by Frederick Mann
To become a Free Sovereign Citizen of Build Freedom, and do justice to yourself, you need to find out who you are. Most of us, including many who yearn for freedom, suffer from what might be called "slave mentality." Our personal philosophy and psychology, in important respects, may be that of a slave rather than that of a free sovereign. The purpose of this report is to help you find out who you are. Finding out who you are is a major step in acquiring freedom technology.
The Sovereign Individual Paradigm
"The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars,
But in ourselves that we are underlings."
- William Shakespeare
A paradigm is a system of belief or a way of viewing the world. The feudal paradigm is that there is a King who essentially owns and controls everything and everybody. People are the subjects of the King. The King may delegate some of his powers to a Lord. Peasants, landholders, and merchants have to pay tribute to the Lord and/or the King.
The American Declaration of Independence of 1776 essentially broke the ties to the King of England. Individuals in North America became free sovereigns in their own right. Individuals became their own masters. We could call this the sovereign individual paradigm.
During the past 200 years there has been a gradual regression in America back to the feudal paradigm. Today most Americans believe that they are owned by the government. The government can draft them (or at least force them to register for the draft) and send them off to a foreign war. Workers and companies pay taxes to the government that are far higher than those just before the Declaration of Independence. The government makes the laws and the people must obey. The government owns children and can therefore force parents to send their children to school. The government owns people's bodies, therefore suicide is a crime. The government owns people's bodies, therefore tells people what they may or may not put into their bodies.
So what we have in America today is essentially a feudal system. Individuals stand in relation to the government as peasants stood in relation to the King in the Middle Ages. Today most individuals are as much "underlings" as the peasants were at the time of Shakespeare.
The sovereign individual paradigm states:
(a) I am the master of my life.
(b) I own my life, mind, and body - and the fruit of my labor.
(c) I am free to do anything provided I do not violate the rights of others or harm them.
To get a better understanding of the sovereign individual paradigm, compare the free-wild horse to the broken-domesticated horse. A horse is born free and wild. Try and ride a free-wild horse and it will do its utmost to throw you off. A free-wild horse doesn't like to be broken - enslaved - ridden by a master.
Once the cowboy has broken the free-wild horse, it becomes a broken-domesticated-obedient horse. Now the cowboy is the master of the horse. The horse is the slave of the cowboy. The cowboy rides the horse. The horse works for the cowboy. The cowboy owns the horse. The horse obeys the cowboy.
Horses are born free and wild. Horses are inherently free. They are naturally free. But they can be broken, domesticated, enslaved.
We humans are also born free. We are inherently and naturally free. But most parents break their children at an early age - turn them into broken-domesticated-obedient little slaves. "Teachers" continue the process in compulsory "schools."
For some reason my parents failed to completely break me. When my father or mother told me, "Fetch my keys from the bedroom," my first thought always was, "Who are you to tell me what to do? "However, if I didn't obey I got spanked. But I never accepted that my parents owned me or had the right to order me around.
When I was about five years old, during a family trip about 300 miles away from home in South Africa, a policeman pulled us over. He had noticed from our car's number plates that we were from the same town where he had grown up. He asked us to convey his greetings to his parents who still lived in our hometown. My parents, sister, and brother expressed their sense of relief that we had not been pulled over for doing something wrong. I, on the other hand, experienced a sense of outrage for being stopped by a cop for no valid reason. I said nothing to my family. They wouldn't have understood - they had been broken.
The feudal paradigm could also be called the "cattle mentality." People believe they are like cattle owned by the government. The government must build fences to confine them, protect them against predators, order them where to go and where not, control what they may eat and what not, and even feed them. Cattle can't think for themselves.
Disobedience.
Once a horse has been broken it timidly accepts being saddled and bridled. The saddle is placed on the horse's back and held in place by a strong strap around the horse's body. Attached to the saddle are stirrups for the rider's feet. The rider's boots may have spurs used to inflict pain on the horse in order to make it run faster. The rider may also use a horsewhip.
