By Roderick Threats
This is the heartbeat of the 9th Amendment Project. By telling Larry Bushart’s story,
In the dead of night on September 21, 2025, the law came for Larry Bushart Jr.
Larry wasn’t a career criminal or a violent radical. He was a 61-year-old retired police officer living in Perry County, Tennessee. He had spent three decades wearing a badge and upholding the law. But that night, four officers stood at his door to arrest him for “threatening mass violence at a school.”
His crime? A Facebook meme.
His punishment? 37 days in jail on a staggering $2 million bond—an amount usually reserved for murderers, not retired grandfathers sharing political irony.
The Meme That Broke the Law
The context of Larry’s arrest is a masterclass in government overreach. Following the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk earlier that month, Larry shared a meme featuring a photo of Donald Trump. The meme quoted Trump’s own response to a 2024 school shooting in Perry, Iowa: “We have to get over it.”
Larry’s caption was simple: “This seems relevant today…”
He posted it in a local Facebook group for Perry County, Tennessee. Despite the meme explicitly referencing Perry High School in Iowa, Perry County Sheriff Nick Weems claimed the post was a threat to the local Perry County High School in Tennessee.
Even though bodycam footage captured the arresting officer admitting he had “no idea” what the threat actually was—and even though Sheriff Weems later admitted he knew the meme was referencing an Iowa shooting—the state chose to “construe” a joke into a felony.
The Enumeration Trap: A Prophecy Fulfilled
If the Anti-Federalists were alive today, they would point to Larry Bushart and say, “We told you so.”
When the Bill of Rights was being debated, men like George Mason and Patrick Henry were terrified of listing our freedoms. They argued that if you list ten rights, the government will eventually claim those are the only rights you have. They feared the state would use the “empty spaces” between written laws to crush individuals.
This is the Enumeration Trap. Because the First Amendment doesn’t explicitly list “the right to share a sarcastic meme,” the state of Tennessee felt empowered to invent a crime to fill that gap. They used “public safety” as a skeleton key to unlock Larry’s front door and throw him in a cage.
The 9th Amendment: The Silent Watchdog
To prevent this exact nightmare, James Madison drafted the 9th Amendment:
“The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.”
The 9th Amendment is a warning: Do not assume that because a right isn’t listed, it doesn’t exist. Larry Bushart has an inherent, unenumerated right to participate in the digital town square. He has a retained right to use irony and sarcasm to criticize political figures. He has a right to be free from “contextual prosecution” where a sheriff acts as both linguist and executioner.
37 Days in the Vacuum
Larry spent over a month in jail. He missed his wedding anniversary. He missed the birth of his grandchild. He lost his post-retirement job.
The government didn’t need to win a trial to destroy him; they used the process as the punishment. By the time the charges were finally dropped in late October 2025, the state had already sent its message: If you speak in a way we don’t like, we will find a way to make it illegal.
The Project’s Conclusion
The Larry Bushart case is the foundational “cautionary tale” for the 9th Amendment Project. It proves that when we rely only on the rights the government permits us to have in writing, we are at the mercy of their “interpretation.”
We must return to the Anti-Federalist mindset: Liberty is not a checklist of permissions. It is an ocean of retained power. The 9th Amendment is the only thing standing between us and a government that wants to turn every Facebook post into a felony.
Larry Bushart wasn’t just a victim of a bad sheriff; he was a victim of a nation that has forgotten how to read the 9th Amendment.
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