Ian Freeman’s campaign of civil disobedience started on the autumn day in 2008 when the Blue Light Gang came for his couch. It was a plaid three-seater, anonymous even by the standards of living-room furniture, except that it occupied prime real estate on the front lawn of his two-story, white-and-green renter in Keene, New Hampshire. His tenants used it for bird-watching. But in this quiet college town near the Vermont border, that put him on the wrong side of a city ordinance that considers such exterior furnishings ‘rubbish.’ A neighbor lodged a complaint. Code enforcement-the Blue Light Gang, as Freeman calls them-asked him to get rid of the couch. He refused. A man has to stand for something.
Plus: Read about the myth of the independent New Hampshire voter.

In court, Freeman (whose given surname is Bernard) represented himself and grilled the lone witness, a city code enforcer. He refused to plead guilty-or not guilty, for that matter-and instead asked the city to pay him a $5,000-per-hour appearance fee (PDF); otherwise he’d consider it kidnapping. The court was not amused. What started as a fine for littering (PDF) escalated to a 90-day jail sentence for three counts of contempt plus an […]