Around the head of the horse a bridle is strapped. Part of the bridle is a metal bit that passes horizontally through the horse's mouth. The reins are attached to the ends of the bit and are used to steer the horse and make it slow down and stop. Pain can be inflicted on the horse by yanking the reins or pulling on them with a see-saw motion.
The above paraphernalia are used to make it easy for a rider to control his or her horse - difficult for the horse to disobey its rider.
The leg of a baby elephant is tied with a rope to a wooden post planted in the ground. The rope confines the baby elephant to an area determined by the length of the rope. Initially the baby elephant tries to break the rope, but the rope is too strong. The baby elephant "learns" that it can't break the rope.
When the elephant grows up into a ten-ton colossus, it could easily break the same rope. But because it "learned" that it couldn't break the rope when it was a baby, it believes that it still can't break the rope, so it doesn't even try. So the largest elephant can be confined by the puniest little rope.
In a sense, the elephant's mind was broken by the rope when it was a baby.
Obedience is the greatest obstacle to discovering who you are - obedience to others, obedience to your own beliefs about your limitations.
However, disobedience may be punished. The horse that fights tooth and hoof to prevent you from putting on bridle and saddle, may be sold as horse meat. The child who disobeys his or her parents may be spanked. The student who disobeys his or her teachers may be expelled. The citizen who disobeys his or her government may be fined, jailed, paroled, etc.
Disobedience has to be creative. Disobey without breaking the law. You also have to formulate your own principles - the guidelines for your behavior to ensure that you don't harm others or violate their rights. Consider the Build Freedom Code.
Disobedience essentially means thinking for yourself and deciding for yourself what to do and what not to do. When you follow the how-to instructions of a car-repair manual, you do so out of personal choice and conscious judgment, rather than blind obedience.
Throughout history, governments have contained the worst parasites and destroyers. They have developed a host of "bridles," "saddles," and "ropes" to ride their subjects. They call themselves "Kings" (cowboys) and their victims "subjects" (horses). They call their theft "taxes." They brainwash their victims into believing that some of the noises and scribbles that emanate from their "holy" mouths and "royal" pens, constitute "the law" (so-called) that must be obeyed.
The elephant was conditioned or brainwashed to believe that it couldn't break a puny little rope. Humans are brainwashed to believe they must obey the noises and scribbles of destructive politicians, lawyers, and bureaucrats. Humans are brainwashed that they are like cattle who need a cattle herder to look after them, tell them what to do, and even feed them.
The Development of Consciousness
I grew up in Zululand, part of Natal Province, South Africa, on a farm, with black servants and farm workers. The first settlement of whites in southern Africa occurred over three hundred years ago, at the southern tip of Africa, called the Cape of Good Hope. Similar to the North American migration from East to West, in southern Africa there was a migration from South to North called the "Great Trek." Some of the "Trekkers" established little "Boer" republics. "Boer" is the Dutch and Afrikaans word for farmer. Afrikaans (derived from Dutch) is the language of about 60% of the whites in South Africa. My great-great grandfather was President of one of the "Boer" republics. Another of these republics was called "Republiek Vryheid" - "Freedom Republic."
A much larger republic was also formed, called the "Orange Free State." Its constitution was closely copied from the U.S. Constitution. Just like the U.S. Constitution didn't recognize "non-whites" as human beings, the Orange Free State Constitution didn't either. Just like in North America whites hunted native Americans, whites in southern Africa hunted native Africans.
One Afrikaans word for native Africans is "naturel" ("native"); another is "skepsel" ("creature"). The most derogatory is "kaffer" ("infidel"). These words are no longer acceptable. My grandfather was a Senator and Chairman of the "Naturelle-Sake Kommissie" ("Native Affairs Commission"). That is the equivalent of the Chairman of a Congressional Committee that overseas the "Bureau of Indian Affairs." My grandfather was considered very wise and knew exactly what had to be done about the "Swart Gevaar" ("Black Danger"). My grandmother taught black children the three Rs and religion in her own farm school. Her mission was to "civilize the savages." One day a black maid licked one of my grandmother's spoons. My grandmother gave the maid a tongue lashing for "contaminating a white spoon" - then gave the spoon to the maid to keep, because it was "no longer fit for white use!"
