Any Christians with Aspergers?

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You are obviously very passionate about this. I also have issues where I disagree with what my church preaches. Quite often actually. But I still go, it is commanded, and I am encouraged by people they are getting to know how to deal with me. Having said that I often come home from church in tears, from "holding it in" or trying to be normal

Umm...Hello?? If judges repeatedly rule that income tax is legal, that IS the current common law!



Also, you might want to actually read the U.S. Constitution ... the Sixteenth Amendment says "The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived, without apportionment among the several States, and without regard to any census or enumeration."

I guess it is safe to say that most tax protesters are not great legal scholars.

Last edited by monty on 03 Jun 2009, 12:06 pm, edited 1 time in total.

To leaders it was always strange and even today it is more lip-service than reality. But coming back to this issue: The idea of the sovereignty of the people was well known in 1776: You have not only the Declaration of Netherlands of 1581, but also during the Civil War in England, namely the Levellers, but also to a minor extent in legal texts going back to the Tudor Monarchy, when e.g. Thomas Smyth, a secretary of the Privy Council of Elizabeth I in his book about the English government stated that the acceptance of people is constitutional for a monarch to reign (otherwise he would have big difficulties to explain the rightful rule of his monarch, Elizabeth I). You will find similar motions in older regulations regarding the election of kings in the Frankish Empire and in first centuries of Holy Roman Empire. Such motions were also to find in the City Republics of Italy, namely Florence and within the Free Cities of the Holy Roman Empire. In fact one of the oldest democratic constitutions in Europe was the "Letter of Federation" of Cologne of 1396; the oldest democratic constitution still in force is the constitution of the Honourable Republic of San Marino from the year 1600 (no typo), a constitution which still preserves the Roman principle of two heads of state (Capitani Reggenti) to avoid to much power to one, like the Roman Republic with two Consults as the highest ranking officials.

You see, the US-declaration of 1776 wasn't new.



It is not complex - Amendment 16. Causa finita.



Really? As the unwritten constitution of the UK stands, Parliament has the power to change all law according to its wish, including any basic law regarding the way the UK is governed. The sole limitation are the international treaties the UK signed, namely the treaties regarding the EU.

I would not call this system "unstable". A constitution is nothing more than a piece of paper. Whatever a constitutions say can be whiped away - either via the formal methods of this constitution or via a revolution. The stability of the political system is not the result of any clever worded rule in a constitution, but the result of a stable society.



It is the nature of any state to impose his rule with the thread of force - otherwise it be not a state.

Monty, I don't want to end up in an endless circular debate, so I'll put it as simply as this....

A judge CAN NOT make up the law, they can only apply law and interpret where there is ambiguity. Anything more than that is referred to "judicial activism" and although it happens, it is outside the just and proper role of the judiciary.

The Constitution says no personal income tax. The 16th Amendment was never lawfully or legally ratified. The fraud has been thoroughly documented and proven. The courts made a political decision to not apply the law but rather impose a political order that is extra-constitutional in nature...and hence, it is invalid. It is an usurping of the lawful process that America is founded upon.

You are rationalizing that "might makes right" with is a principle the American legal system (at least officially) rejects.

If my source is correct, Joseph Stalin (hardly a friend of freedom and liberty) said, "It is enough that the people know there was an election. The people who cast the votes decide nothing. The people who count the votes decide everything."

If you give people the appearance of judicial review but ensure the outcome by corrupting the judiciary to take your side rather than obey their sworn oath to support the Constitution and to rule based on the evidence, is that a legitimate act of judicial review? I say it is not, and I have the rule of law on my side. Others (like yourself) may disagree, but you don't have the rule of law, you have "might makes right" as your justification.

And please do not rely on Wikipedia as an authoritative source. Anyone can go in there and put anything they want. That is not an accurate definition of common law, and I can say that because most all states (for reasons too complex to detail here) have rejected the "common law" and moved over to "statutory law."



You might want to re-read what I had to say about the 16th Amendment never being legally or lawfully ratified because of fraud and the fall out from that. More so, a United States Supreme Court ruling shortly after the passage of the 16th Amendment affirmed that the amendment conferred NO NEW TAXATION POWER upon the U.S. Government. So, if income taxes were unconstitutional before the 16th Amendment was passed, and IF the 16th Amendment was legitimate, income taxes would still be unconstitutional. This legal issue has NEVER gone before the Supreme Court since the fraud was documented and publicly exposed.

