to engage in international travel is not a privilege as it is the home state doing the restricting. It is a loss of freedom to have the home state in control of deciding which of its own non-incarcerated citizens are to be able to engage in international travel and which of its citizens should be prohibited from departing the country. [Control orders of this sort -- and that is what passport denial in the current era is about -- are associated with the ways of imperialism, neo-feudalism and jack-booted authoritarianism but have been incorporated even by states that at varying points in time claimed to be opposed to such anti-democratic behavior.]

Think about the following:

1. Isn't it that, according to the US government, all US adult citizens are required to enter and exit on a US passport (or US government approved document or DHS-accepted functional-equivalent) when it comes to all but a small minority exempted until all aspects of WHTI is fully implemented?

2. Isn't it that the passport (or DHS-accepeted functional equivalent document for international travel) information of US citizens arriving in or departing the US on commercial airlines are required by the US government?

Answer the questions in the affirmative? Then isn't it clear that it is the US government that is trying to restrict the movements of non-incarcerated US citizens by depriving them of the right to international travel by controlling who is and is not issued a US passport or other DHS-accepted travel document? It ought to be.

The minority of US citizens not required to enter and leave the US on a US passport or other US government-approved functional equivalent is shrinking and only applicable to a narrowing set of US citizens. That a growing number of US citizens are violating US laws won't change the way it is: most US citizens are legally required to enter and exit the US on a US passport when traveling by commercial airlines across international boundaries.

GUWonder

Anyone know of another country (other than the US) that denies passports to its citizens for failing to pay child support?

GUWonder