IJ's Freedom Flix

In Virginia, you can teach anyone anything—except how to earn an honest living. http://www.ij.org/vayoga   Anyone in Virginia can do yoga, and anyone can teach yoga. But, incredibly, it is illegal to teach people to teach yoga. Yoga-teacher training is just the latest target of vocational school licensing laws that require countless entrepreneurs to ask the governments permission before opening their mouths. Vocational-school licensing burdens both economic liberty and freedom of speech. The cost of compliance is typically thousands of dollars and over a week of full-time administrative work. For owners of small schools, these costs can make the difference between viability and closing down.   Vocational-school laws arent just bad policy—theyre unconstitutional. The First Amendment protects the right of individuals to decide for themselves what is worth saying and who is worth listening to. States cant require writers to get permission before publishing a book, nor can they force filmmakers to seek permission before making and selling a movie. Similarly, it is unconstitutional for state governments to demand that speakers ask the governments permission before lecturing to a room of willing listeners, regardless of whether the subject is how to do something useful.    This case seeks to vindicate the right of all Virginians to speak and earn an honest living. That is why, on December 1, 2009, yoga-teacher trainers Julia Kalish, Suzanne Leitner-Wise, and Beverly Brown teamed up with the Institute for Justice to challenge the constitutionality of Virginias vocational-school law as applied to yoga-teacher trainers.   Please subscribe to our YouTube channel.   We appreciate you watching, rating and sharing our videos. {enclose ijff_Teaching_is_Not_a_Crime_VA_Yoga_Pod.m4v}

Every year, 1,000 Americans die because they cannot find a matching bone marrow donor. Minorities are hit especially hard. Common sense suggests that offering modest incentives to attract more bone marrow donors would be worth pursuing, but federal law makes that a felony punishable by up to five years in prison. That is why on October 28, 2009, adults with deadly blood diseases, the parents of sick children, a California nonprofit and a world-renowned medical doctor who specializes in bone marrow research joined with the Institute for Justice to launch a legal fight against the U.S. Attorney General to put an end to a ban on offering compensation for bone marrow donors.  The National Organ Transplant Act (NOTA) of 1984 treats compensation for marrow donors as though it were black-market organ sales. Under NOTA, giving a college student a scholarship or a new homeowner a mortgage payment for donating marrow would land everyone—doctors, nurses, donors and patients—in federal prison for up to five years. NOTAs criminal ban violates equal protection because it arbitrarily treats renewable bone marrow like nonrenewable solid organs instead of like other renewable or inexhaustible cells—such as blood—for which compensated donation is legal. That makes no sense because bone marrow, unlike organs such as kidneys, replenishes itself in just a few weeks after it is donated, leaving the donor whole once again. The ban also violates substantive due process because it irrationally interferes with the right to participate in safe, accepted, lifesaving, and otherwise legal medical treatment. The only thing the bone marrow provision of NOTA appears to accomplish is unnecessary deaths. A victory in this case will not only give hope to thousands facing deadly diseases, but also reaffirm bedrock principles about constitutional protection for individual liberty. This is the first time NOTA has ever been the subject of a constitutional challenge. 'Actual Bone Marrow Donation' photo reproduced under a Creative Commons license from flickr user limowreck666.  For more on this case visit: http://www.ij.org/bonemarrow   {enclose ijff_Saving_Lives_Bone_Marrow_Pod.m4v}

How arbitrary has government power grown? Take a listen to the Saga of San Tan Flat -- the Arizona steakhouse where the government tried to ban outdoor dancing. {enclose ijff_001_The_Saga_of_San_Tan_Flat.m4v}

Why is school choice important? Let school choice mom and IJ client Andrea Weck tell you in her own words. You can learn more about this case here: http://www.ij.org/1066 {enclose ijff_Andrea_Weck_and_School_Choice_pod.m4v}

Under Louisiana law, it is a crime for anyone but a licensed funeral director to sell "funeral merchandise," which includes caskets. To sell caskets legally, the monks of Saint Joseph Abbey would have to abandon their calling for one full year to apprentice at a licensed funeral home, learn unnecessary skills and take a funeral industry test. They would also have to convert their monastery into a "funeral establishment" by, among other things, installing equipment for embalming human remains. {enclose ijff_Louisiana_Caskets_pod.m4v}