True, but as you so eleqountly detailed, the number of free societies where the PEOPLE were the soverign were nowhere close to the 50th percentile of the world's governmental structures. Such societies were rare, and the philsophies of such socieites were shuned and rejected even though other thought of them before the US came to be.

It's evidence like you present that make me part mad and yet want to laugh at people who insult the Founding Fathers by referring to them as simple minded white men who had little clue of what they were doing. These men were probably better educated than most of us were if you consider what was available in their day and yet they managed to craft a government modeled to provide maximum freedom and liberty and minimal government intervention in such a way that it had the hope of lasting for hundreds if not thousands of years.

The deconstruction of these wise men was the first step in convincing Americans to reject the wonderful heritage we were given for other ideas that have proven themselves to be failures again and again throughout history.



Question....how do you know what an "unwritten" constitution says? If it's not written down, doesn't that mean you can't prove any of what it contains? This is why we AS folks hate the "unwritten" rules of society. How can you know what you can't look up? It's the same thing that makes TSA rules here in America outrageous. The TSA claims the rules are "secret" but travelers must obey them. That's an abomination in the American legal system. A law you can't read for yourself has no legal effect....it's thuggery, pure and simple.

You are correct that the stability of a society is more about the people than just a document, but the opposite is true. In any professional field, there are STANDARDS. These determine if you are in compliance or if you are not. The Constitution sets the standard for the American government. It is the rule to which government is held accountable. It is "enshrined" because if it wasn't government could do whatever it wants, claim legitimacy, and everyone would have to accept it. The Founding Fathers knew that governments were inclined to evil and despotism, but they were needed. So, they created a government that could be held accountable. No Constitution = no accountability...short of a violent revolution every time the people are upset over something. A document that spells out the limits placed on government power provides a framework where breaches can be resolved civilly by a diligent populace rather then resorting to bloodshed. This helps promote a stable society in ways a government with no standard to abide by can not hope to achieve.



That is one definition, yes, but not the only definition.

America is modeled after the "social contract" theory. Government has duties and obligations to the people. The people have a duty of loyalty to the government. If one breaks the contract, the other's obligations end.

Many other societies rule by threat of violence. They show limited or no regard for the right of the individual, often treating the individual as property of the state.

In the last 50-60 years, America has been sliding from the constitutionally-established social contract theory into a totalitarian state. Our elections have become largely meaningless, the courts no longer maintain the rule of law whenever it suits those in power to do whatever they want, and the executive walks about as armed thugs that you don't question even though they are supposed to be our (the people's) servants.

Now, I could take a pragmatic approach (as it seems you do) and say that since things are the way they are, the right choice is to accept the way things are now and say it is right and good because factually, that is how things are.

However, I utterly reject that reasoning. Might does not = right. It may put a person on the top of the heap, but it does not make them legitimate. America makes the individual person KING, not the state. Until the nation as a whole formally chooses to abandon that, I owe no duty to the state as my king. That a select few seek power and work to usurp the American model of government with their own twisted interpretation does not make them right, nor does it convey a duty on my part to acquiesce to their designs.

Unless people, like myself, who value freedom and liberty stand up and fight to PRESERVE what our Founding Fathers gave to us, it will not stand.

Laissez-faire might work fine as an approach to business, but one can not take a "devil may care" attitude to the functioning on their nation...otherwise, they are choosing to let whoever has the biggest gun in the crowd dictate what will be in their lives.

Common law holds it to be legal and it is made by judges.

Illegal things done by the courts depends on interpretation of law. Some would hold that these things in the courts are only illegal if the courts deem these actions illegal and act against it.

If you put a gun to my face and take my money while wearing a fancy robe and title, well, I would assume that you would be operating with the validity of law, because the validity of law and the force of law are inseparable. If something is not valid, then it cannot invoke the force of law because nobody would consider it a law. In this case, both the courts and the people of the US consider this to be a law.


In a sense it gets power from the people, but in a sense it does not, which is the same as any other government. (being semi-democratic is really irrelevant to this issue though) Power is always limited. Power is not enumerated though, and to think that power can be so strictly enumerated is to misunderstand power.

