The Montana Freemen

Dan Rather called them a “hate group” and Ted Koppel “racist hustlers.” They were labeled “domestic terrorists” by the mainstream news media. But the truth was that the Montana Freemen came closer to exposing the fraud within the Federal Reserve system than anyone ever had since the bank’s doors first opened in 1914.

Why did Attorney General Janet Reno really send a total of 600 FBI agents to surround the farming area in central Montana in a siege that lasted 81 days? And why were the Freemen never allowed to use their own papers at trial? This evidence disappeared forever when the Garfield County, Montana courthouse in Jordan mysteriously burned to the ground later that year.

Pat Shannan spent a total of 18 days in Montana during that 1996 standoff at the behest of The Spotlight newspaper, and the result was a book unlike any other written on the topic before or since.

Review by Heidi Rankin, Staff Writer for The Jubilee:

I had heard the story, followed it on the evening news, read about it in The Jubilee, commented on it with my husband, and therefore thought I had exhausted the topic. Until I picked up this 115 page book The Montana Freemen: The Untold Story by J. Patrick Shannan. I was immediately drawn into the story by Shannan’s easy writing and subtle sense of humor. The book reads like a novel but the many footnotes and references are a chilling reminder that this is not a work of fiction. This is a real story, and yes this did happen in America. Once I got started, I did not put it down until the last word had been gobbled up by my eager brain. I was left satisfied, although I must admit, Shannan has aroused a curiosity for Common Law knowledge I have never before felt. In it’s introduction, The Montana Freemen takes us from the very beginning of the Common Law to the position the United States now finds itself. In a way, this book is an introduction to the particulars of Common Law, but this information, which tends to be tedious, is presented in such a way a child could explain it and even enjoy it. The introduction to Common Law gives us a basis to understand who the Montana Freemen are and what they are trying to do. If you’re already familiar with Common Law, you will still find this book to be a great review and description of the Freemen’s particular circumstances.

If you ever wanted to know why the Justus Township was targeted by federal agencies to be next in line for extermination, your questions will soon be answered. What you may begin to wonder is how the township made it as far as they did. There certainly seems to have been some divine intervention. Even their township name [Justus] is, unbeknownst to them, Biblical. (Justus is a surname of Jesus, Col. 4:11 KJV).

The book details the media black out, the “circular filing” of most of the Freemen’s paperwork, the mislabeling and misconstruing of terms and names by ignorant press and the lack of support from many “patriots” due to misunderstandings and/or possible coercion by federal forces. There really is only one way to find out what really happened, and that is to hear it from the victims themselves. Shannan interviewed all 23 Freemen in order to accurately report the development of circumstances that led most of them into jail for charges seemingly, and in some cases admittedly, trumped up.

The Montana Freemen – describes just what it was Leroy Schweitzer discovered that got the officials so stirred up, and why. Even now, they are doing everything in their power to keep this knowledge from being released to the public. They are caught in their own trap and they know it! Leroy Schweitzer shares the atrocities committed to him by prison officials; you will cringe at the obvious abuse of this peaceful man. But a few short sentences later, you will rejoice with him as he succeeds to make a tumult out of the court. He has prosecutors thumbing through law books unable to keep up with him as he recites law from memory. Shannan also addresses the militia, who, having received a lot of negative coverage in the past couple of years, vigilantly kept watch during the siege, should the worst of events materialize. After learning what our fellow countrymen have suffered to redeem and secure our God-given rights, how can we not feel supportive of our fellow patriots?

The patriot community has a tendency toward pessimism, however, and few believe as the Freemen do, that their cause will ultimately succeed and bring to light to the American public the lies they have been told since at least 1913. I’d like to believe, with divine assistance, it may come true.

“Now you see when I get done, everything I have done will be a supreme court report, and it will go into the Superintendent of Documents in Washington, DC on a mandate published. And that will be making it public lawfully…Then we will tie it into our Congressional Reference case, and at that point we will start to run the country lawfully and it’s been authorized by their Appellate branch,” said Leroy Schweitzer, “The ramifications are endless,” Shannan remarked.

“Yes, they are…”

From the Introduction:

Concerning situations regarding government security, we journalists have found in recent years that there are almost always two, very opposing, stories. One is the who-what-when-where-and-why of the truth, and the other is the government-fabricated myth – the total flip-flop reminding us of our chuckles emitted while reading the distortion of facts flowing from the Soviet Union’s news agency Tass not so long ago.

Tass’ mission was always to glorify the government’s position and the actions of its agents while debunking truth and demonizing anyone whose position was adversarial. This is now the solitary path of the American news agencies. Today in this country, whenever we see information suppressed for “reasons of national security,” we immediately perceive this to mean reasons of government security.

In the early spring of 1996, hundreds of FBI agents surrounded the Ralph Clark ranch complex near Jordan, Montana for a total siege of 81 days. The government spin was that the nearly thirty people inside were of a radical anti-government and racist religious sect who had written bad checks and threatened judges, among other things. About the only true claim made was that, indeed, these people were of a great threat to government security but not for the reasons portrayed.

In fact, the Montana Freemen were coming closer than anyone had in 82 years of exposing to the American people the fraud and myth of the Federal Reserve system. This is why the federal government jumped on top of them and began to stomp with both feet. The inside secrets of those twin sisters of deception – the FED and the IRS – must be preserved at all costs.

After a total of 18 days in Montana on two separate trips – first on behalf of The People’s Radio Network in May and then for Spotlight newspaper in June – I was flying back to New Orleans and began to realize that not only was I the only reporter on earth with this full story but almost the only one who had been seeking it. Certainly, the robotons from Associated Press and the national television networks had not tried to learn the Freeman’s side. I was the only journalist to interview the Freeman in the Billings jailhouse. This was only because they had heard my radio reports and knew that I was attempting to treat them fairly, and that was all they ever wanted – fair treatment. They never got it in the courtrooms.

One of the most outrageous displays indicative of a tyrannical police state happened the week before I arrived in Jordan. Lt. Col. (ret.) James “Bo” Gritz and retired Phoenix cop Jack McLamb had attempted to negotiate a surrender for four straight days without success. The final day before giving up, Bo Gritz emerged from the ranch house with a videotape in one hand and a 19-page document in the other. He handed the tape to an ABC newsman, as instructed by Freeman Russell Landers, and deposited the document into the hands of the FBI Special Agent in Charge. Then he turned to the news cameras and spoke:

“Here is your chance, Janet Reno,” he said, “to behave lawfully instead of forcefully this time,” with an obvious reference to the Waco incident. “Review this document and show the Freeman how they are wrong, and they will come out tomorrow.”

It was the high water mark of the Freeman and an offer that should have been repeated every day of the siege. Not only did Janet Reno and the Justice Department prove by their reticence that they could not face the truth, but the FBI immediately confiscated the video from the newsman, and the contents were never aired.

I later secured a copy of that 19-page document explaining the Freemen’s stand and reprinted it in the appendix. It alone is worth the price of the book. It explains much of the presumption of law by which the tyrannical District of Columbia governs by usurpation of the constitution. The reason the Justice Department refused to respond will be obvious to the reader. The videotape, had it been aired nationally, would have been devastating to the government’s propaganda machine. It showed the very articulate Russ Landers explaining the Freeman’s lawful stand in terms that anyone could understand and appreciate.

THE MONTANA FREEMEN – The Untold Story of Government Suppression and the News Media Cover-up is a story told from the other side of the fence, from inside the jailhouse, and from inside the brains of some very brilliant men.

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