Common Law is a real thing. It is a
real system of laws derived from centuries of work, study and
sacrifice of millions of people. It is not trivial and
inconsequential as some would have you think. It is the Common
Law that is most represented within Our Constitution,
Declaration of Independence and Our
Bill of Rights. These documents were designed to limit and
eliminate the vicious Equity, Maritime or Admiralty Law which was
what we revolted against as Our Revolution against the
totalitarianism of England.
Did you know the Anglo-American system (Our system) of
jurisprudence is the only one which developed out of what is called
the Common Law, that is, the general law
of private property known in the British Isles? It is true -
Common Law was designed through the
centuries to secure the rights of individuals (you and me) to
property and to make it difficult for property to be taken away from
us by a government or governmental structure (bureaucracy) without
due process of law. The Common Law was
expounded over the years in hundreds of thousands of case decisions
as a result of trials in which the Common
Law jury acted as the Judges,
and in which they exercised the authority to hear and decide
questions of both Law and fact. Common
Law deals with legal relationships, powers and liabilities, and
types of actions rather than theoretical definitions of abstract
legal concepts. The Common Law was
recognized by Our Founding Fathers and is the basis of all law in
America today.
The Common Law recognizes the Power
of Government lies in the common people and not in an elite group of
power brokers. It is the terrible Equity, Maritime or Admiralty Laws
(laws of contract) that steals this power from the people and
centralizes it into the hands of a few power oriented men. The
Common Law deals in real property
whereas the Equity Laws deal in written abstractions of performance
(agreements or contracts). In other words, Masters own their own
property, work and destiny. We are all Masters when we truly own our
own property. Slaves do not own property, they usually rent property
of another and are compelled to perform upon or with that rented
(tenured) property according to some agreement or
contract.
It is from such controversies involving property that all of our
Rights
have come. Property is known as Substance at the Common
Law, and includes hard Money in the form of gold and silver coin as required by Our federal
Constitution and every other State Constitution as
they were all drafted to be in perfect harmony one with another.
Controversies involving these matters carry with them a Law
jurisdiction, a jurisdiction in which all of our Rights
are found. The Judge in a Court of Common
Law is an impartial referee of the dispute, and he is bound to
protect the Rights
of the parties to the dispute, or he will have lost whatever
jurisdiction he may have had, or claimed to have had. It is the Jury
who decides whether or not the Facts of the case are valid and they
also decide the Law - does it apply? Is it correct for this case?,
etc. Only judges acting under equity law can decide law...
You know you are in an Equity/Admiralty Court when an
American flag
is displayed that has a GOLD trim. The gold trim denotes
military
jurisdiction and not Common
Law or Constitutional jurisdiction. Wherever this
flag
is flown the Constitution is NOT. To
see the admiralty flag click here.
Gold and silver Coin are the only Things recognized at Law (within
our Constitution) to be
real and lawful money.Money is
Substance in possession and not a Chose (thing) in action. When a
debt is paid, at Law, the debt is extinguished; debt no longer
exists; the debt is paid. Debt can only be paid with gold and silver
Coin, or certificates redeemable on demand, at par, in gold and
silver Coins. This is the legal meaning of the expression "tender
in payment of debt", as found in Article I, Section 10 of the
Constitution of the United States. Federal Reserve Notes are not
money - they are bills/notes and/or
certificates of indebtedness as each and every one of them are
owed back to the Federal Reserve Bank who lent them to Us - plus
interest.
Thomas Jefferson placed great emphasis on the concept of Rights.
He said we did not bring the English Common
Law, as such, to this continent; we brought the Rights
of Man as evidenced through and by the tried and true ancient
system of Common Law.
The Common Law of the States of the United States is the
Common Law of England adopted by the original Constitution of the
United States, so far as not modified by any alterations made by the
Constitution of the State at the time of admission to the Union, and
so far as not in direct conflict with the Constitution of the United
States of America.