The US government is a government, it is the socially accepted monopoly of force within a given region. I do not think that anything the founders of the US ever did could destroy that nature of the phenomenon. Certainly if such an invocation were used, it would have to be done from more of a stance of the empirics of the working system rather than an appeal to foundations. Although, the US has been crushing tax resisters from the start as seen from the Whiskey Rebellion.

So, right, my last sentence does not undermine anything. You just seem to think that a fancy cloak of words used utterly changes the nature of social realities.

Well, actually, I doubt they really did craft a government modeled to provide maximum freedom and liberty and minimal government intervention. I mean, one thing that happened was that they scrapped the Articles of Confederation arguably prematurely, given that people were still confident enough in their experiment to continue lending. Also, the Federalists were actually more for big government and pushed in manners that would promote this, even though a smaller government would have been possible.

In any case, I think the record is mixed on all policies, so I wouldn't jump ahead to worship a bunch of dead white guys, whether they are the founders of the Constitution or Marx and Engels.


Well, the fact that something isn't written down doesn't mean it doesn't exist. It isn't as if rules for society first began with writing, and I think most historians think that Hamurrabi's code of law was not a new writing, but rather a recording of what was basically already believed. In fact, the idea that laws emerge from unwritten standards is part of the legal thinking of scholar Friedrich Hayek, whom you may be familiar with depending upon how well-read you would tend to be in your beliefs.


Well, there are standards set by the government and societies for maintaining the standards of a profession, but beyond that there are no standards.

The government basically can do whatever it wants and claim legitimacy, just so long as this agrees with how the people view the government's abilities. I mean, even without a constitution, a view that a current regime is violating "how things have always worked" can still be powerful, and undermine the legitimacy of that government. Certainly there could be accountability standards if there were an intelligent enough ruler to recognize these unwritten rules of society as well. Written law just replaces unwritten law by making things clearer.


Being modeled after the social contract theory does not mean that the social contract theory is valid though. As Lysander Spooner, a lawyer around the time of the civil war, argued, he never signed any contract, nor did most other people, and so to him, there was little reason to see the US government as necessarily valid because of the lack of real contract.

Most societies cannot really rule by threat of violence, there are too many levels for that to go wrong. Most societies are ruled by norms, where those who violate these social norms are punished in some manner, either officially by government, or unofficially by other members of society.

Well, if might does not equal right, then in what sense is Romans 13 valid? The Roman emperor was not put in place by a contract so much, nor was he invested with power by a vote. How was he legitimate? If your political theory does not declare the Roman emperor legitimate, then how can you do justice to the text of Romans 13? If your political theory does declare the emperor legitimate, then how can you not have to admit that might, to some extent, makes right? As after all, Rome was kept in power by it's might, but it was assuredly an evil in Christian eyes.

As for your statement about the individual person being king, is that just a statement about freedoms? If so, then I am indifferent. If that is a statement about the nature of the political system though, I just have to call that baloney.

Well, actually, given the amount of power that you have to affect the course of your nation, taking a "devil may care" attitude is more rational, and it certainly would have no effect either way. After all, the amount of power you have within society is on the level of meaningless.

You and I will fundamentally disagree on this issue. I can tell you that my legal education does not affirm your position.

If you define the validity of law based on who possesses superior firepower, you are not describing a republic or even a democracy, you are describing a totalitarian society.

Perhaps you are content to live under such a society, but I am not.



If the world chooses to adhere to "social realities" then we will always live on a downward spiral. Society caters to the masses...the lowest common denominator.

New societies embrace IDEALS. No, they aren't always practical or 100% possible to bring to fruition, but the Supreme Court said this best....

It would take time to find the actual case, but in a court ruling, the Supreme Court expressed the following idea.

From the beginning, America has never 100% adhered to what the Constitution requires. Even though that is so, the failure to render total fealty to the Constitution does not eliminate the duty to do so. America is defined by the striving to adhere to the ideal created by the Constitution, not in how perfectly it achieves that goal.

The social reality is that government is out of control, disregarding limitations placed on it by design. If we submit to the social reality, the government will become and open tyrant against the people. Americans are not expected to cave in when government acts badly. Americans have the right to stand against government and hold it accountable to the ideals it was commanded to abide by.

