The Court and Your Castle
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Justifying the Glorious Revolution of 1688, John Locke advanced natural-rights theory of government. He argued that all just governments are founded on consent and are designed solely to protect people in their inherent rights to life, liberty, and property. By "property," Locke meant more than land and goods that could be sold, given away, or even confiscated by the government under certain circumstances. Property also referred to ownership of one's self, which included a right to personal well being.
“In one key respect Jefferson used Natural Law instead of natural-rights theory, substituting "the pursuit of happiness" for "property" in the trinity of inalienable rights. In this change, derived from the Swiss legal philosopher Emerich de Vattel, he emphasized public duty rather than (as the language seems to indicate) personal choice, for natural law theory is that happiness is attainable only by diligent cultivation of civic virtue.”
Note that Vattel’s view of property clashes with Locke. For Vattel - The nation may alienate its public property: “THE nation, being the sole mistress of the property in her possession, may dispose of it as she thinks proper, and may lawfully alienate or mortgage it. This right is a necessary consequence of the full and absolute domain: the exercise of it is restrained by the law of nature only with respect to proprietors who have not the use of reason necessary for the management of their affairs; which is not the case with a nation. Those who think otherwise, cannot allege any solid reason for their opinion; and it would follow from their principles that no safe contract can be entered into with any nation; - a conclusion which attacks the foundation of all public treaties.”
The Fifth Amendment in the Bill of Rights to the U.S. Constitution specifically references property thusly: “ . . . nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.
Even the most simple of minds can understand the meaning of private property being taken for public use. Heretofore the public nominally accepted that the United States honors the rule of law. After the KELO et al. v. CITY OF NEW LONDON et al. decision, the supreme court has demonstrated decisively and for all times that the legal system has become a Vattelian harbinger of regal predictability. If the constitution deemed the relevance of recognizing private property as an essential right and empowered eminent domain solely for public use, with just compensation; by what stretch of credulity should a reasonable man conclude that we still live in a country that adheres to the most fundamental principles of national creation?
Recognize from the outset that natural rights are not conferred by a court, a legislature, a head of state or even by a constitution. For a right to be ordained it must be inherent in man’s nature. The five judges Stevens, Kennedy, Souter, Ginsburg, and Breyer inextricably prove that they are tools of an oppressive autocracy bent on eradicating the last vestige of citizen sovereignty. Dissenting Justice O'Connor sums up the lawful revulsion precisely: “Today the Court abandons this long-held, basic limitation on government power. Under the banner of economic development, all private property is now vulnerable to being taken and transferred to another private owner, so long as it might be upgraded--i.e., given to an owner who will use it in a way that the legislature deems more beneficial to the public--in the process. To reason, as the Court does, that the incidental public benefits resulting from the subsequent ordinary use of private property render economic development takings "for public use" is to wash out any distinction between private and public use of property--and thereby effectively to delete the words "for public use" from the Takings Clause of the Fifth Amendment.”
Appreciate the reality that the mantra of a government under the law is a myth. The mere fact that Chief Justice John Marshall set into motion the primacy of judicial review doomed this nation to the whims of arrogant black robed tyrants. The fact that citizens accept this fraud and so easily surrender their God given created endowments attests to the cowardly and gutless moral fiber that runs in the veins of spineless serfs that bow to a corrupt and illegitimate government.
If the favored noble is the only knight worthy of owning property, the feudal realm will strip the land and steal the soul from every ordinary citizen that deems to reside in their own castle. If the “public good” is left to be defined, exclusively by beneficial use for the government and their crony patrons, we have lost the very purpose of our country. Allowing adjudicators to interpret language, much less basic rights, is like giving the keys to your house to the tax assessor so their civic planning bureaucrat compatriot can gain access to redesign the best use for your home for the advantage of the State. If this is free enterprise, give us chaos . . . liberty seems to foreign for the guardians of the public trust!
Losing your home to the corporate/state partnership bulldozer should get your blood boiling. How many of the docile populace will just accept a valueless check and move on? The answer is apparent, the outrage talk will be prevalent, while the overt action will be nil. Unless the fundamental injustice is resolved, the courts will just continue their robbery of your sacred heritage. When will the breaking point come – when will the public go postal? The time is so far overdue for direct confrontation and the necessary removal of the ill gotten fraudulent authority of judges and their fake legal sham that if folks refuse to rebel over the loss of their residence, just what will it take to rise up against the despots?
It can be said that radical proponents of Locke’s natural-rights theory justified civil disobedience whenever government encroached on any of the specified rights. Even the more conservative Jefferson held that resistance is justified only when a consistent course of policy shows an unmistakable design to establish tyranny. Look to your heart and conclude that radical action is proper, appropriate and necessary to restore individual dignity and reclaim our traditional heritage. The rule of law is dead. The age of corporate/state despotism can now sentence you to tenant lessee status in a public housing project. Your own citadel of refuge from the barbarians at your gate can now be forfeited. The sheriff, under orders from the Star Chamber high court can now escort you from your home to make room for governmental progress. The bastion of your family can now become the graveyard of dreams for the greed of favored contributors.
Is this what America was intended to be all about? Or are you willing to exist under the Vattel mistress model of the property that now extends to any choice location that advances the landholding of the State? Even Vattel acknowledges limits on confiscation: “The general rule then is, that the superior cannot dispose of the public property, as to its substance - the right to do this being reserved to the proprietor alone, since proprietorship is defined to be the right to dispose of a thing substantially. If the superior exceeds his powers with respect to this property, the alienation he makes of it will be invalid, and may at any time be revoked by his successor, or by the nation.” If KELO v. CITY OF NEW LONDON doesn’t deserve to be revoked, what would! The classic liberal revolution fought by our founding fathers was meant to establish a Jeffersonian vision of “the pursuit of happiness” for individuals – NOT GOVERNMENT. That cause was waged to protect property rights for every citizen, not just the connected and privileged few.
Eminent domain acquisition should be strictly limited, rarely implemented and always have a clear, direct and distinct public use benefit. Kangaroo courts do not have the tolerable authority to destroy our property rights. Protect your castle, lay siege on the judiciary and throw them into the dungeon – a chamber fitting for their treachery.
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