When I was about seventeen I got engaged in a conversation with a black man. Suddenly, as if hit by a sledgehammer, I realized that I was talking to a Human Being! Up to that time I had unconsciously assumed that blacks were "inferior creatures" - kind of sub-human.
Steve Biko was the founder of the "Black Consciousness" Movement in South Africa. Biko recognized that the biggest problem was that blacks in their own consciousness regarded themselves as "inferior creatures." The culture we grew up in - the language we used - planted the notion in the minds of whites that they were "superior beings," and in the minds of blacks that they were "inferior creatures." Practically all whites and blacks were subconsciously enculturated in this manner. Biko recognized this phenomenon and advocated that blacks had to free their consciousness from the "inferior-creature" shackles. Biko became world-famous and was visited by people like Bobby Kennedy. Biko was also the greatest threat to white government in South Africa. The police effectively murdered him. The murder was "whitewashed."
A few years before Biko's death I started reading books about freedom, books critical of government, books alleging that inflation was something done by government, books about secret conspiracies that were the real government behind the scene.
One such book was How I Found Freedom in an Unfree World by Harry Browne. It had a profound effect on my consciousness. This and other books - particularly The Discovery of Freedom by Rose Wilder Lane - eventually led me to discover that I was a free and sovereign individual. Steve Biko was also a major inspiration in the development of my consciousness.
Soon after Biko's murder I left South Africa. Since then I have lived as a free sovereign individual in several countries. In Brussels, Belgium I came across The Cinderella Complex: Women's Fear of Independence by CollZette Dowling. The theme is that in their consciousness women tend to regard themselves as "inferior slave creatures." This inferiority is mostly subconscious and culturally imposed. Men regard themselves as "superior master beings."
I also met an American woman, a teacher at the American School in Brussels. As a result of discussing politics and education with her I came up with the term "cattle mentality." Subconsciously this teacher regarded herself as a "cow" owned by the government. The government had a right to milk her, to build fences to confine her, to tell her what she was allowed to eat and what not. Like a cattle herder, the government also had a duty to look after her and feed her. And it was her duty to "educate" the "calves" under her care with the "cattle mentality." Of course, her "calves" had to be forced into "schools" and taught what the government dictated.
In America today, we see on TV and read in the papers daily, of business leaders begging big-daddy government for protection against big-bad-wolf unfair foreign competition, or big-daddy government must do this or that to help us poor helpless little creatures.
There is a common denominator here:
Inferiority mentality may be the subconscious basis behind the demand for "affirmative action" - "I am inferior and therefore I can't be or don't deserve to be hired on my own merits; therefore I want big-daddy government to force someone to hire me. The free sovereign individual wants a job on the basis of voluntary cooperation. Both he or she and the employer seek to gain from the association. Sovereign individuals believe they have something to offer and can find an employer willing to hire them on the basis of their abilities. The free sovereign individual says, "I don't care how much people discriminate against me. I will find a job or start my own business."
Much of feminism also seems to be based on the inferiority mentality - "As a woman I am inferior and therefore I want big-daddy government to force someone to give me "equal treatment."" The free sovereign woman says, "I don't care how much people discriminate against me. I will find a job in a business where women have the same status as men, or start my own business. I will persuade women investors to invest in businesses that discriminate in favor of women."
Consider the possibility that when women or minority members run to big-daddy government for special favors, they become "double slaves" - slaves of their perceived oppressors as well as slaves of government.
Free sovereign individuals do not stoop to beg for special favors. They assert their freedom, sovereignty, and personal power. The free sovereign individual has a reality-based pride - "I am the master of my fate, the captain of my ship of destiny!"
More on the Sovereign Individual Paradigm
(Acknowledgment: Some of the information under this heading comes from The Federal Zone: Cracking the Code of Internal Revenue by Mitch Modeleski.)