My legal education does not affirm your position either.

I never did define the validity of law on superior firepower. In any case, the question here is always Rome. If my theory of law can describe a society like Rome, then you are bound to uphold such a law, as Romans 13 was not written under the rule of Fuzzikins, the fuzziest bunny of them all, but rather under a Roman society that believed that a good way to execute people was to stick them on a cross and wait for them to die.


But good sir, your ideals aren't even shared by all, and you cannot put your ideals above the workings of society as it is. Rome did not share your ideals, but it is the model for your obedience. To look too much at your own society, and to worship it as an idol certainly isn't your theological creed.

The Supreme Court has said multiple things. I mean, supreme court justice Oliver Wendell Holmes was one of the major thinkers of legal realism, which upholds the idea that laws are indeterminate and ultimately just social instruments rather than some abstract idealisms out there. This kind of thinking stands against your constitutionalist idealism, and it is hard to say that the Constitution prevents theories of the indeterminacy of law and law as a social instrument.

Is there an official legal document giving Americans the right to stand against government, hold it accountable, and the circumstances under which this is possible? I mean one that you could show to a court and expect them to take you seriously with, not just a bit of rhetoric that does not really impact the legal system. The reason I say this, is because if your ideals and ideas are not really in the law itself or necessary, then you are not standing behind Romans 13 in good faith, but rather are placing your ideal as an idol in front of Romans 13.

A pragmatic view....but an utterly hopeless one.



That is true, but it would only be "valid" if your nation follows a totalitarian model of government. A nation that embraces a republican model of government would not agree with your reasoning. A republican model of government does not embrace might = right.



The theory is valid if it is the foundation of a nation's government. In the world you have two systems to govern. You either have a mutual agreement where duties are exchanged between parties or the state rules by brute force against the governed.

A free society is modeled after "social contract." The legitimacy of government exists only so long as it adheres to the social contract with the people. Maybe you and I didn't sign to such a "contract" but would anyone prefer to live under the rule of brute force? When the government breaks the contract, it loses its moral and legal legitimacy. That the government has the brute force to impose its will on the people does not make it "legitimate" in any moral sense. It does not deserve to be obeyed because it can muster significant firepower on demand.

By your rationale, an invading army should be submitted to purely because they have the military might to invade your homeland. That would be rather silly, right?



Try not to blur the issue by comparing apples to oranges. Ancient Rome had fallen from a Republican form of government to an dictatorship in its end. In the time of the Christian movement, it was a different political situation. For example, only citizens of Rome had rights. A foreigner in America has certain "rights" even without possessing citizenship. The model that America was founded upon did not physically exist when Romans 13 was written. More so, a Christian owes his highest loyalty to Christ, not to the state. If the state orders you to do something contrary to God's law, you cannot obey the state.

In the end, Rome's tyranny was unleashed mostly on foreign nations they conquered and not so much on its own people until you saw the persecution of Christians, and Rome ultimately fell to invading barbarians thanks to the cultural dry rot that weakened the empire to the point that it could no longer effectively defend itself.



My ability to influence the world about me may be negligible, but you need to understand that the greatest battle in your life happens in your mind.

If the government can convince you that it is benevolent and loving while it treats you like a slave, you will become dependent and respond as a well-conditioned slave. You will think as a slave.

If you recognize the evil that a government does for what it is and refuse to bow down to it, you keep your mind free. Practically, you may be regarded as a slave and that won't ever change, but your refusal to be a slave in your mind can make all the difference.

Examine human history. How many invasions and occupations were overthrown by a small populace that refused to let their minds be enslaved and resisted in any way they could?

Judicial activism is what happens when a judge makes a decision that someone doesn't like ... if people like it, it is called a fair decision.
Judges can and do make law. They typically interpret existing law and interpret ambiguity, but are sometimes faced with contradictions between different laws and legal principles and must decide which is most important and which trumps the other. This process is making law.



While there may have been issues with the ratification of the 16th Amendment, it's passage has been certified and it is in effect. It is the law of the land.



No, I am not advocating "might makes right" - I am saying that the current interpretation is the current interpretation. Individuals can challenge this interpretation, but only the courts can overturn it. So far, the courts have never sided with the tax protesters.




