From: "rastech", [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Very well put Steve (Cox). The following is a bit long as a response, and I
apologise in advance, but I hope it will help the debate.
In fact, as I understand it, what Steve put is just about the basis of
Common Law, and the true legal situation. Unfortunately it has become
surrounded with the fog of confusion over time.
There was a very clear explanation I once had, of how reference to the law
must be made, or action taken, when "away from home". Within the home,
different rules applied, pretty well exactly as you stated them. Sadly I
have lost track of the explanation now.
In essence, it was about a situation where you are held up by a highwayman,
who draws their sword, and demands your money with menaces, even if you only
had a few pennies in your pocket at the time. In those circumstances, your
life and limbs are immediately threatened, and you are at liberty to draw
your own sword and engage your attacker. In contrast, a situation where you
give someone a bag of money to hold, while you alight from your carriage,
and they refuse to return it to you when you have reached the ground, in
those circumstances, you are not at liberty to draw your sword and demand
its return, because you have the full force of the law available for the
return of your property, and the righting of the wrong, your life and limbs
not being in immediate danger.
In the first instance time is of the essence, and recourse to the law is not
available to support your defence of life and limb, in the second, time is
not of the essence, and recourse to the law IS available. The law refers to
life AND limb being threatened, and an individuals inalienable right to
defend them, because your limbs (including your teeth), are your final and
ultimate means of defence, and therefore potentially crucial, when all else
has been lost.
Somehow, this comprehensive and coherent legal basis is being confused with
"taking the law into your own hands". The fact of the matter is, that the
law is PUTTING the lawful authority into the individuals own hands, with
clear boundaries and definitions, for assistance in personal protection and
preservation, and the preservation of an ordered and just Society. The very
FIRST priority, of any Society, is the matter of self defence. Because it is
the very foundation stone of Society, the reason it is formed - due to the
tumultuous circumstances of an unpredictable world, with its many known and
unforseeable dangers, individuals band together into Societies, to improve
their effectiveness in
self preservation. Society is entirely a mutual contract of common
assistance to each other member, and its laws must take account of the
common sense reasons it was formed, as well as the individuals Natural
Rights and Liberties, if there were to be no such thing as Society. That
factor comes into play, when you have individuals that live outside the
rules of Society, and prey upon citizens that DO live by the rules of
Society. How can Society legislate to protect people that by their own
actions live
outside the rules and laws of that Society? Isn't that what law is, to
defend us from
people that reject Society? Aren't they, by every definition, the enemies of
Society? How can Society impose laws that restrict available responses, upon
its law abiding citizens, when those citizens are confronted by individuals
that do not recognise the legitimacy of the very Society that is their
host, and certainly its laws? In short, it can not. It is as Steve says, it
is not a game. An individual is either a
consenting part of Society, or they are not. A member of Society,
fundamentally, cannot be bound by the rules of Society, when confronted
with, and at the mercy of, individuals that recognise no such restrictions
upon their actions. It is a self protecting obligation of Society, to see to
it that members of that Society are not disadvantaged in those
circumstances, when confronted with Societies enemies, and therefore,
Natural Law, has to take precedence. That is why no law in Society, can ever
run counter to Natural Law. If a law does, then it is not legitimate, and no
Court can uphold it legitimately. To do so, simply sows the seeds of that
Societies destruction,
and it is like inviting disease into the healthy body.
It is clearly stated, accepted, and common sense, that the First Law of
Nature, is the Right of Self Defence, and no Society can legitimately deny
that right to its members, any attempt to do so being unlawful and void. It
is also an attempted denial of that Right, if the means for the individual
to effectively defend themselves are also denied. To deny the means is to
positively deny the right.
Once that vital and pivotal foundation of Society is undermined, or even
lost, the contract of mutual defence of the individual and the defence of
the whole, then that Society will inevitably crumble away and disappear,
because the original contract has been removed. It is only ever a question
of time, before that Society descends into rapidly increasing lawlessness
and anarchy, and the eventual achievement of un-Governability. Once enough
people no longer understand and acknowledge the rule of law and their
freedom under that law, and place themselves outside of a Society, either to
prey upon it, or forced to do so for the practicalities of their own
self-preservation (due to a failure of that Societies leaders to recognise
their duties and responsibilities to its members), then all is lost, and we
embrace a new Dark Ages for mankind.
It should be clear enough, why an unarmed populace ends Societies sooner
rather than later, by inviting aggressors, both internal and external, to
wreak havoc and spread terror and destruction. That is why the Right to keep
and bear arms for the individual citizen, is a Right and not a privelege, no
matter what our present politicians might say to the contrary. It is a vital
part of the original contract between individuals and their mutual defence
of their Society, and a deterrence to the ambitions of enemies, of whatever
scale. When a member of Society is confronted by a hostile outsider (even if
that outsider lives amongst its host victims), it is a full state of war
that exists between Society and its enemy. The American Founding Fathers, as
well as British Common Law, clearly recognised this fact (and Blackstone
states for good reason, that it is the Fifth auxiliary Right of the
citizen). In the case of America and its Second Amendment, that was just a
reaffirmation of an accepted and logical truth.
I hope that the above has illustrated that it is OUR law after all, and our
fundamental Right, with our Politicians, and our Public Servants, including
the Police, employed by us to assist in enhancing its smooth functioning and
the continuance of Society in peace - for OUR common benefit. No Public
Servants, no Politicians, no Police, are employed or contracted by us, to
take OUR law, out of OUR hands, to deny us our original contract with our
own Society, and
even foster the basis of its very destruction. We are not members of Society
to be thrust into anarchy and lawlessness against our will. The shoe is
actually, completely on the other foot - our Public Servants, our Police,
and our Politicians, must NOT take the law into their own hands, and they
are not empowered to do so. It is OUR property, it is OUR birthright.
Bob
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