A Response to Usurpations

“The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny...” Declaration of Independence

This certainly describes most governments, including the United States and other western socialist democracies. But what exactly is a usurpation? It is the exercise of powers by an agent which have not been delegated to him by the principle. As Jefferson stated so eloquently in the Declaration, all men and women have unalienable rights and governments are instituted for the purpose of securing said rights. Legitimate governments derive their powers from the consent of the governed for the purpose of protecting those rights.

The United States, like most nations, has a constitution, the supreme law of the land. The U.S. Constitution goes to great lengths, specifically in the bill of rights, to limit the government's activities to the core purpose of protecting rights. Usurpation is when the acts of government officials go beyond or contradict those powers delegated to them. Unfortunately, just about everything government does these days falls into the category of usurpations.

“We are fast approaching the stage of the ultimate inversion: the stage where the government is free to do anything it pleases, while the citizens may act only by permission; which is the stage of the darkest periods of human history, the stage of rule by brute force.” Ayn Rand

The key principle in all this is that all official actions not derived from delegated powers are null and void by definition, not when the supreme court decides the matter. A law that grants a non delegated power is illegitimate from its inception and no official act can make it legitimate. There are a number of ways we the people can deny our government the exercise of illegitimate power. Nullification by a smaller body politic is one, currently being exercised by most of the counties in Virginia as the state government seek to deny them the right of self protection. Jury nullification is another. Petitions, protests and ultimately revolution are also means to protect against usurpations.

“A patriot must always be ready to defend his country against his government.” Edward Abby

All that is well and good but the key is this. You are a sovereign individual and your rights belong to you. No court, no legislature, no group of your peers determines when the government has stepped over the line of its delegated powers. You, as an individual, know when your rights have been violated and the constitution is not some incomprehensible legal document, it is clear when it has been ignored. We have a duty as citizens to obey legitimate law but if the law is in conflict with the constitution or violates a natural right, our duty then lies with the higher law. Our duty to determine constitutionality is nondelegatable, we cannot transfer authority over our unalienable rights to another.

“I know no safe depository of the ultimate powers of the society but the people themselves” Thomas Jefferson

This means exactly what you think it means. We have no moral duty to comply with laws that violate our rights or the constitution. In Virginia they are standing up for their natural right to self protection and their constitutional right to keep and bear arms that is not to be infringed. In recent years in Oregon and Nevada brave men and women have stood up for property rights. No government existing today is going to protect your rights, that government is dead and gone. It is only you and I having the courage to stand up and refuse to comply with all the government's usurpations that will break its power and restore our liberty.