This simply happened to be the first description I found in today's search - it is consistent with thousands of other descriptions of common law. While wikipedia is subject to error, so are all other sources, and one should not discount something merely because it appears in wikipedia.



Well then, if it hasn't been struck down as improperly ratified, it hasn't been struck down and remains in effect. You may not like it, but it is in the Constitution and will be there until the SCOTUS decides that errors in the process require dropping it.

Most nations in the world (not just the Roman Empire) followed your theory of law. I fail to see your point.



No. I am not demanding all share my ideals. I focus only on what happens in the nation where I live and I know the standards it is supposed to adhere to. Rome is not the model of Christian obedience.

Sadly, this debate is a very complex one. Christians are not mandated to bow to tyranny. If a Christian didn't like living in Ancient Rome, there was no mandate to remain in Rome, or to stay and never speak out against wickedness in government. There certainly was no commandment to participate in wickedness. Any such interpretation of Romans 13 disregards other mandates in God's Word, and that's why selective quotation of the Bible leads to confusion.

In a very short summary, God NEVER wanted HIS PEOPLE to live under a king. God is your master, not any man. That the people of God chose to demand a king be appointed over them does not mean it is what God intended. That men seek to be masters over their brothers does not mean God approves of it. Jesus instructed that in God's plan, those who seek to be the leaders would become the servants of everyone else.

That is God's order for how governments should be run. A Christian should strive to bring about God's way of doing things into the world around them. Tolerance of a government that oppresses and crushes people is not a Christan mandate.

Pragmatic realities are irrelevant. The Christian life is one of striving for an ideal, not for settling for what's practical. A Christian is himself defined more by his struggles to be more Christ-like, not by how perfectly he manages to achieve the goal.



Yes. The Constitution of the united States of America. That our legal system has become corrupted to the point that holding government accountable is increasingly difficult to do is a major problem our nation faces, and it may be why in short order we will fall as a nation.

Ok.


I don't see how occasionally voting on people who will vote for and against my interests is really so revolutionary of a change.


Well, the issue is that Lysander Spooner argued that your theory ISN'T VALID. Not only that, but I really do think you understate the number of options in the world, as things don't just boil down to such simple terms.

Being "modeled" seems irrelevant, it is like your boss telling you that you can talk to him like you would one of your friends, just words. Not only that but "would you prefer the other option" does not make a contract exist, particularly given that there are other theories about how society can organize itself in the first place.

Actually, Locke's own social contract was developed TO justify obedience to an invading army, by claiming that this army was legitimately in power because the people didn't all leave the region. Not only that, but to make that argument is to misunderstand my stand, which fits into one of those nuances that you have somehow removed from existence.(which seems absurd, given that nobody likely thought of your false social contract theory except for a few hundred years ago, so to boil things down like you did seems questionable)


Ok, but the issue is that there is little reason to think that the interpretation of Romans 13 dramatically changed because the model changed. Particularly given that the "model change" idea seems downright sketchy. Are income taxes contrary to God's law? I see no reason for that to be so.

Well, it isn't as if the persecution of Christians didn't start somewhat early to some extent. Paul was killed by the government. Christ was killed by the government. Resistance to the government began in Acts 4:19 and 5:29 as seen from the fact that men(governing figures) were put as opposed to obedience to God.


I don't even see how that issue matters. Not only that, but I don't see many invasions that are "overthrown" by a small group of tough rebels, only some that make things more annoying for invaders, and some that are utterly wiped out.

No. Judicial activism is when a judge knows what the law says but decides to impose his or her values over what the law is unambiguous about. There is a substantial gap between interpretation to address an ambiguous area of the law and creating a rule that contradicts existing precedent without the current case being diverse from prior cases.

Likewise, a court is not to pass ruling over areas it has no basis to make a ruling. Where there is no applicable law, the court is supposed to be powerless.



It is fraudulent law. Pragmatism vs. idealism. There are many "laws" on the books that lack proper legal authority, but they still exist. Existence does not convey legitimacy.



Granted. However, in a corrupt judiciary, how can one expect a civil redress of grievances? Should one accept something as legitimate when it is upheld by corrupted judges who disregard the law they must test cases by?

