Constitutional Law

In consideration of the times in which we live and the character of government to which we are now subjected in this country, can there be any possibility that our Founders would have conceived and established a government that was so centralized in its supremacy when they fought, sacrificed and died to gain independence from a supreme government only to create one similar in supremacy?

Through the decades there has been almost a daily remodeling of the very substance of our government and of the intentional divisions created by the Framers of our Constitution to make such consolidation of government supremacy so cumbersome that any such attempts would not only cause conflicts, but pressing inefficiencies. When, in the course of such remodeling, the powers of representation become despotic, not only in its execution of power, but in its very nature, then it becomes the most desperate duty of the People to staunchly defend the original principles enumerated to enlighten the awareness of their Liberty.

Once the spheres of co-ordinate powers were clearly distinguished there was no doubt as to the operations of such powers or of the manner in which those powers should and should not overlap jurisdiction. As time passed however, the lines were intentionally blurred by the body politic as exclusive privileges were introduced, government pensions promoted and various judicial actions dispensed, which allowed an arbitrary power in government to collect and then dispense the wealth of this People at its pleasure, to determine the degree of Rights afforded to the People as though such Rights were a government grant. In doing so, this government has created the most lucrative partialities for itself and its beneficiaries, all in its attempt to gain a centralized supremacy over the system of federalism that once, to a degree, protected the People from the abuses brought about by both uninhibited ambition and the avarice that follows such ambition.

There has been a political habit of corruption within our government, brought about by the instrumentality of supposed necessity and, of course, convenience. As with all such political corruption, there are always consequences, one of those consequences is the positioning of this government as the bountiful grantor to its beneficiaries, whether the wealthy or the poverty stricken, using powers never enumerated and definitely never delegated. Over the years, this government has used these powers; all usurped, to create the most dangerous political combinations, many between the government itself and corporate entities, combinations that provide mutual benefits to both while creating a greater distress among the People who must pay the price for such relationships. There has also arisen, within such political combinations, a power vested by government itself to actually regulate the poverty and even the wealth of individuals through the manipulation of economic principles.

Within these political combinations, there has evolved a body politic that now materially affects the interests of all persons in this country through the expansion of powers far beyond those delegated. It is evident that all powers were originally delegated from the People, through the agency of the Several States, and yet, the federal government now assumes powers far greater than the very source from where all power and authority was delegated, and thus extracted. Policies, pernicious in character, have been formed between those who administer government and those who seek to benefit, either financially or politically from such policies. It now appears that both the vices and the capriciousness of politicians dictate all the claims of government to powers that were never intended to reside in government. Such claims to power always beget a growing oppression of the People, as experience of such coercion has sufficiently proved.

The evolved hostility toward individual Liberty is increasingly exemplified by this government?s claim to regulate essential aspects that are commonly associated with the life of an individual. While it is very true that our Freedoms may well prove inconvenient to this government, we should, in no wise, allow this government any abridgements of the foundations of our Liberty. There is, as there always has been, a propensity of the political process that leans toward mischievous inclinations. There must be a reinstitution of the Constitutional prohibitions on the powers by which this government nurtures itself. There must be a rejection and an elimination of government precedents by which such infringements have become legally justified.

Along with such blatant infringements, our Congress has been successful in the creation of pecuniary inequities, redistributing, as it were, both the wealth and the poverty of this country on a scale that has never been witness in our history. With such inequities come discord and discontent, all the while avoiding the very principles, which would be far more propitious to the happiness of the People and the future safety of the Republic. With such powers, the government has extended itself beyond the limits of all social necessity in the pursuit of its own aggrandizements, its funding systems, emoluments, pensions, standing armies, government sponsored corporations, banks and by its political patronages. In short, it has assumed the absolute power to act according to the pleasure of political expediencies in the interests, ambitions and avarices of its own administration.

The principles of our American Revolution have long since faded; instead we have allowed this government to invest itself in the instruments of our own oppression. By a system of inferences and distorted construction, this government has laden itself with superfluous powers, which are both pernicious in execution and devoid of Constitutional principles. We have yet to understand that the lost of one of our natural Rights is equivalent to the loss of them all.

