“You cannot maintain liberty if you subscribe to the notion “that any act of the legislature, contrary to the tenor under which it was created” is lawful.
You cannot maintain liberty if you believe that it is the state, rather than the People who should possess the power of the ‘Sword’.”
Restore the Republic – by Nicholas Testaccio
The year was 1924. In an article for The Baltimore Evening Sun, H.L. Menchen wrote, “All the extravagance and incompetence of our present Government is due, in the main, to lawyers, and, in part at least, to good ones. They are responsible for nine-tenths of the useless and vicious laws that now clutter the statute-books, and for all the evils that go with the vain attempt to enforce them. Every Federal judge is a lawyer. So are most Congressmen. Every invasion of the plain rights of the citizens has a lawyer behind it. If all lawyers were hanged tomorrow, and their bones sold to a mah jong factory, we’d be freer and safer, and our taxes would be reduced by almost a half.”
What Menchen wrote was a restatement of what the Founders feared most; a legal institution that would consolidate its power. For the most part, lawyers operate under the control of a legal system, but not the “rule of law” as those who delegated certain sovereign powers to the state instituted it. Lawyers abide by the court, and not in accordance with what was intended as a nation wherein the People are the ultimate arbiters of the law.
During the ratification debates there were those who felt that there was wording in the Constitution that could be interpreted to mean other than what was clearly decided by the delegations. Suspicion was cast on the legal profession as a primary vehicle for corruption.
Writing as Brutus for those who opposed the Constitution, Robert Yates stated, “The supreme court under this constitution would be exalted above all other power in the government, and subject to no control. The business of this paper will be to illustrate this, and to show the danger that will result from it. I question whether the world ever saw, in any period of it, a court of justice invested with such immense powers, and yet placed in a situation so little responsible.”
The ink was not yet dry on the Constitution when the court started to dismantle the document by first taking allegiance to the Bar as the method, by which an attorney could counsel. Eventually by conferring upon itself the authority to interpret the law, the legal profession has made law a cesspool. When a lawyer speaks it is legalese based on misdirection, misinformation, misapplication, propaganda, and in many cases outright lies. I have seen enough judges perjure themselves from the bench, and I’ve seen one too many attorney’s sell out their client.
Lawyers take an oath that states in part, “I will not counsel or maintain any suit or proceeding which shall appear to me to be unjust…” Are we to believe that the position of state prosecutor, one that was despised by the Founders, is in any form complying with that oath?
From time to time the good People of this nation must be reminded that this is a nation of popular sovereignty. The state is an establishment, by which we the People band together in order to have a forum and method for protecting rights, freedom, and tranquility. We do so because there is, first and foremost, evil about that seeks to disrupt the lives of the common man. In the hope that they could limit, or possibly eliminate the encroachment upon liberty, the Founders created, and intended to maintain a uniform “rule of law” so that the state could not impose its awesome power on the individual by making rules outside its delegated authority.
It should be obvious that in order to maintain this system, it was up to the good People to enforce the law so that no one could unjustly prosecute, particularly by the hand of the state, any individual. Some clearly defined tools were incorporated into this nations Constitution that were to stand for justice, and prevent state abuses.
Government can never be a perfect institution. This was understood, and so the Founders attempted to design a functional government with certain limited delegated sovereign powers while “sovereignty itself remains with the people, by whom and for whom all government exists and acts”.
The Constitution established as indisputable law with enumerated powers and mechanism a bulwark against encroachment by the state. Even the common dirt farmer of the day understood the principles for which they had suffered through years of turmoil in order to create a nation of free People.
However, we now have a system of government that is beyond corrupt. It is everything that the Founders feared, and by no means the nation that farmers, merchants, laborers, and even clergy laid down their lives to create.
It has morphed into this, not because we lack the utility to thwart tyranny, but because we are a population that is as intellectually dishonest as the system that we allow to exist. We are a people that are so ignorant of the design of this nation that we work to support the encroachment and infringements by the bureaucracy rather than working to halt the obviously budding police state.
There is still hope, but that hope lies in a very few who are not encumbered by their ego. They are those people who live by the doctrine that every word in law has its intended meaning, and that assumptions in law, opinions of attorney’s, and judicial wrangling are the enemy of a free society.
You cannot maintain liberty if you subscribe to the notion “that any act of the legislature, contrary to the tenor under which it was created” is lawful. You cannot maintain liberty if you believe that it is the state, rather than the People who should possess the power of the ‘Sword’.
Logic should tell us that almost every lawyer is either ignorant of the law, or as many already believe, a liar. They do not fight the system, but rather operate in a fraud shrouded in legalese. Misapplication of law, improperly and illegally instructed jury’s are common place without an attorney lifting a finger to put an end to those acts of judicial tyranny.
In most cases, instead of assisting your cause, your lawyer works to further his situation and that of the system. I’ve seen that far too many times to feel comfortable in what I laughing refer to as a court of law, lorded over by a black-robed bureaucrat. Has anyone heard of an attorney admonishing a judge for improperly instructing a jury?
To place a fine point on the legal profession, I once heard an attorney say that if lawyers were honest, most of us would not be paying an income tax. As one who has read through the code, I know this to be true.