And the Common Law of the States may
not be modified, limited nor abrogated either by an act of the
legislature (Congress or State Legislature) or by a ruling of some
judge or by any county board of commissioners or any other servant to
the people. Federal and state bureaucracies are constantly writing
and presenting code, rules or statutes in an attempt to circumvent
the original Common Law foundation of
Our Constitution. A major part of the problem that we are in is a
result of these unlawful attempts by legislatures, judges and
bureaucracies to modify or abrogate Common
Law and thus Our Constitution.
While, in England, this Law was derived from feudal tenures in
real property as held by a pyramid of proprietors (land owners)
holding their rights given them from the King (or Crown) on
down the line. The American Revolution destroyed any and all
allegiance to the British Crown, including the rights of property in
land, and all feudal tenures and dues were overthrown. All Rights
of property in land in the United States became ALLODIAL TITLES in
Allodial Freehold, existing under no lord or overlord whatsoever,
including the authority of the Colony or State. The ties that
bound property use or ownership to a higher or superior power were
entirely and completed severed, destroyed and made as though they
never existed.
This is the reason why our founding fathers considered that they
had made every man a "King" on his own property. They got rid of the
controls from the King and 'castle keep' owners (feudalism) within
property ownership.
In England, William Pitt summarized the concept of private
property under Common Law, as
follows:
'The poorest man may, in his cottage, bid defiance to all
the forces of the Crown. It may be frail; its roof may shake; the
wind may blow through it; the storms may enter; the rain may enter;
but the King of England cannot enter; all his forces dare not cross
the threshold of the ruined tenement. "
As a result of all of this, the Common
Law of the States is founded and grounded upon substantive titles
in real property. No mere legislative enactment by Congress or State
Legislature nor judicial ruling by Federal or State Courts can
operate to deprive the People of their Rights
at Law. This includes their Rights
inherent in their Allodial Land Titles and to be Merchants and/or
Traders at Law on the cash basis, and their Rights
to access to Courts of Law and to a jurisdiction where their
Rights
are protected.
In the same vein no county or city ordinance, code, rule, policy,
regulation or 'law' can override these same absolute guarantees. The
same applies to corporate or private policies of business conduct
which are often used to override Common
Law or Constitutional guarantees. In other words, business or
corporate policy cannot supersede Constitution
Rights even though nearly every corporation in America ignores Our
Constitution in pursuit of
ever more bogus Federal Reserve Notes.
As contrasted with the Common Law of
England, the system of law as practiced on the Continent of Europe
(European Common Market) is called Civil Law, or Roman Civil Law,
which is derived from the Law of the Ecclesiastical Chancellors. This
is partly the ancient Law of Rhodes, the law of merchant traders upon
commercial documents. The Civil Law is prosecuted by the Chancellor
(the King's agent); he is not an impartial referee of the
dispute.
This Civil Law of Roman origin has never been part of the Laws of
England and has been declared not of the Laws of the Realm by the
Parliament and by many experts of England in jurisprudence, such as
Coke, Blackstone and Sir John Fortescue.
"The Common Law is absolutely distinguished from the Roman
or Civil Law systems. "
People v Ballard
155 NYS 2d 59
The Roman Civil Law has always been outside of Common
Law, operating on SUMMARY PROCESS, in gross violation of our
RIGHTS TO DUE PROCESS.
As English society developed over the years, situations were met
in the Common Law for which the Courts
could provide no relief by any precedent. The controversies did not
involve property, or substance. The parties thus had no other
recourse than to go to the King. And when they did, he delegated his
first minister to solve these problems. The minister was called a
Chancellor (the same title as used on the Continent) and the relief
granted was called Equity. This "Equity" meant what would be fair if
the Common Law principle were extended
and applied to the case at hand, as the Chancellor, in his sole
discretionary judgment, chose to do. This is the so- called "law"
we see being applied by "Judge" Wapner in the well known fake TV
court program. He alone decides the law and facts of each case.
There thus developed in England and America two distinct systems
of law and courts, each having a peculiar and particular application
and jurisdiction. Equity is a jurisdiction in which the individual
does not have any Rights,
and one to which the individual can be subjected only if he
volunteers or gives his informed consent. In the Common Law we
have recognized inherent rights whereas in the Equity Law we have no
rights whatsoever except those which may be bestowed upon us by the
graces of the chancellor -(judge) wholly at his sole
discretion.