There are basically two types of construction regarding the Constitution, one which is maintain the principles upon which this country was founded, the other calculated to corrupt those principles and, in the process, destroying such principles. As the expositor of certain powers, this government, extending those powers, no longer seeks to preserve the Rights of the People, but seeks to diminish the force of such Rights in the lives of individuals while reigning over them as though they were subjects of government instead of Sovereigns. It should be very evident that the means to accomplish destruction of the force of our Rights, as individuals must occur before it destroys the Liberty associated with our country. This government has employed a variety of obscurities while assuming unlimited powers of Constitutional construction to destroy our Liberties piece-meal. 

Should we find it amazing that the idea of a sovereign national government is nowhere to be found in either the Declaration of Independence, the federal Constitution, nor, for that matter, in any Constitution of the Several States? In fact, the word is never used in any of those documents and yet the word is now used to describe not only the character, but also the very nature of this heavily centralized government. Our Founding documents never presented the intimation of sovereign power to government, instead, every one of those documents we find instead of sovereign powers, powers that are co-dependent, divided powers and powers delegated or, as in the case of the States, reserved powers. All such powers, as evidenced by those documents, were both intentionally restrained and limited.

There is however, a reference within the Bill of Rights which declares the States ?to be free, sovereign and independent, but while it is clear that each State has those attributes it does not imply that the government of those States are free, sovereign and independent, for the State governments must also be subject to the Sovereignty of the People themselves. The reference is in regard to each State?s stance in relationship to other States and any foreign entity or country, including the federal government. Since our governments, both federal and State, are established by the People, the People retain all Sovereignty and deputize governments to act on their behalf and in their best interests. Our governments are the Servants of the People, as such there is no way to invest Servants with Sovereignty since Sovereignty, by definition and implication, declares the superiority of the Sovereign and the subordination of the Servant. Likewise, as the States, deputized by the People, did not, upon acceding to the union, transfer any Sovereignty from the People, but confined and limited powers as a means of sustaining the Right of self-government only.

It must be understood that actual Sovereign can neither be fiduciary, nor is it subject to external limitations except by the act of deputizing the law and the trust of the People. A government which has no external limitations, one which has the ability to determine its own limitations will always become unlimited in the scope of power it exerts and will eventually self-destruct from the excesses it pursues.

Can there be any doubt that it is a Natural Right to institute and limit our own government, establishing it on very specific principles designed to inhibit the possible extension, and therefore, the usurpation of powers which are even now used to regulate the consciences of People, confiscate their properties and redistribute the fruit of their own labors. Our government has increased its own authority, and there should be no doubt that the various degrees of our oppression are caused by what can only be described as this government?s pecuniary fanaticism. The Framers, at least most of them, viewed the idea of a sovereign government, whether the federal government or those of the States, as dangerous, as such, they sought to eradicate the principles of a government sovereignty by deeply investing our governments with very specific and very limited powers, all of which were enumerated.

Our country is now tortured by all the usurpations of the People?s Sovereignty and yet, we have been carefully taught to believe that our government is indeed sovereign and that we should, in all allegiance to the idea of its sovereignty, sacrifice ourselves, our Rights, our Liberty and our Freedom to maintain a system that no longer acts on the behalf of the People. Under the pretense that the purposes of this government is nothing less than the advancement of the national good, many have willingly allowed themselves to be subjugated to an illegitimate authority that, by its own claim, is the sovereign power over the People and the People little more than servants to the government?s supremacy. We now find ourselves in a thralldom, subjected to a system that imposes itself upon the People as though they were subjects of the government.

There should be nothing more objectionable to a free People than the idea of sovereign supremacy of government, for such an idea should be no less abhorrent than the rodomontade of kings who claimed their powers by divine right.  Contrary to discerning any power of sovereign supremacy of government, our Constitution enumerates such a long catalog of balances, checks, and divisions of powers, limitations and restrictions that the concept of such supremacy is nullified. Sovereignty and the Right of self-government inherently reside in the People, but neither resides in government except by force and fraud.

Sovereignty therefore, by definition, infers a corresponding inferiority. Since this is the case it must be concluded that all political departments of government hold power through the authority of the People as it is delegated to the government and not from the government itself. While our government pretends to respect the Sovereignty and Consent of the People, the truth is that it directly assaults both. Original construction of the Constitution basically established three conventional authorities over the federal government, the mass of which reside within the People of each of the Several States, the next was in the State governments which were deputized by the People to appoint Senators to the federal Senate and the third being the authority of the States to enter into convention for the Amendment of the Constitution. Two Constitutions are involved in our form of government, one being the Constitutions of the States, the other being the federal Constitution, as such there are two distinct jurisdictions, each with powers delegated and reserved.