To be fully human, I believe, includes that you discover that you are a free sovereign individual. The following comparison is adapted from a presentation by Martin J. "Red" Beckman:
Majority Rule Democracy Constitutional Republic ----------------------- ----------------------- Elite Cartel [Creator] Majority Mob Individual President Constitution Congress President Bureau- and Terrocrats Congress Case and Statute Law Case and Statute Law Corporations Public Servants Individual Corporations
In a majority mob-ruled democracy, the real sovereign rulers form an elite cartel or conspiracy. To a large extent they dictate public opinion through their control of the media and by forcing children into "schools" for brainwashing. The majority mob appoints a minute percentage of the government, thereby creating the illusion of "democracy." Most of the key bureaucrats and terrocrats are appointed by the elite cartel. Case and statute law are "manufactured" to serve the special interests of the elite cartel. Next in the "democratic" pecking order come the corporations who beg and bribe for special favors. And at the bottom we find the individual.
This is the feudal system of modern America. Individuals are regarded by the "powers that be" as cattle. In the consciousness of the elite, individuals are cattle to be corralled, herded, and milked. And in the consciousness of brainwashed American individuals, they are cattle to be corralled, herded, and milked. They accept their lot with hardly a moo. This is the phenomenon that Steve Biko identified. This is why Biko was the man most dangerous to the economic and political elite in South Africa. This is why Biko had to be murdered.
The U.S. was established as a Constitutional Republic. For theists, the Creator forms the top rung of the ladder. For others, the individual is supreme and sovereign.
The U.S. Constitution, as a contract between individuals, is below the individual. The individual is senior to the Constitution. The following U.S. Supreme Court case illustrates individual sovereignty:
"Sovereignty itself is, of course, not subject to law, for it is the author and source of law; but in our system, while sovereign powers are delegated to the agencies of government, sovereignty itself remains with the people, by whom and for whom all government exists and acts. And the law is the definition and limitation of power. It is indeed, quite true, that there must always be lodged somewhere, and in some person or body, the authority of final decision; and in many cases of mere administration the responsibility is purely political, no appeal except to the ultimate tribunal of the public judgement, exercised either in the pressure of opinion or by means of the suffrage. But the fundamental rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, considered as individual possessions, are secured by those maxims of constitutional law which are the monuments showing the victorious progress of the race in securing to men the blessings of civilization under the reign of just and equal laws, so that, in the famous language of the Massachusetts Bill of Rights, the government of the commonwealth "may be a government of laws and not of men." For, the very idea that man may be compelled to hold his life, or the means of living, or any material right essential to the enjoyment of life, at the mere will of another, seems to be intolerable in any country where freedom prevails, as being the essence of slavery itself." Yick Wo v. Hopkins, 118 U.S. 356, 370 [emphasis added].
The people - individuals - are supreme and sovereign. The very idea that the life or property of an individual is subject to the will of another is the essence of slavery. The military draft - including compulsory registration for the draft - is intolerable and the essence of slavery. All taxes - taking people's property by force - compelling people to hold the means of living at the will of another - are intolerable and the essence of slavery. Forcibly incarcerating children in government "schools" is intolerable and the essence of slavery.
The principle of individual sovereignty is also embodied in the American system of trial by jury. If American judges were not ignorant or corrupt, they would inform every jury that the individual jurors are the sovereigns who have the final say regarding both law and fact. It is both the right and the duty of each juror to judge both fact and law. If one of the twelve jurors says, "Not guilty; it is a bad law," that's it. Congress may pass a law, the President may sign it, but the individual juror has the power to nullify that law - at least in a specific case. If sufficient jurors nullify a particular law, it becomes unenforceable and is either repealed or simply ignored. The important principle is that the individual is senior to both Congress and the President.
Thomas Jefferson regarded jury nullification - the jury's right and duty to judge the law - as the most important check on government. He described the jury as "the only anchor ever imagined by man by which a government can be held to the principles of its constitution."