The methodology “enshrined” in our Constitution to thwart tyranny are a grand jury, jury, and the Militia of the several states. These agencies of the People were intended to have the ultimate authority to stop the encroachment that is so obvious today. They cannot be voted away, legislated away, or judicially voided by instructions from the bench. They do not depend on what a lawyer might say, but rather what justice calls for, and what is the understanding of the People as to the function of law.
Each of the lawful bodies that are enshrined in the Bill of Rights have atrophied by our own hands, and our misguided trust of those within the legal profession. We have succumb to “the useless and vicious laws that now clutter the statute-books, and for all the evils that go with the vain attempt to enforce them”.
We not only submit, but we validate it by enforcing every act of twisted words, and unconstitutional agencies. All about us a police state grows. All around are lawyers whom, rather than speak the truth they work within their own system to slowly, but surely, take all that we have, all the rights, and eventually the freedom fought for with the price of blood.
Patrick Henry, an attorney himself, was one who had no love for the ratification of the Constitution because he saw it as an instrument that could be easily manipulated to take power from the People. He understood the character of men, and in particular those of his own profession. It is why he insisted, along with others, that a Bill of Rights be added as some measure of clarity and security.
That Bill was intended, not merely as words to constrict the federal government, but also as a doctrine for the states and the People to uphold the rule of law. In this nation, despite all the theorizing about what this or that might mean, “the Constitution must mean exactly what it says or it means nothing at all”.
It is simple enough to understand that words have specific meaning within the context of a statement. The U.S. Constitution recognizes just one body as that, which has the authority to “execute the Laws of the Union”. That authority is the Militia of the several states. It’s not debatable, nor can it be disregarded, removed, dismissed, or formed outside the spectrum of a body of all the People without the force of law.
You will note that most of my recent articles gravitate towards Militia at some point. I do this for a number of reasons. First, Militia is a lawful authority of the People. Second, it was not a voluntary organization, but rather mandatory on all. Third, it was under the direction of officers appointed by the state as demanded by the Constitution. Fourth, it cannot be lawfully formed outside the rule of law by persons with no lawful authority as so many believe. Fifth, it is“necessary to the security of a free state”. Sixth, the vast majority have no idea as to what Militia is, its intended functions, duties, its power, and its ever pressing need. I could go on.
Militia is so misunderstood by the populace that it is ignored or disparaged by even those who profess to be supporters of the Second Amendment; “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the People to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”
There are “Thirteen Words” within that amendment that are disregarded. But the amendment doesn’t tell the entire aspect of law because at Article 1, Section 8 we can read:
“To provide for calling forth the Militia to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions;
“To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the Militia, and for governing such Part of them as may be employed in the Service of the United States, reserving to the States respectively, the Appointment of the Officers, and the Authority of training the Militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress;”
The amendment and the authorities enumerated in the Constitution are acts of law, and as such cannot be interpreted away, nor can they be changed without the consent of the good People as instituted at Article 5.
Militia cannot be formed by a group of men outside the rules set forth by the Constitution that relied on the previously existing state statutes that defined all the workings of the body.
“A well regulated Militia” organized in a manner provided for by statute, and regulations created by the congress is a lawful authority that is included in both the federal and state constitutions.
“Inclusio unius est exclusio alterius.” Because the congress has the power “To provide for organizing” Militia, it does not have the authority to un-organize it as is believed by the pro-2nd community. In fact, the Dick Act that supposedly creates an “unorganized militia” does not contain those words, but instead contains the definition of those who are not “Regular Militia” as being “the Reserve Militia”. Reserve being those who are statutorily excused from the required scheduled training, or have reached the age of maturity.
As a matter of fact, as the Supreme Law of the Land, the Constitution codifies Militia across the spectrum of law from the federal to the local. Neither the congress, the states, nor the People themselves have the authority to un-organize militia, or create bodies that do not comply with the law as it was originally defined.
Herein lies the heart of the matter when we talk about the legal profession, and the judiciary. The doctrine of law is clear. Lawyers fail to abide the simplest principles of the rule of law; “An unconstitutional act is not a law; it confers no rights; it imposes no duties; it affords no protection; it creates no office; it is, in legal contemplation, as inoperative as though it had never been passed.”
We fight endlessly about statutes that are enacted contrary to the Constitution, when it is those very statutes that contradict the tenor of law that are the problem. If we concern ourselves with the simple rule, as was the original intent we can regain the authority “necessary to the security of a free state”.
We need not run to those who have a vested interest in maintaining their status while diminishing ours. We need only to read and understand the simple words that the Founders gave us, and tell all others that we are perfectly capable of being the ultimate arbiters of the law.
“Men at some time are masters of their fates. The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but in ourselves, that we are underlings.” – From Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar
Nicholas Testaccio
http://www.restoretherepublic.org/2015/04/recognizing-the-enemy-part-2/
The author’s absolutely right, but he doesn’t go far enough. Lawyers, and our corrupted legal system are only part of the problem.
They’re the enemy’s foot-soldiers rather than the definition of our enemy.