In Equity there are no jury trials. The powers of the Common
Law jury to hear and decide questions of both Law and Fact
are exercised exclusively by the Chancellor. However, there may be
"advisory juries" to advise the Chancellor of certain facts, but they
are not permitted to hear any arguments regarding the Law. (Does this
sound familiar today?) The controversies are decided by the
Chancellor, who, besides being the Chief Prosecutor, (or Inquisitor,
if you will), can go to any source he chooses, even to his own
"conscience", to prove or justify his decision. In Equity, the
parties do not have any Rights;
the Constitution is stated by the Chancellor to be "frivolous"; and
any so-called "rights" in his Court are actually "privileges" granted
by the Chancellor, which he can also take away. Today this all
powerful person is not called a Chancellor. She/He is called a Judge
and she/he operates in all levels of "courts" throughout Our
Land.
During the past century, the Congress of the United States and the
Legislatures of the several States, as well as the Judges have
presumed to exercise the authority to "merge" the procedures of Law
and Equity. This is authority they do not have, yet this, too, is
part of the problem we face today all over Our Land.
When we realize that a Court of Common
Law proceeds "according to the course of the Common
Law ", and that the parties have a Right to trial by a
Common Law jury, where the jury
exercises the authority to hear and decide questions of both
Law and Fact, we can then know that if we are in a Court where
the procedures have been "merged" with Equity, then we can
know that we are not in a Court of Common
Law ! Such a court does not recognize and refuses, to We The
People, our Constitutional
Rights to self and property.
For instance, the Constitution of the State of Iowa, Article V,
Section 6, states, in part, as follows:
"The District Court shall be a court of law and equity,
which shall be distinct and separate jurisdictions, . . .
."
Obviously, the two court systems have not been lawfully merged,
and We The People do not have to accept the idea that they have been
merged simply because a 'judge" or bureaucrat
says a code, rule, statute or regulation makes it so. Remember
that these lesser rules and regulations MUST be in harmony with the
State and federal Constitutions in order to be valid and lawful.
Otherwise they are null and void.
We must realize that the principles of Common
Law and of Equity are those as distinguished and defined in
England, before the adoption of the Constitution
of the United States of America. Any modifications in definition or
practice of either Law or Equity in England since the adoption of the
Constitution of the United
States of America have no significance, bearing or authority in the
United States, since we are no longer under the jurisdiction of
either Parliament or the Judges of England. Yet there are those in
this country who claim that Equity jurisdiction (otherwise known as
Chancery jurisdiction) in this country is the same in nature and
extent as Equity jurisdiction in England!
Where the Constitution
of the United States of America, or the Constitution of the State of
Iowa, or of any State, mentions "law", it means "Common
Law"; it does not mean any other "kind" of law! ! In addition to
the above mentioned jurisdictions of Law (meaning Common
Law ) and Equity, which are the only Judicial
jurisdictions authorized either by the Constitution of the United
States of America, or by the Constitution of the State of Iowa, or of
any State, as drafted in conformance thereto, and being second
thereto, there is also a private, political
jurisdiction which is operative only on those who volunteer
into it's private domain, outside of the Constitution. It is known as
Law Merchant (lex mercatoria) the private rule of the bankers
and merchants.
It is this system of 'legal' snares that has all of We
The People by the throat...."
Law Merchant is neither Law nor Equity, but is only raw,
private, political power, alien and illegal to our
Constitution whatsoever,
and operates outside of the Constitution.
The Law Merchant is an independent, parallel system of law, like
Equity or Admiralty. The Law Merchant is not even a modification of
the Common Law; it occupies a field over which the Common Law does
not and never did extend. Common Law deals with the Money
of Substance belonging to the People (Gold and Silver Coins);
while the Law Merchant deals with the law of Bills, Notes and Checks,
(in other words, with negotiable instruments and commercial paper).