The U.S. Constitution grants certain powers to Congress and imposes certain limits on these powers. The Bill of Rights attempts to safeguard certain individual rights. Remember, "the law is the definition and limitation of power," as stated in the above Supreme Court case. When you study the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution (which includes the Bill of Rights), it will become clear what an amazing and daring system our Founding Fathers tried to create - a society where the individual is supreme and sovereign.
Underneath the Constitution come the President, Congress, Case and Statute Law, Public Servants, and Corporations.
In modern feudal America, the political system created by our Founding Fathers has been turned upside down.
What is Coercion?
My dictionary (Webster's New Collegiate) defines "coerce" as:
Coercion is the overwhelming of the will of another by force or threat of force. Examples of coercion:
Ayn Rand made the crucial qualification of the initiation of violence or threat of violence. As long as someone has done nothing to harm others or violate their rights, no one has the right to initiate violence or the threat of violence against them.
There is a common-law principle that states that for there to be a crime, there has to be a victim (corpus delicti). Without a victim there is no crime. There can be no "victimless crimes." There is also a principle which states that for a contract to be valid it has to be intentionally, voluntarily, and expressly entered into. Attempting to force people to do something when they haven't committed a crime or entered into a contract to do it, is coercion.
Many Americans are blind to subtle violence, subtle coercion. They don't recognize the government requirement that people register their cars as coercion or violence. If you don't register your car, a policemen will pull you over. If you resist his unwarranted coercion, he will physically attack you, and may shoot and kill you. They don't recognize forcing children into schools as coercion or violence. Many parents don't recognize the coercion they perpetrate against their own children as violence.
American culture - as in the rest of the world - teaches that the big and strong, especially those with guns, get their way through violence. Children must obey their parents because their parents are big, strong, and violent. Subjects must obey their government because their government is big, strong, and violent.
Coercion or violence is the hallmark of feudal society. Voluntary cooperation is the essence of a free society. The following Supreme Court case, comparing Europe to America, illustrates the contrast:
"In Europe, the executive is almost synonymous with the sovereign power of a State... Such is the condition of power in that quarter of the world, where it is too commonly acquired by force or fraud, or both, and seldom by compact [voluntary agreement or contract]. In America, however, the case is widely different. Our government is founded upon compact. Sovereignty was, and is, in the people." Glass v. The Sloop Betsey, 3 Dall 6 (1794) [emphasis added].
What is Evil?
A friend and I were discussing the case of Dick Quinn who describes in his book Left for Dead how his doctor subjected him to useless double-bypass surgery instead of a vastly more effective natural remedy. I contended that the doctor was evil in not even considering natural alternatives. My friend said the doctor was brainwashed in medical school, didn't know anything about "natural remedies," and anyway the FDA effectively outlaws natural remedies. I said that the doctor was evil for not knowing alternative remedies and even considering them. We looked up "evil" in the dictionary: "Something that causes harm; something that brings sorrow, distress, or calamity."
The doctor who kowtows to the AMA and FDA, doesn't question what he or she learned in medical school, doesn't find out what is being done in Europe and other parts of the world, in my opinion, practices evil. Whatever you do that causes harm, sorrow, distress, or calamity, is evil - whether done knowingly or unknowingly, intentionally or unintentionally.
With another friend I discussed judges. I said that judges who didn't inform juries properly were evil and corrupt. My friend said that most judges were brainwashed in law school - as described by Gerry Spence in With Justice for None: Destroying an American Myth - where they didn't learn the Constitution and common law. I said that it was evil for a judge to swear an oath to uphold the Constitution without studying it and common law (the law of the land) thoroughly - whatever the "teachers" said in law "school." For a judge to not know the law is both evil and corrupt.
The greater the evil, the more blind we tend to be to it, the more difficult it is to confront. This made it possible for Hitler to do what he did. A basic reason why health care costs are soaring is because individuals in general can't confront the evils of our medical "profession." A basic reason why the national debt has soared above $4 trillion is because individuals in general can't confront the evils of government - and the IRS brainwashes, terrorizes, and coerces them into financing the evils...
