A United States Law Primer

I would like to start off by saying sorry to the readers who do not live in the United States. This thread is here to try and clear up what you may think you know about the system of U.S. law. I was inspired to put this to the internet, and ATS in particular because I have seen a great number of threads about how 'The Government' is doing illegal things and is evil.

This OP will really be in a number of posts, each covering a topic I feel is basic to the understanding of the United States system of law.

P1: The back round of the United States of America, and the legal documents that founded it.
MP1: The Constitution of the United States of America
SP1 - The Bill Of Rights
SP2 - The rest of the constitution
MP2: What is not a legal document
SP1 - The Decleration of Independance
SP2 - The Articals of Confederation.

P2: The smooth running of a nation that changes
MP1: Orgnazed Revolution
SP1: Voteing
SP2: Non elected officials
MP2: The Governmental Chain of Command
SP1: Law enfocement chain
SP2: Legal document primacy
MP3: How out dated law is removed or ammended
SP1: Slavery
SP2: Ignore the Constitution?

P3: Tax Law
MP1: Is taxation legal?
SP1: United States Tax Code
SP2: Reasons for Taxation
MP2: How to reconcile the Revolution with current tax law.
SP1: The American Revolution was not about taxes
SP2: Tax law from 1790 to 2010 in short.

P4: The International Connection
MP1: Treties
SP1: They are the law
SP2: How can outside powers dictate U.S. law?
MP2: International Governing Bodies
SP1: The UN and how it effects the U.S.
SP2: NATO and how it effects the U.S.

P5: Notes, Links, and summary of the facts


Note to readers: In the intrest of my reader I have tried to break down what I feel are important parts of the united states code. I will have 5 more posts after this one and ask that you hold your replys until I have put up all of my information. Post five will have all of my links and refrences. I will mark any refrences with a number like this (00) so for example ref. 1 shall look like this: (01). Please note that this thread is intended to inform the reader about what is in official documentation according to the Government. If you do not trust the government by default then I feel that you will gain very little from this thread. Please excuse my spelling and grammer, I will try to fix it as I go. The start time of this post is 1534 CST and I estimate that this shall be finished by 1730.

NOTE to Mods: I will be quick posting the five posts so that my post reads as four unbroken parts, so if you see 4 blank posts after this one, they will be filled as fast as I can type.

ONLY BY KNOWING THE LAW CAN YOU DEFEND YOUR RIGHTS!

P1: The back round of the United States of America, and the legal documents that founded it.


MP1: The Constitution of the United States of America

The Constitution of the United States was adopted by the country on September 17, 1787. This document alone forms the basis of federal law, and is considered to be the highest law of the land. That is to say that no law may be made that changes the US Constitution. Changes made to the constitution must be done via the Ammendment Process. I'll not cover the process here, but I will link it in the final post. (01)

SP1 - The Bill Of Rights

The Bill of Rights is the first ten amendments to the constitution. I will give a breif explanation for each.

A1: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances" This is commonly called 'The freedom of speach' Amendment. What it says is that no religion shall get special treatment, for good or for ill. This is important because it has been used to allow tax breaks ( covered later) to religious groups. As long as every ligitimate religious group gets the same break then no offence has been commited.

A2: "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed." This has been called the Right to Bear Arms amendment. This allows citizens to own thier own fire arms. This is important for a number of reasons, but it is important to know that the Militia refrenced in the amendment is the National Guard, which is under the command of the state in which it is raised. The President of the United States (From here on called the POTUS) actually needs the approval of the Governer to activate a guard unit for Federal service. It is also important to note that the amendment only protects your rights to own weapons. It does not say that the government cannot put reasonable restriction on fire arms. If you read the amendment the word used is 'Arms' which can be used to discribe anything from Spears and Crossbows to Missile Launchers. So in that light your really do not have a right to own a gun per se, but just an Arm.

A3: "No Soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, without the consent of the Owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by law." A direct responce to the Quartering Act. Please pay special attention to the last nine words of that amendment.

A4: "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized." This is the serch and seizure amendment. It is pretty clear about what it means. That said, if a law enforcement office can prove his case to a judge then they can get a warrant to do just about anything.

A5: "No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, 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" This one is a big one. It established the Grand Jury, Military Law, Double Jepordy, The right to not self incriminate, And the right to seek compensation if your assets are wrongly taken or damaged by the government. Remember that you are innocent until proven guilty, so if your assets are taken by the government during your arrest, and you are later found not guilty, they must return or pay for all of your assets. This is also the reason why people who do twenty years and then are cleared of all charges get back pay for the time in prison. If you are found not guilty then it is as if you were never found guilty at all.

A6: "In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defence." This is the right to due process, the right to have your case heard in a timely manner, and the right to be able to face your accusers. This is all to prevent abuses by the government against the people.

A7: "In Suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury, shall be otherwise re-examined in any Court of the United States, than according to the rules of the common law." Basicly this is saying that you cannot be sued in every court in the land until one finds in your favor.

A8: "Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted" This is the cruel and unusual punishment ammendment. It allows for the people to be defended against government abuses. This is where the argument against the death sentance is taken from. Please note that what is curel and unusual is based on the culture where the offence took place. This is what allows Utal to kill by fireing squad if the condemned wishes.