The Law Merchant is closely allied to the Equity system of agreements
and contracts which it uses extensively because the Constitutions of
Our States recognizes Equity law. Equity Law is the 'back door' used
by Law Merchants (bankers, etc.) to gain access to what used to be
Allodial Title or absolute ownership previously enjoyed by all
Americans.
Our Declaration
of Independence charges that America had been progressively
subjected to "a jurisdiction foreign to our Constitution" (meaning
the unwritten English Constitution), This foreign jurisdiction was a
jurisdiction of lawless ad hoc equity derived out of
the Roman Civil Law under the stark
cover of such obscenities as the Writs of Assistance (which our
Courts of today also claim to have the authority to issue) which
allowed summary plundering of the colonists' wealth and
substance TO THE ADVANTAGE OF the East India Company which
controlled the Parliament. (As today, it allows the summary
plundering of the American citizens' wealth and substance TO THE
ADVANTAGE OF the banks and other financial (lending, insurance, etc.)
institutions which control the Congress and State legislatures). It
has been recognized and stated for over one hundred years that "we
have the best Congress that money can buy" ! !
These Writs, even as only one wrong perpetrated by the commercial
interests in the Parliament, were given authority by an Equitable
jurisdiction called a debt action in assumpsit. This action,
which gave satisfaction pursuant to the customs of the Law Merchant,
(having been voluntarily entered into), had been an old debt action
triable in a Court of Common Law (merely as a courtesy of the Common
Law Courts, and not inherently a part of Common Law) (and triable by
a Common Law Jury, as a protection to the Defendant), until lord
Mansfield, Chief Justice of the Kings Bench, in 1760, arbitrarily and
on his own authority, denied trial by jury in debt actions in
assumpsit AND REMOVED THAT ACTION FROM THE Courts of Common Law
into the Courts of Equity, where a trial by jury could not be had,
and where there was merely a summary proceeding with no semblance of
a "due process of Law". In other words, a merchant can, with a
flick of his Pen, deprive anyone of their property without due
process of Law (Common Law). Sound familiar?
This case is known as:
Moses y MacFerian
2 Burroughs 1005
and is the case that sparked the American Revolution and caused
Thomas Jefferson to say that English law since that date (1760)
should not ever be used over here as Equity/Merchant laws had become
an instrument through which merchants could, from then on, assume
power over anyone else's property solely at their discretion and
whim.
It was this Equitable debt action in assumpsit which the
Seventh Amendment of the Constitution
of the United States was specifically meant to outlaw, by
specifically providing that
"In suits at Common Law, where the value in controversy shall
exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be
preserved..."
The significance of this is pointed up by the fact that any
controversy involving Money (Gold
and Silver Coins) in an amount greater than twenty dollars, or any
property such as real estate can only be tried in a Court of
Common Law with the right of trial by jury who decides Law as well as
the Facts of the case!
This means that any Mortgage Foreclosure action can be
tried only in a Court of Common Law, and that the State Legislature
has no Constitutional authority to provide, by statute (statutes
are not real Law but are in reality 'color' of Law only and therefore
are only binding on a voluntary or mutually agreed upon basis),
that mortgage foreclosure actions shall be Equity actions! This means
that Sheriff's Sales as a result of these Equitable Mortgage
Foreclosure actions are null and void! ! And that the Sheriffs
have participated in criminal confiscation of real property in
violation of the Constitution and of their oaths of office! !
So, it can be seen that summary and arbitrary confiscation of
income and property is nothing new in American tradition and
history out of an illicit (meaning unlawful and unconstitutional)
Equitable jurisdiction. It is precisely this Equitable
jurisdiction wherein the Chancellor enforces the combination of
unconstitutional Executive and Legislative Equity which is the
jurisdiction foreign to our Constitution
referred to in the Declaration of Independence. This is precisely
what our American Revolution was all about and what our Bill of
Rights was designed to prevent.
It is also a measure of the extent that the Bankers (both foreign
and domestic) and other merchants, and their stooges, the lawyers and
Judges, as well as the politicians of both major political parties,
have betrayed the Public Trust and have attempted to place us in a
Dictatorship of Unelected Rulers (being the "judges" and bureaucrats)
! !
