In Foundation Stone we showed that all humans have the right of self determination. They get this right from Natural Law, which is essentially the logical reasoning they were created with.
All 13 of the free and independent States had created their own constitutions based on these same principals. They worked together to produce and ratify the US Constitution.
The word States is confusing because of a language misdirect. Prior to the US Civil War, a State was a nation. An independently governed country. In fact the word State still means that. For example the US State Department is the department that represents with the US Nation (State) with other nations, like Germany and Russia (both States).
The word province is typically used to designate an administrative division within a nation. For example Canada has a Federal Government and 10 provinces. The United States of America is similar in that it has a Federal Government and 64 provinces, 50 of these are called states, 14 are called territories. Why do we call them states? Its because they were States for the first 100 years of US history.
The United States of America was formed as a union of free and Independent States in the exact same way that the European Union was formed, and mostly for the exact same reasons.
To understand the Constitution, you must understand the concept of free and independent States. For example all humans enjoy the right of self defense, which includes the right to keep and bear arms, especially against a tyrannical government. However, the second amendment does not grant this right. This right comes from our humanity not government.
What the second amendment does affirm, is that the Union (US) cannot restrict the people from being able to defend their State from foreign States, other union States, the Federal government or any other threat. The States were afraid the feds might try to threaten their sovereignty, so they added this amendment. Read it again, and see if it doesn’t suddenly make more sense.
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.
The key is that the word State does not refer to the US, but rather the free and independent State that was being asked to sign the US Constitution.
Under the British system, the King had all power. He appointed governors, distributed land, and had sole authority over the military. So the authority came from the King down. If a governor appointed a police captain, and the captain hired police officers, these all got power through this hierarchy from the King. The King was the sovereign, the one who held all the power.
America is backwards from this. The sovereign is the citizen. The citizen delegated some of his power to the State, limiting that power via the State constitution. The State government delegated some of its power to the federal government, limiting that power with the US constitution.
So read this and if you understand the concept it will make more sense than it ever has.
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.
So under the US Constitution, you have all the power not given to the State you are a citizen of. The State you are a citizen of has all the power not given specifically to the Federal government.
Lets look at this concept with an extreme example. I don’t think anything like this will happen, but it illustrates the concept. I live in Idaho, and the Idaho constitution includes a section preventing it from quitting from the union.
SECTION 3. STATE INSEPARABLE PART OF UNION. The state of Idaho is an inseparable part of the American Union, and the Constitution of the United States is the supreme law of the land.
So what does this mean? It means that all the citizens of Idaho have NOT given permission to the State of Idaho to separate from the American Union. If the State legislature tried to separate, it would be clearly unconstitutional.
So what would happen if the United States utterly failed, and the Idaho legislature wanted to assert itself as a free and independent State(nation)? First they would have to get permission from the people via a process already accepted by the people to change the Idaho constitution. Once the Idaho constitution was legally changed to allowed the Idaho legislature to separate from the Union, the Idaho legislature can separate.
For a semi-humorous example of the whole process read I can’t drive 55!
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