A9: "The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people" This one is very important as it tell the government that it may not use one amendment to void another, nor may it base a law on an ammendment that would violate another ammendment. This means that if via due process of the law excessive bail was set, that would violate this ammendment.

A10: "The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people" This is to some people the most important ammendment in the books. To them, it means that unless it is clearly layed out here then it cannot be done. Taxes come up alot for this. However, one would have to answer the question of how the government could pay for the following, "establish Justice(the court system), insure domestic Tranquility(Law enforcement), provide for the common defence(Military), promote the general Welfare(Health and Human services), and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America."?

SP2 - The rest of the constitution

I lined the rest of the document above. But here I will cover some of the ammendments that are hot right now. Note that there are 27 Amendments to the Constitution, But never ever ignore the actual constitution which has 7 Articles and over twenty sections (10 in article one and less in the following ones, seven has no sections for example)



MP2: What is not a legal document
SP1 - The Decleration of Independance
SP2 - The Articals of Confederation

P2 here

P3 Goes here

P4 Goes here

P5 here

This space reserved for additional information that I may post. Will be removed if not used by the end.

ONLY BY KNOWING THE LAW CAN YOU DEFEND YOUR RIGHTS!
Just a couple questions to start things off... If you could please give me a numerical answer to "precisely how many laws are there?" . How many books contain said laws? Where can I locate and have access to said books? How much is it going to cost me? Please estimate the amount of time it would take a high school graduate to read these books? Would that high school graduate be able to understand what is contained in these books...given the wonderful public education system we have?

reply to post by Obinhi


Boring

Only one law in the totalitarian states of amerika.. OBEY the state.

reply to post by G.A.G.


Well if you check in later you will have your answer. And yes, I think that if a high school (Aged between 14 and 18 on average) student had the inclination to learn they could understand. If you cannot wait for me, the national archives and the library of congress have all of the laws for free. If you need a hard copy you can order them here: US Government Book Store

reply to post by Obinhi

Nice Idea.

I would recommend anyone who expects to live as an adult in the USA take an Employment Law and a Business Law course from the Community College.

The Business or Contract Law course is the real must have. You will be signing contracts all your life and if you do not have a basic understanding of the Commercial code you are at great disadvantage.


YUP the stuff is dry as dust until you realize you were had on a contract you signed. Then the stuff gets REAL interesting

Rights don't come from the law, they come from God.

Laws are supposed to protect the rights given to us by God.

God didn't give us the right to loot other people at gun point or throw them into dungeons when they don't pay up.

reply to post by mnemeth1


Man, I should have never taken a break from writing this to look at the replys. Prove to me that any god exists and we'll talk about rights given by god. Oh and the god of the big three religions does tax, I belive it is 10% of your income. I would find the refrence but I'm do busy in reality to disprove your fairy tales.

Sorry folks, looks like I left the edit window up too long on account of kids bath time and bed time. I will be busting my deadline, but oh well, I'll keep writing and post when I can.

Originally posted by Obinhi
reply to post by mnemeth1

 

Man, I should have never taken a break from writing this to look at the replys. Prove to me that any god exists and we'll talk about rights given by god. Oh and the god of the big three religions does tax, I belive it is 10% of your income. I would find the refrence but I'm do busy in reality to disprove your fairy tales.

Ok, Buddha gave us our rights.

Maoist Space Alien creators gave us our rights.

The fact we are human endows us with rights.

God in the sense used has no bearing on what god you chose to use since god in that phrase represents a natural endowment of rights due to the nature of our existence within this physical world.

If there were no law and no God - I would still have the right to defend myself.

I thought you might be smart enough to figure that out with me having to spell it out in this post.

My assumptions proved wrong.

Originally posted by mnemeth1

Originally posted by Obinhi
reply to post by mnemeth1

 

Man, I should have....

Ok, Buddha gave us our rights.

Maoist Space Alien creators gave us our rights.

The fact we are human endows us with rights.

God in the sense used has no bearing on what god you chose to use since god in that phrase represents a natural endowment of rights due to the nature of our existence within this physical world.

If there were no law and no God - I would still have the right to defend myself.

I thought you might be smart enough to figure that out with me having to spell it out in this post.

My assumptions proved wrong.

edit on 10-12-2010 by mnemeth1 because: (no reason given)

I see, So you expect me to belive that as a human, some magical/mythical/Flat out BS have me my rights and not an agreed upon social contract that puts into law precise and clear guidelines that allow me and the government to do things, or not do things. I think you will find that the government rules not because of guns but because the people by and large have faith in the system. And I know that you will jump on the word faith because you are clawing for anything to discredit me and my arguements, but the government, any government only exists because the people will it. Much like our money today, and any number of other things, they only have value because be belive they have value, hell Kung Fu Panda will point that simple fact out to you with out the need for gods or anything else.

Sorry guys, but if I dont get the rights back to edit my posts I'm going to end up doing this in Word, converting the paper to Adobe, and posting that here. I want to do this in a way which is easy to read, but this is turning out harder then I figured.

reply to post by Obinhi


OOooooooooo I saw you utter my phavorite phrase

"Social Contract"

If you can produce any documentation with my signature on it that says I agreed to be a part of your "Social Contract" I'll shut up.

Until then:

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/43c1fd6cd0ec.jpg[/atsimg]

please keep going! love it

talk about our nazi cops and corrupt courts and roll of the DA