In the first two paragraphs of Common Sense, Thomas Paine wrote:
"Some writers have so confounded society with government, as to leave little or no distinction between them; whereas they are not only different, but have different origins. Society is produced by our wants, and government by our wickedness; the former promotes our happiness positively by uniting our affections, the latter negatively by restraining our vices. The one encourages intercourse, the other creates distinctions. The first is a patron, the last a punisher.
Society in every state is a blessing, but government even in its best state is but a necessary evil; in its worst state an intolerable one; for when we suffer, or are exposed to the same miseries by a government, which we might expect in a country without government, our calamities are heightened by reflecting that we furnish the means by which we suffer."
What Nietzsche Said About the State
"There are still peoples and herds somewhere, but not with us, my brothers: here
there are states.
The state? What is that? Well then! Now open your ears, for now I shall speak to you of
the death of peoples.
The state is the coldest of all cold monsters. Coldly it lies, too; and this lie creeps
from its mouth; 'I, the state, am the people.'
It is a lie! It was creators who created peoples and hung a faith and a love over them:
thus they served life.
It is destroyers who set snares for many and call it the state: they hang a sword and a
hundred desires over them.
Where a people still exists, there the people do not understand the state and hate it as
the evil eye and sin against custom and law.
I offer you this sign: every people speaks its own language of good and evil: its neighbor
does not understand this language. It invented this language for itself in custom and law.
But the state lies in all languages of good and evil; and whatever it says, it lies - and
whatever it has, it has stolen.
Everything about it is false; it bites with stolen teeth. Even its belly is false.
Confusion of the language of good and evil; I offer you this sign of the state. Truly,
this sign indicates the will to death! Truly, it beckons to the preachers of death!
Many too many are born: the state was invented for the superfluous!
Just see how it lures them, the many-too-many! How it devours them, and chews them, and
re-chews them!
... It would like to range heroes and honorable men about it, this new idol! It likes to
sun itself in the sunshine of good consciences - this cold monster!
It will give you everything if you worship it, this new idol: thus it buys
for itself the luster of your virtues and the glance of your proud eyes.
It wants to use you to lure the many-too-many. Yes, a cunning device of Hell has here been
devised, a horse of death jingling with the trappings of divine honors!
Yes, a death for many has here been devised that glorifies itself as life: truly a
heart-felt service to all preachers of death!
I call it the state where everyone, good and bad, is a poison-drinker: the state where
everyone, good and bad, loses himself: the state where universal slow suicide is called -
life."
Friedrich Nietzsche, 1884
Typically, in the history classes taught in the last generation in America, when Nietzsche is discussed, he is depicted as the forefather of Hitler's Nazi ideology. Nothing could be further from the truth. Nietzsche was probably the most penetrative philosopher and psychologist there has ever been. He saw right through the falsehoods on which the state rests. Fifty years before Hitler came to power he was already disgusted at what he saw happening in Germany. He predicted that Germany would suffer a horrible calamity. He was so disgusted that he renounced his German roots and became a Swiss citizen.
The Nazis did take some of Nietzsche's statements out of context and used them as slogans. But to teach that Nietzsche inspired the Nazis is pure brainwashing. Nietzsche clearly saw what a destructive disaster the state was and expressed his view in unequivocal terms. Maybe that is why government monopoly schools try so hard to discredit him.
Nietzsche was a most inspiring example of someone who devoted his life to finding out who he was. Freud said that Nietzsche was the most conscious person there had ever been, and that probably no future person would ever be as conscious. (Nietzsche wrote about the subconscious long before Freud and about the hierarchy of needs long before Maslow.