Thank you for pointing that out.

IF Romans 13 means what it is frequently interpreted to be, why was Paul executed by Rome? If he practiced what he preached, he was no threat to Rome. Still, he was convicted and executed as an enemy of the state. So, either he didn't mean what he is believed to have said or perhaps no matter how much he tried to be obedient to Rome, his duties to God (which he could not walk away from) made him sufficient a criminal to be executed. In any case, a literal interpretation of Romans 13 is not believable.

Christ was killed by the government because it had to happen. Jesus himself stated that he could prevent it from happening, but it was not time for Him to act that way. His execution was a sacrifice for humanity. He was illegally tried and convicted of crimes he was not guilty of by His own people. The Romans carried out the murder. In this, all of humanity (Jew and Gentile) was equally guilty for the crime. When Christ rose, the revelation was not just revealed to the Jews (as the apostles initially felt should be the case), but God mandated that all the world should know and be redeemed.

You had in some of those societies more freedom than in the USA - even today: In the spiritual princedom of Kurtrier with an Archbishop as head of state is was always allow to drink alcohol in the public. Do not think that the idea that personal freedom can be e.g. defended in court is an US-invention or independent supreme court: The first independent supreme court in Europe was the Imperial Chamber Court of the Holy Roman Empire, founded in 1495 and worked till 1803.

The idea that a head of state can be impeached in a legal process is also not an US-invention: In the Holy Roman Empire two kings were disposed after a trail: In 1295 and in 1399.

When it come the "sovereignty of the people" this idea was, as I explained, a long time around.



Perhaps they were simply slave holder, how wanted to keep their slave. As you perhaps know in 1772 slavery was finally declared within the UK illegal (the famous judgement of Lord Mansfield). It was a matter of time when this judgement would be applied in the colonies too. So becoming independent was a good way to keep to much freedom loving English judges out. BTW: Lord Mansfield argued with the terms of Common Law (there was even a reference in the trail to judgement under the reign of Elizabeth I).



Sorry - the USA are a relative new comer on the world stage. 230 years are no history for a state. The Holy Roman Empire existed between 800 and 1806. History is a slow mill and the outcome is not certain.



Because it is noit formal law, but to see via observation how it works. The Sovereignty of Parliament is standard feature at least since the rule of the Tudors (perhaps even earlier - as to be suggested by the laws under Richard III regarding the marriage of his brother Edward IV and the laws regarding the status of the children of the 3rd mirrage of John Gaut). The status of Parliament is described best by Thomas Smyth, as secretary of the Privy Council of Elizabeth I in 1581:





This is precisely the nature of a Common Law System, when law is not primary defined in statutes, like the Code Napoleon or the BGB, but by custom and judgements over centuries. So long judges in the UK reject to judge over an Act of Parliament, as recently seen in the failed attend to stop the ratification of the Lisbon Treaty, so long this rule of absolute sovereignty of parliament will stand. If you don't like this, you may shall move to continental Europe, where Law is defined as the wording of the statute books.



Germany gave himself in 1919 a democratic constitution - and not a bad one; much better in its wording than e.g. the current constitution of The Netherlands of 1815. This constitution failed in 1933 and was replaced within weeks by the most brutal dictatorship in Europe ever.

A constitution is a piece of paper - it is a power if forces do support it. If it fails those standards will vanish.

You may say that the US-Constitution is a long time in force. I can tell you that the constitution of the Holy Roman Empire of 1356, the Bulla Aurea was in force till 1803 and finally failed. The German remember in 2006 this important constitution (it is still part of the school curriculum):



So don't take the US-Constitution for granted.



I never signed a "contract" to be obedient to the law, as the term "contract" suggest. A "contract" is something between private persons (legal or natural). A state rules - he does not need my agreement that I pay taxes or do not use certain drugs or what else. The state orders. In international this actions of states are accounted a "iure imperii". A term also known in US law.



Is the police in the USA not armed? Was it not "violence" which decided the Civil War in the USA? Are not more inmates in prison relative to the population than in any other western country? Is not the US the only western country which still kill citizen by law? If this is not violence ...



At first you may look-up what a "totalitarian" state really is. Otherwise: It your office to vote reasonable. If you vote for idiots, ... Every country has the government it deserves.