There is, and must be, a material difference between the concepts of the Right of self-government and sovereignty of a government; the first allows for the People to bestow very limited and enumerated powers to government while the second allows for the People to receive a limited franchise to their lives. The People of the Several States retain all powers that were not bestowed on either the State governments or the federal government; as such, the People never relinquished a portion of their Sovereignty proper, but only allowed for the limited grant of power deputizing the governments of the Several States and the federal government. Essentially, neither the State nor federal governments received any powers except as trustees of the Sovereignty of the People.

Upon reading elements of the various State Constitutions it becomes obvious that the principles behind those Constitutions recognized the self-evident Rights of the Individuals. Additionally, there is the expression of the Sovereignty of the People in their sole ability to form, by compact, a government. There is no higher form of Sovereignty than the capability of forming a body politic or government.

When reading the individual Constitutions of the States, the phrase ?Several States or States? does not refer to all the People that comprise the United States, but the People who comprise the individual State Republics. The usage explicitly denotes a mutual consent of the People who have organized themselves into a civil society, as such the Sovereignty of this association and all allegiance due to that Sovereign association, along with the Right to internal self-government clearly declares the fact that there is nothing synonymous between the terms State and government. The States are comprised of Sovereign Individuals and the governments of those States are the instituted organizations that has been deputized by the Sovereign Individuals used, in trust, to help facilitate the maintenance, and if necessary, the defense of their Rights, Liberty and Freedom.

The plurality of the States, as well as the definition of federalism itself, completely rejects the idea that there is a national state organized and centralized in a general supreme government by the federal Constitution.  When speaking of the term ?United States?, the Constitution simply bears witness that there was an averment of the pre-existing condition set forth by the compact between the People, called the States. There is, in the very word ?United? an admission in the Constitution that political societies are able to contract with each other; thus when we understand the phrase ?a more perfect union?, it was a recognition that there was, in the powers of the People, the ability to amend the previous union under the Articles of Confederation, each State being the same party to the amended union as they were to the original union.

A Compact, such as the Articles of Confederation or the federal Constitution, exhibited the Sovereign character of the People, via the instrumentality of the States, as they exercised their Right and Power to enter into treaties with each other. While the Articles of Confederation gave preference to the State governments, the Constitution gave preference to a co-ordinate structure of checks and balances between the States and the newly formed general government. The parties of the previous Confederation were exactly the same parties who formed the Constitution, as such, the States, which are trustees of the People?s Will and Consent, not only had the Power to create a Charter, but retain, to this day, the Power to amend or even destroy that Charter. It should therefore be evident that the term ?union? was never intended to describe our government, only the Compact between the States as they exercise the Sovereignty of the People.

The lack of uniformity in the Constitutions and the governments of the Several States denotes the explicit independent nature of the States and, in contrast to the States, of the federal government itself, for if the formation of the union of States and the resulting general government it created were the action of all the People of all the States in unison, then there would be no need for State Constitutions. Indeed, had the Constitution been an act of the whole of the population of the United States then every State would simply be a province without the necessity of individual Constitutions, jurisdictions, legislatures, senates, etc. The States would have been relegated to nothing more than departments of the federal government, completely dependent upon the central government?s dictates without recourse or redress, without power to amend any edicts imposed by the general government. Of course, that is exactly what the Consolidationist have always wanted, a nationalized government ruling over provinces and that is essentially what this country has devolved into over the decades.

As trustees of the Sovereign Power of the People, the States have the authority to amend the Constitutional Compact, such power and authority is not left in the hands of Congress, no majority in Congress is able to either call a convention or amend the Constitution. It is the States, acting on behalf of the Sovereign Character of the People, who can, upon gaining two-thirds agreement in the legislatures of the States, compel Congress to call a convention, once called three-fourths of the States may amend the Constitution. That power and authority does not reside in the federal government or in any branch of that government, but in the States. There is therefore, a recognition of the instrumental supremacy of the States as they act in the Sovereign Character of the People. This instrumental supremacy is not only over Congress, but also over the Executive and Judicial Branches of our federal government. The Power to Amend the very document that allows for the general government is the Power over the general government in all its aspects. Indeed, the Power to delegate or even reserve any power or authority denotes instrumental supremacy.

