Quote from: My Name Was Taken on October 20, 2014, 08:12:54 PM

Quote from: duke1839 on October 20, 2014, 07:50:32 PM

Quote from: My Name Was Taken on October 20, 2014, 07:35:35 PM

Quote from: BADecker on October 20, 2014, 06:35:41 PM

There is NO place where the people gave up their authority to the government that they created, even though they act as though they did, by obeying the laws made by the government. The people individually or collectively can disregard their government, if they do it the right way, and if they understand their position.

I'm gonna have to disagree with this sentiment. The US is founded on the idea that people vest authority in the US government voluntarily. See the Declaration of Independence:

Quote from: Declaration of Independence

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

Because the government is of the people, the phrase "consent of the governed" means the government acts with the Will of the People. The government is granted its authority through popular consent, with the caveat being that if the government becomes destructive to the Will of the People, the People retain the right to abolish it. This is an en masse action though. One person does not have the right to disclaim the authority of the government because they disagree with a decision it has made, backed by the implicit Will of the People. People who try this end up in prison. I suppose the classic example is taxes. If the majority pass a tax hike on the richest Americans, you can't decide not to pay the taxes because they're unfair.

Nope. The Declaration of Independence is about declaring independence which is a great thing. It doesn't grant anyone authority over anyone else. Consent of the governed is impossible. It is like saying agreed to be raped. If you agreed to it, it wasn't rape. And if you are consenting to it, it is voluntary. Voluntary means not governed. This is why some anarchists call themselves voluntaryists.

Your analogy doesn't hold at all. In no way is consent of the governed impossible or analogous to agreeing to be raped, either semantically or logically. Maybe you skipped history lessons, but the whole point of the DoI was to outline the acceptable methods of government to the colonists and to justify the reasons they were declaring independence. The DoI doesn't grant any authority, you misunderstood what I said. The DoI explains the rationale by which the government later granted itself authority by claiming it was acting with the consent of the governed. By living here, you are consenting to the jurisdiction and authority of the government, because you're free to leave. However, you're not free to ignore the edicts of the government, that is "the Will of the People." (Said semi-sarcastically)

Don't misread me. I'm sympathetic to voluntaryists. I'm merely explaining the rationale behind the system of government, not defending it. I think democracy is a rather dreadful thing, as the majority forces its will on the minority with impunity. However, I've never become convinced a completely voluntary society would work, for many reasons which are not the point of this thread.

The short of it is that the DoI does not do the vesting of authority. It explains how and why the vesting of authority is legitimate. The actual vesting of the authority comes from the Constitution.

The vesting of authority was in the government to do exactly the things that were expressed in the vesting. Inside those things there is way out for people not of the government, to get out of the authority of the government any time they want. It is not implied. It is stated. You can find it if you almost literally look up the meanings of every word in the constitution, within the context of their meaning at the time they were written. If you don't want to do that, take the shorter route of perusing the website I provided where it will be shown to you - http://1215.org/.

There is no authority from the past that is binding on anyone of the present in any way. Dead people don't jump up and do anything. The authority of the present is according to what people of the present accept as authority. And they accept it voluntarily, or by force when someone stronger than they forces it on them. Otherwise, they don't accept it. Constitutional history that applies to us only applies in the context of how the people of the present use it. Government people take an oath that essentially states, among other things, that they will use the application of the past. That application doesn't apply to any of us who haven't taken the oath. That's why government is so adamant that the schools make everyone from childhood pledge their allegiance.