Thus it can be seen that there is a direct similarity of our
political/legal situation today with what it was in the years
immediately preceding the Revolution of 1776. Only today we have a
written Constitution that
spells out our Rights
and our freedoms, giving us precedents, whereas two hundred years ago
they did not.
The Common Law Jury members (acting as judges of the Law) were
sworn to "Do equal law, and execution of Right, to all the King's
subjects, rich and poor, without having regard to any person" and
that they will deny no man Common Right; but they were NOT sworn to
obey or execute any statute of the King, or of the King and
Parliament. Indeed, they are virtually sworn NOT to obey or execute
any statutes that are against "Common Right", or contrary to
the Common Law, or "Law of the Land"; but to certify the King thereof
"... that is, to notify the King that his statutes are against the
Common Law;.... and then proceed to execute the Common Law,
notwithstanding such legislation to the contrary. The words of the
oath on this point are these:
"That we deny no man Common Rights by (virtue of) the King's
letters, nor none other mans', nor for none other cause; and in case
any letters come to you contrary to the Law, (that is, the Common
Law) that ye do nothing by such letters, but certify the King
thereof, and proceed the execute the Law (that is, the Common Law),
notwithstanding the same letters"
In Federalist Papers #48, Alexander Hamilton wrote in part, "No
legislative act contrary to the Constitution can be valid." "The
Constitution is, in fact,
and must be regarded by judges as a fundamental law."
The Sheriff is also a servant of the People, elected and paid by
and for Them; upon taking office he takes an oath to uphold the
Constitution (the People's
Law) and keep the peace.
In American Jurisprudence, on Sheriffs, Police and
Constables, we find the following:
Origin of office: The office of sheriff is an
ancient one, dating back to at least the time of Alfred, King of
England, and the holder thereof has always been the chief executive
officer and conservator of the peace in his shire or county. He is a
county officer representing the executive or administrative power
of the state within his county. In this country, the office is
generally an elective one, and anciently in England, sheriffs were
elected by freeholders of the county, although gradually, it became
the custom for the Crown to appoint the Sheriff."
Abraham Lincoln stated the following on February 12, 1865:
"The people are the rightful masters of both Congress and
the Courts. Not to overthrow the Constitution, but to overthrow the
men who pervert the Constitution."
The general misconception is that any statute passed by
legislators bearing the appearance of law constitutes the law of the
land. The U. S. Constitution is the supreme Law of the Land, and any
statute to be valid, must be in agreement. It is impossible for both
the Constitution and a
statute violating it to be valid. In such a dispute, one must
prevail, and that is the Constitution
.
In Volume 16, American Jurisprudence, 177, we find the
following:
"The general rule is that an unconstitutional statute, though
having the form and name of law, is in reality no law, but is wholly
void, and ineffective for any purpose; since unconstitutionality
dates from the time of its enactment, and not merely from the date of
the decision so branding it. An unconstitutional law, in legal
contemplation, is as inoperative as if it had never been passed. Such
a statute leaves the question that it purports to settle just as it
would be had the statute not been enacted.
"Since an unconstitutional law is void, the general principles
follow that it imposes no duties, confers no rights, creates no
office, bestows no power or authority on anyone, affords no
protection, and justifies no acts performed under it. . . .
A void act cannot be legally consistent with a valid one. An
unconstitutional law cannot operate to supersede any existing valid
law. Indeed, insofar as a statute runs counter to the fundamental law
of the land, it is superseded thereby.
No one is bound to obey an unconstitutional law and no
courts are bound to enforce it. "
"We the People are the rightful master of both congress and the
courts - not to overthrow the Constitution,
but to overthrow the men who pervert the Constitution."
Abraham Lincoln
Portions of this publication are copyrighted by Delta
Spectrum Research. Permission is hereby granted to any individual
or entity to copy this booklet as long as it is presented in its
entirety and no pages, quotations, or text are omitted, and that this
copyright notice appears in its original form on all copies.