It should also be evidently clear that the People of the Several States, acting in their Sovereign Capacity, invested their State governments with far greater latitudes of political operations than they invested in the federal government. The federal government was limited in its authority and in the execution of that authority. Equally clear is the Eleventh Amendment to the Constitution, which prohibits any construction that would allow the Rights Retained by the People to be denied or disparaged; the principle is further constructed in the Twelfth Amendment which reserves to the States respectively or to the People all powers not delegated to the United States, nor prohibited to the States.

A Power can only be Reserved or Retained if it were originally resident in the first place, likewise, a Power can only be delegated from the source of that Power. Therefore, the States, acting upon the Sovereign Character of the People have granted a degree of limited power to the federal government.

Despite arguments to the contrary, there has never been a single one of the States in these United States which have consented to dissolution into one nation under a centralized government. All Powers reserved by the States and Retained by the People are not delegated, in any way, to the general government through the instrument of the Constitution, nor have any Rights of the People, whether considered in terms of the plurality or the Individual, been relinquished to either the State or federal governments.

All Powers and Rights Reserved are only exposed to very specific and narrowly defined deductions, while all powers and rights delegated are limited and with that limitation there is a definitive injunction against the denial or disparagement of the Rights enumerated and those which were not enumerated by the Constitution. It is quite evident in this quote from The Federalist: ?The Assent and Ratification of the People, not as individuals composing one entire nation, but as composing the Distinct and Independent States to which they belong, are the Sources of the Constitution. It is therefore not a national, but a federal Compact.?

Prior to our Constitutional Compact, societies and governments were formed on the principle of subordination and submission to unlimited power and authority.  Had it not been for those Patriots who bravely fought and sacrificed during the Revolution and the political philosophies that influenced those Patriots, then the Natural Right of Self-Government and the Rights of the Individual to pursue Freedom and Liberty may have never arisen. Within the Declaration of Independence there is a proclamation of the Right of the People to Alter, Abolish and Institute governments that ?seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness?. That is an amazing principle today, especially when the People begin to once again claim that Right and Duty.

Far from being indistinct or undefined, our system of governments is one of several co-ordinate, but distinct divisions that are specified with the most deliberate exactitude. When speaking of our governments, it is evident by virtue of their Right to Alter, Abolish and Institute governments, the People of the Several States established these co-ordinate divisions within our government, but did so without investing one section of that system of governments with supremacy over the others. Accordingly, due to the mutual structural dependence of the federal Legislative, Executive and Judicial branches, there is also a structural dependence of those federal Branches on the States themselves and upon the union they [the States] have with one another under the Constitutional Compact. At one time, the federal government was dependent on the States, unfortunately that is no longer the case as the principles of Constitutional Construction have been subverted and distorted through federal usurpations.

The primary principle of our system of governments is that both the federal and the State governments are, in fact, nothing more than different agents and trustees, deputized by the People and instituted with different powers for different purposes. The two governments, federal and State, are intended to provide a set of controls which provide for the security of the People in their Sovereign Character. Indeed, the federal Legislature was to be restrained by its dependence on the People, not only by its dependence on the People, but by its dependence and the oversight of the Legislatures of the Several States in order that there be a collateral control outside the federal government. The degree of supremacy delegated to government, either federal or State, is only delegated within the very restrictive spheres of action, limited to the basis of the powers actually and explicitly delegated.

The Framers of the Constitution were well aware that if the general government were to possess powers resembling sovereignty, then it would eventually take upon itself the power to regulate public and private property, disposing of it at the will of government politicians and bureaucrats. Indeed, they were aware of the tendency of governments to grow as the access to power increases; as that access increases, the more people are included in the decisions of the use of such power, the consequences of such growth and access is that the ambition and avarice of those in power is gratified at the expense of the People.

