We have been raised to believe the narrative that the government has ruler-ship over us; the people. This is completely incorrect. This article details the history of English Law and what changed after the War of Independence. It’s a very simple history that is reflected in our founding documents and in our laws. These documents seize a power that shocked the world and altered it forever.

In 1066, William the Conqueror captured England and declared that all that he saw was his. By this declaration he made himself king over everything. It reduced the people of England from being citizens to subjects. A citizen is an equal under the law while a subject is a person under the control of another. This is the beginning of English law and our starting point for the War of Independence. A subject could be deprived of all their rights and property with no legal recourse. After all, they were owned by the crown. As such, when the colonies declared independence they set the precedent back 700 years.

During the centuries from 1066, the nobility sprung up that were allowed to control the lands around them. Eventually, they had assumed property ownership with the crown’s permission. They were still subjects, but they were better off than the common people. They were responsible for maintaining control over these lands and to pay their taxes to the crown. If the crown became too tyrannical, the nobles would rise up with their armies and fight back. This lead to the Magna Carta being signed and started the whole business concerning rights. How the power breakdown under The Divine Right of Kings looked like:

King

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Nobles

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Commoners

The Declaration of Independence in no uncertain terms that the people in the colonies are equal to the king. They were citizens and not subjects. This caused a shock in Europe, because here were a bunch of commoners declaring that they were equals to all the nobility. Part of the declaration, it lays out that all rights come our humanity and that the role of the government is to secure those rights. This foundation provided the framework for what was to follow. By operating through the individual states and in a Congress they created a contract of mutual protection in the form of the Articles of Confederation.

This is how the Declaration of Independence changed the power structure:

People

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Local government

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State government

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Congress of the Confederation

Each state held exclusive powers and the Congress could not infringe upon it. These states guarded these powers jealously and would not give them up without a fight. Under the Articles, the Congress required a 100% majority on all laws that were passed. Congress could not raise money through taxation and definitely could not tell another state what to do internally. Congress, also, could not coin money as it was a right reserved to the individual states. They did, however, fulfill the primary objective of winning the war.

In 1787, the Philadelphia Convention was convened under the authority of the Congress of the Confederation. This was in direct response to the Annapolis Convention of the prior year. After the war, the states began issuing fiat currency to pay for everything. Cost of goods and services increased due to inflation to a dangerous rate while unemployment skyrocketed. Being that the states were still agrarian that this forced many farmers to lose their farms to the bankers. In response to this, Captain Shays lead a rebellion to stop the tax men from seizing their farms. He lead his men to seize courthouses and forced them to not conduct business. This stalled the seizures as no cases could be heard.

Captain Shays was a decorated veteran of the War of Independence. His service was exemplary. Their petitions to the state legislature lead to inflation as Massachusetts printed more and more money. Veterans were promised a pension for their service and this was the money that was used to pay off their loans to the banks. Due to the devaluation of the money, it required more and more money for payment.

Congress of the Confederation met in Annapolis to discuss how to ensure that another rebellion didn’t occur. They decided the best course of action was to convene another convention with state delegates to hammer out amendments to the Articles of Confederation. The delegates at Philadelphia decided that instead of writing new amendments they would write a new federal government. Once the writing was done the delegates sent the Constitution to the Congress of the Confederation for approval. They did so and it took until 1789 for it to be fully ratified. Under the Constitution of the United States the power structure changed to the following:

People

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Local government

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State government

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Federal government

As you can see, the power structure remained the same as it did after the Declaration of Independence. The only difference was the removal of the Congress of the Confederation to the United States federal government. In the first session of the Congress of the United States, they passed the Organic Act. The act fixed the Declaration of Independence, Articles of Confederation, and the Northwest Territory Act into law. They did not alter the relationship between the people and the government.

Today, the government has manipulated people, through “education”, into believing that their rights come from the government and not their humanity. This has given rise to all the arguments about “civil rights” and ignoring natural rights. A civil right is nothing more than a relabel for a privilege. A privilege is where the government can take it away either through executive order, legislative law, or judicial decree. A natural right cannot be taken away as the people hold all the power. The people created the government to safeguard their rights and liberties from all enemies.

How the government controls people is through the use of permits and licenses. Both words have similar legal definitions which is, “the act to do something without permission is illegal.” Funny, but the federal government only has roughly 20 powers delegated to it by the states. The states have powers delegated to it by the people while the remaining power is held by the people. Now this is all supported by the Constitution of the United States and the individual state constitutions.

Here is a sample from Missouri’s Constitution.

Section 1. That all political power is vested in and derived from the people; that all government of right originates from the people, is founded upon their will only, and is instituted solely for the good of the whole.

Section 2. That all constitutional government is intended to promote the general welfare of the people; that all persons have a natural right to life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness and the enjoyment of the gains of their own industry; that all persons are created equal and are entitled to equal rights and opportunity under the law; that to give security to these things is the principal office of government, and that when government does not confer this security, it fails in its chief design.

In both of those clauses, it establishes that all power comes from the people and that the government originates from them. Government’s sole object is to promote the general welfare of