Selected Articles from the LAND Newsletter
MEET THE NEW LAND DIRECTORS
By LeAnn M. Harner, LAND Executive Director
Joining the LAND Board in December were three new directors: Jim Berg, Starkweather; Curly Haugland, Bismarck; and Paul Henderson, Calvin. We thought you’d like to meet them
Jim Berg is a third-generation farmer and lifelong resident of Starkweather. He attended Concordia College in Moorhead and graduated from NDSU, teaching vo-ag for one year before entering farming in 1980. A big event in Jim’s life was traveling to Nepal to propose marriage to his North Dakota girlfriend who was serving as a missionary for a year. Elizabeth said “yes,” and is now an R.N. working with O.B. patients and childbirth classes.
The Berg’s have four children-ages 16 to 9. They enjoy outdoor activities, host foreign exchange students, and are involved in their local church. They raise small grains, edible beans, confection sunflowers, and soybeans and have black baldy commercial cow/calf enterprise.
Jim sees LAND “as a leader in the state for addressing the issue of property rights to three groups: the public, the membership and the legislature. I believe the organization can be a complement to other farm/livestock/property groups.” He says he’s now at a point in life where he could commit time for the Board and he’s looking forward to learning more about private property rights and issues.
Curly Haugland was raised on a small family farm near Crosby, ND, where we raised small grains, a few head of cows (milked by hand), some pigs, chickens, etc. He graduated in 1970 from UND with a degree in journalism. He worked for newspapers, then for a state agency in public information.
Curly moved into the construction industry, eventually starting Recreation Supply Company and Eureka Manufacturing Company, both of which supply and/or manufacture products used in the construction of commercial swimming pools; companies that he owns and operates today. He also owns and operate farmland near Bismarck and a ranch in McKenzie County.
Curly and his wife Darlene have three children, all of them active in our various family enterprises. He is a private pilot, political activist, and enjoys hunting, fishing, and hiking. He is active with the Republican Party and numerous trade groups and social organizations. Curly joined the board “to be active in the fight to preserve and protect the right to own and control the use of private property.” He says, “LAND should be a proactive force in the property rights area working to anticipate threats to property rights and to expose the enemies of capitalism and free enterprise. It should be a high priority of LAND to educate the general public about the source and nature of the threats to private property.”
Paul Henderson was brought up in a large, close family near Calvin in Cavalier county. Twenty years ago Paul married his high school sweetheart, Donna. They have four sons, ages 1 to 8. who love the farm life and are learning to care for their animals, including cats, chickens, tame ducks and geese, and dairy goats. Paul says the boys do the milking!
Paul and his family enjoy all types of outdoor activities, including camping, fishing, hunting and ice fishing….oh yes, and farming, too.
Paul has been a LAND member for many years. He says, “LAND appeals to me because it wasn’t afraid to take on wetlands and other private property issues that pertained to me. As time went on I appreciated the gains that LAND has been able to enact even with it’s relatively small membership base and budget. I believe we must use our grassroots base to promote legislation to protect private property; protect the rights for development and improvements on all property. Private property is useless without retaining all the options to use the property as the owner sees fit.”
Jim admires Teddy’s Roosevelt’s outlook on life, especially this quote: "not the critic who counts...but the credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena." Jim believes each of us are called to make a difference in our vocation and our community, but especially with property rights: “I have strong feelings regarding special interests groups and Washington politicians reaching way out here to impose their belief systems on property owners. I feel that those of us who live here are conservation-minded and seek a balance between nature and business.”
Curly cites Adam Smith. “Smith wrote, "The Wealth of Nations" in 1776 which helped lay the intellectual framework that explains the free market and the economic freedom which results when free markets forces are allowed to work. Smith first used the phrase "the invisible hand" to demonstrate how self-interest guides the most efficient use of resources in a nation's economy, with public welfare coming as a by-product.”
Curly explains. “The right to own private property is the fundamental right that sets us apart from most other economies and forms the basis for our free enterprise system. I believe that threats to the ownership of private property endanger our entire way of living. Many forces are at work to institute a different method of appropriating opportunity. I want to be a part of successful efforts to preserve and protect our free society. LAND and groups like it across the country will be instrumental and critically important in such efforts in the coming years.”
Paul Henderson also looks into the past for inspiration. “The very people that settled this land; struggle after struggle to build this country with their brains, individual ‘can-do’ spirit based on the belief that if they worked hard they could actually own property, bettering themselves and their families, all the while working under a government that was elected by the people, limited in size and scope have allowed us to build the greatest country in the history of the world.”
He quotes James Madison, who, after working on the Constitution, reflected on his work with these words: “We have staked the whole future of American civilization, not upon the power of the government, far from it. We have staked the future of our political institutions upon the capacity of mankind for self-government upon the capacity of each and all of us to govern ourselves, to control ourselves, to sustain ourselves according to the Ten Commandments of God.”
Paul says, “without everyone’s participation to retain and protect our rights we will not be able to pass this country on as we received it.”
These three new directors have brought fresh perspectives to our concerns and made for some very interesting board meetings.