An Important Supreme Court Case
The sovereign individual paradigm is reflected by the following U.S. Supreme Court case:
"The individual may stand upon his constitutional rights as a citizen. He is entitled to carry on his private business in his own way. His power to contract is unlimited. He owes no such duty [to submit his books and papers for an examination] to the State, since he receives nothing therefrom, beyond the protection of his life and property. His rights are such as existed by the law of the land [Common Law] long antecedent to the organization of the State, and can only be taken from him by due process of law, and in accordance with the Constitution. Among his rights are a refusal to incriminate himself, and the immunity of himself and his property from arrest or seizure except under a warrant of the law. He owes nothing to the public so long as he does not trespass upon their rights." Hale v. Henkel, 201 U.S. 43 at 47 (1905).
Let us analyze this case. It says, "The individual may stand upon his constitutional rights." It does not say, "Sit on his rights." There is a principle here: "If you don't use 'em you lose 'em." You have to assert your rights, demand them, "stand upon" them.
Next it says, "He is entitled to carry on his private business in his own way." It says "private business" - you have a right to operate a private business. Then it says "in his own way." It doesn't say "in the government's way."
Then it says, "His power to contract is unlimited." As a sovereign individual, your power to contract is unlimited. In common law there are certain criteria that determine the validity of contracts. They are not important here, except that any contract that would harm others or violate their rights would be invalid. For example, a "contract" to kill someone is not a valid contract. Apart from this obvious qualification, your power to contract is unlimited.
Next it says, "He owes no such duty [to submit his books and papers for an examination] to the State, since he receives nothing therefrom, beyond the protection of his life and property." The court case contrasted the duty of the corporation (an entity created by government permission - feudal paradigm) to the duty of the sovereign individual. The sovereign individual doesn't need and didn't receive permission from the government, hence has no duty to the government.
Then it says, "His rights are such as existed by the law of the land [Common Law] long antecedent to the organization of the State." This is very important. The Supreme Court recognized that humans have inherent rights. The U.S. Constitution (including the Bill of Rights) does not grant us rights. We have fundamental rights, irrespective of what the Constitution says. The Constitution acknowledges some of our rights. And Amendment IX states, "The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people." The important point is that our rights antecede (come before, are senior to) the organization of the state.
Next the Supreme Court says, "And [his rights] can only be taken from him by due process of law, and in accordance with the Constitution." Does it say the government can take away your rights? No! Your rights can only be taken away "by due process of law, and in accordance with the Constitution." "Due process of law" involves procedures and safeguards such as trial by jury. "Trial by jury" means, inter alia, the jury judges both law and fact.
Then the case says, "Among his rights are a refusal to incriminate himself, and the immunity of himself and his property from arrest or seizure except under a warrant of the law." These are some of the rights of a sovereign individual. Sovereign individuals need not report anything about themselves or their businesses to anyone.
Finally, the Supreme Court says, "He owes nothing to the public so long as he does not trespass upon their rights." The sovereign individual does not have to pay taxes.
If you discuss Hale v. Henkel with a run-of-the-mill attorney, he or she will tell you that the case is "old" and that it has been "overturned." If you ask the attorney for a citation of the case or cases that overturned Hale v. Henkel, it is unlikely that there will be a meaningful response. A friend of mine has researched Hale v. Henkel. He reported:
"We know that Hale v. Henkel was decided in 1905 in the U.S. Supreme Court. Since it was the Supreme Court, the case is binding on all courts of the land, until another Supreme Court case says it isn't. Has another Supreme Court case overturned Hale v. Henkel? The answer is NO. As a matter of fact, since 1905, the Supreme Court has cited Hale v. Henkel a total of 144 times. A fact more astounding is that since 1905, Hale v. Henkel has been cited by all of the federal and state appellate court systems a total of at least 1600 times. None of the various issues of this case has ever been overruled.
How does that compare with the other Supreme Court cases? Although a complete study has not been made, initial observations indicate that no other case surpasses Hale v. Henkel in the number of times it has been cited."
Personal Status: Freeman or Slave?
[This section is extracted from an article by Alfred Adask in the Nov/Dec 1992 issue of AntiShyster.]
[Reprinted (with minor changes) with permission from the AntiShyster, PO Box 540786. Dallas, TX 75354-0786 - (214) 559-7957 - annual subscription $25.
