Freedom’s Founding Documents

This is a condensed summary of the facts represented in the following documents, using my standard method:

  1. Declaration of Independence (1776)
  2. Articles of Confederation (1781)
  3. Northwest Ordinance (1787)
  4. United States Constitution (1787)
  5. Federalist Papers (1787-1788)

Why

We are close to 2.5 centuries of the most free, open time in written history. This is a paraphrasing of the ideas that began that set of ideas.

I have also made it my priority to address certain elements that we, looking back, can see in ways that nobody could have anticipated at the time:

  • Slavery is now formally abolished (though informally practiced).
  • The legal existence of a corporation’s rights should be enumerated and clarified alongside legal persons, since a corporation is a relatively new 19th-century invention.
  • There should be a clear distinction of what a legal person is, versus what a living person is.

Given Presumptions

It’s non-negotiable that all people are:

  • Created equal
  • Endowed by God with certain inalienable rights, including:

Governments get their power from the consent of the governed.

  • Governments are designed to secure human rights with that power.

If a government doesn’t secure human rights, the people also have the right to change or remove that government.

  • As a logical consequence, they are entitled to start a new government.
  • Their new government should then be based on what would make them find the most safety and meaning instead.

It’s not wise to remove governments that have been around a long time over small things.

  • People are more likely to put up with uncomfortable situations they can withstand than to break from precedent.
  • Before they perform any large-scale revolution, they should consult their neighbors and local officials first to see if that will improve the situation.

However, people have a right and moral obligation to remove that government and install a new government if there’s a long history of violations by a leader who wants to have absolute power over its people.

There are various examples of government leaders who should be removed:

  • Not honoring clearly stated laws that serve the interests of the public.
  • Forbidding lawmakers from passing urgent laws, which may include requiring extra verification steps that cause extra suffering.
  • Refusing to make laws that serve large populations unless they benefit the leaders’ interests.
  • Calling leadership meetings at odd times or locations to disorient them into compliance.
  • Ending leadership meetings prematurely when they don’t serve the leaders’ interests.
  • Refusing others to be elected, which would return the power to the people, and meanwhile creating both security and corruption risks.
  • Preventing smaller subsidiary governments from running things how they wish.
  • Forbidding the free travel of people to where they wish to go.
  • Preventing the courts from acting on the laws they’re supposed to act on.
  • Made judges depend on the leadership for their livelihood.
  • Appointing new offices that serve to micromanage the people.
  • Keeps active armies without the government’s approval and in peacetime.
  • Holds the military as completely independent of the courts’ jurisdiction.
  • Holding the people to laws from different jurisdiction than where they live.
  • Requiring people to give their resources to maintain large groups of soldiers.
  • Protecting soldiers with a mock trial (kangaroo court) from the consequences of murdering any of the people.
  • Cutting off trade with other parts of the world.
  • Taxing people without their consent.
  • Removing, for most cases, trial by jury.
  • Sending people to other regions for trials over alleged crimes.
  • Establishing an alternate law system in a neighboring region, then expanding that region to institute laws that shouldn’t exist.
  • Taking away access to written laws.
  • Abolishing laws without due process.
  • Altering the core structure of government procedure.
  • Suspending portions of government and transferring power to the remainder.
  • Declaring the people of a region to be out of a government’s control, then declaring war on them.
  • Taking and destroying the people’s possessions and lives.
  • Sending large armies as a show of force to suppress dissent.
  • Requiring captured people to fight for that nation or risk being killed if they protest.
  • Provoking domestic insurrections, which can allow powerful enemies to attack and weaken a region.
  • Responding to any of the above complaints with further enforcement actions against the people.

Method

A government should have its own power for the following:

  • Start wars.
  • End wars.
  • Make alliances with other nations.
  • Direct the flow of business.
  • Provide shared defense against enemies.
  • Secure everyone’s freedoms.
  • Ensure everyone’s wellness.
  • Require subsidiary governments to assist each other against all attacks, which can include:
    • Religion
    • Control
    • Business

Within that power, subsidiary states have additional powers:

  • Absolutely everything that the larger government does not have.