Our Constitution did not empower, nor did it invest our elected representatives with the authority to govern beyond certain limitations, this is especially true when it comes to individuals and their property. Elections were seen as another layer of control over government, while not perfect, it has a chilling effect on the attributes of usurpation when the electorate are involved and educated, otherwise it becomes a an exercise in futility as politicians abuse the electoral system to their advantage.

When the politicians are held to their responsibility as trustees of the People?s Sovereignty, then the relationship between the trustees and the People?s trust is maintained. It is apparent that politicians must be reminded of their obligations and while there is the tendency of politicians to seek powers of supremacy in governing, they must always be held accountable if they seek to subvert the principle of the People?s Sovereignty. This demand for accountability must be held in the highest regard, both by the People and those invested with the People?s trust, otherwise the foundation upon which our Republic rests will eventually crumble.

It must be understood, that in a similar fashion as the federal government, the State governments are also only trustees of the People, deputized on their behalf to lend a layer of protection to the People, not only against internal State intrusions into their lives, but also federal intrusions. Likewise, just as the federal government was not invested with unlimited powers of taxation for maintaining and sustaining itself, so too the States themselves were limited in their ability to tax the People in order to sustain State government. Of course, it is under the pretext of the public good that government tends to  mask its requirements of ever-increasing taxation.  The People are not the government?s purse!

Within our Constitution there is evidence that the motives behind the various enumerations of powers and rights invested in both the State and federal governments were to be precautionary in nature. Indeed, the Constitution places prohibitions on States as well as on the federal government, and with good reason. For instance, the States were prohibited from passing any bill of attainder or expost facto law or any law that would impair the obligations of contracts, at the same time it empowers the Congress with the responsibility to coin money and to fix the standard of that money in terms of weights and measures. Why? These were precautions against the various modes of assaulting private property and indeed individual liberties associated with economic oppression. It can not be more clear that a power which is prohibited to the States and not expressly delegated to the federal government should be exercised by neither; should it not be equally as clear that if the direct exercise of a power is prohibited, then it should not be exercised indirectly either.

This government, especially Congress, has long-since abandoned the idea that while it has the delegated power to make all laws that are necessary to execute the powers of government, it also has the responsibility to make sure that those laws are also proper for the execution of government. If the end result of a law is not legitimate, then the law itself cannot be legitimate, there must be a proper role for a law, any law passed by Congress and the primary factor determining legal legitimacy is the effect it has upon the People, upon their lives, their livelihoods, their Liberty and their Freedom.

Can there be any doubt that the Framers, at least the majority of them, viewed the consolidation of powers as a very real and potentially destructive danger to not only the Liberty of the People, but the entire structure of the Republic? To entertain the idea that the intention of the Framers was to imbue our federal government with sovereignty is completely inconsistent with all the principles they crafted into the Constitution, such as the balance and restraint of powers, the division of powers; indeed the entire concept of a federation denies the foundation of either centralized sovereignty or localized State sovereignty. While it is true that our government has devolved into a system that determines its own limitations, that was not the case at the time our Constitutional Republic was established. For if our government can determine its own limitations then, it should be obvious, the judgment of government will always exercise power in an unlimited fashion. The federal government, no matter what Branch, cannot be its own judge.

It is impossible for a delegated power to be exercised as though there were absolutely no restrain as to how that power is used, that is the purpose of the act of congruent powers, both delegated and reserved. It is the balance in the system, just as the federal government can seek to impede certain activities of the State governments because of the prohibitions that the States agreed to adhere to in regards to the powers they delegated to the federal government, likewise, the federal government can be impeded in certain activities by the States because of the limitations placed upon the federal government through the delegation of powers by the States. The fact is that both the federal and State governments are both entrusted with certain powers, but with that entrustment comes very distinct limitations, thus both governments are limited governments. Both governments received no monopoly of power nor were they delegated a monopoly on the means and manner in which those delegated powers could be administered.

It should also be obvious that when a system of government is reduced to the clients of various interests, whether corporate or political, then our Legislators can be and have been bribed into a docile state of obedience to masters other than the People. Our government officials, both elected and appointed, have, for the most part, have chosen to participate in a bonus and patronage system that can hardly be considered in the best interest of this country or the People.

Today, we live under a system that is the progeny, not of our Constitutional Framers, but under a system born as the continuing progeny of Un-Constitutional Bastards, illegitimate, with no claim to the Heritage of our Founders and no desire to that claim.