So, How Do You Find Out Who You Are?
You could think of yourself as a self-programmer. During your lifetime you have surrounded yourself with programs. How you view your environment, other people, and institutions like the state, are programs that profoundly affect how you view yourself.
You have programs that define who you are, who you are not, how you are, how you are not, what you think, what you don't think, how you think, how you don't think, what you emote, what you don't emote, how you emote, how you don't emote, what you say, what you don't say, how you say it, how you don't say it, what you write, what you don't write, how you write, how you don't write, what you do, what you don't do, how you do it, how you don't do it, what you can do, what you can't do, etc. You also have many "why" programs: the "reasons" for all the above.
Many programs you made up yourself. Many you received and accepted from your parents, other family, friends, teachers, preachers, politicians, books, newspapers, magazines, radio, TV, journalists, etc. Any programs you received and accepted from others, without consciously evaluating their utility, constitute brainwashing. You either program yourself or you allow others to program you.
Your limitations are in your programs. You created them yourself - or you received and accepted them from others. Your self-esteem is determined by how you view and measure yourself. Having essentially created your limitations yourself, you can remove them.
You can think of yourself as the Great Programmer surrounded by layers of programs like an onion. In order to discover yourself you peel off the layers of limiting programs. Or you simply jump out of your old programs and operate according to new programs.
Some of your programs define your "comfort zone." There are things you find comfortable thinking, emoting, saying, writing, and doing. Other things you find uncomfortable. To discover yourself you may have to jump out of your comfort zone: and think, emote, say, write, or do the uncomfortable.
When I was about nine or ten years old I read about Robert Clive (of India). He tried to commit suicide, but the gun failed to fire. So he decided it was an omen that he would become a great man. In London, near Downing Street, there is a statue of Clive of India. The Clive story inspired me to become a great man. I formed a "metaprogram" that I would become great. "Meta" means behind or beyond. A metaprogram is a pervasive or overriding program.
I seek to learn, improve, and implement the greatest practical ideas of my favorite psychologists, philosophers, thinkers, healers, and freedom-fighters: Jeremy Bentham, Steve Biko, Éttiene de la Boétie, Edward de Bono, Nathaniel Branden, Harry Browne, Guy-Claude Burger, Lewis Carroll, Noam Chomsky, W. Edwards Deming, Buckminster Fuller, Robert Fritz, T.C. Fry, Mohandas Gandhi, F.A. Hayek, Robert Heinlein, Shad Helmstetter, W.G. Hill, Claude Hopkins, L. Ron Hubbard, Julian Jaynes, Thomas Jefferson, Alfred Korzybski, Rose Wilder Lane, Timothy Leary, Abraham Maslow, Friedrich Nietzsche, William of Ockham, Thomas Paine, Jean Piaget, Karl Popper, Ezra Pound, Ayn Rand, Robert Ringer, Murray Rothbard, Irwin Schiff, Harry Schultz, Martin Seligman, Herbert Shelton, Lysander Spooner, Max Stirner, Jonathan Swift, Thomas Szasz, Lao Tzu, Hans Vaihinger, Voltaire, N.W. Walker, Frank Wallace, Win Wenger, Robert Anton Wilson, etc.
Build Freedom is my attempt to implement the best practical ideas of my favorite "greats" - plus, of course, any good ideas suggested by my colleagues, as well as my own good ideas. This is my process for finding out who I am. Build Freedom is a sudden jump out of all the old unworkable economic, social, and political programs. For me personally, it is a sudden jump out of my former relative obscurity and mediocrity into being the "Founder of the world's first truly free country." I invite you to embark upon your process for finding out who you are...
Your Programs
To find out more about your limiting programs and how to replace them with empowering programs I recommend two books by Shad Helmstetter, Ph.D.: What to Say When You Talk to Your Self (Simon & Schuster, NY; 1987) and The Self-Talk Solution (Simon & Schuster, NY; 1988).
Personally, I have found Dr. Helmstetter's taped programs extremely useful. For information contact Build Freedom.
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