With the considerable growth of
international commerce and powerful corporations, combined with the
ever-present need of the few to rule the many, the commercial legal system
known as Roman Civil Law, has expanded internationally and led to the existence
of bijural (dual jurisdiction) systems of regulation in all the World's Common Law countries. The British
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| A David with the head of Goliath statue in the gardens of Schwerin Castle in northern Germany. |
These two competing systems of
regulation, the ancient and preeminent jurisdiction of Common Law and the
subordinate statutory jurisdiction of Roman Civil Law are in constant
ideological conflict with each other.
The primary and compelling reason for
the United States’ Declaration of Independence was to eliminate the Roman civil
legal system from the domestic law of the colonies due to its potential for
conflict with freedom.
Briefly, and stated in general terms,
the basic concepts of these two systems are diametrically opposed. In the Roman
statutory legal system, the source of all regulations is the State or the
personal ruler, it or he is sovereign. In the common law, the source of all law
is the People, and they as a whole are sovereign. The most prominent
distinction between common law and the statutory legal system is that common
laws are principle based and applied equally to all men, while the statutes of
the Roman legal system are more prescriptive, can only hold jurisdiction over
legally registered consenting persons and can be made to apply to specified
parts of society.
The Roman civil legal system is
recognised as lending itself towards an oligarchic state, whereas the true
democracy enhancing Saxon Common Law promotes moral self-determination of the
People by the People under a Constitution created by the People. The
Roman civil legal system is a top-down authority, whereas the Common Law system
is a people-up authority, with the People as the foundation of power.
During the centuries, these two
systems have had an almost deadly rivalry for the control of
society. The Roman civil legal system and its fundamental concepts
have been the instrument through which men of genius and self-serving ambition
have set up and maintained despotisms through trading and
money. Whereas the common law, with its basic moral principles being
the instrument through which men of equal genius but with love of mankind
burning in their souls, have established and preserved liberty and free institutions.
Society
has been hierarchical for millennia, revolving around the status of individuals
and organisations. The words state,
statute, statutory all have their root in the word status. By legal definition, a ‘society’ is “a number
of persons united together by mutual consent, in order to deliberate,
determine, and act jointly for some common purpose.”
All
Acts of Parliament are statutes known as legislation, they are technically not
laws. They are parliamentary legislated
policies, which determine what is ‘legal’ or ‘illegal’ - words which are
derived from the word ‘legislated’ and ‘legislation’. A ‘Statute’ is defined as a rule or policy of
a society, an edict of legislation used to govern that society. Statutes are subject to the consent of the
society – and this is individual consent and not collective consent.
Statutes
are often incorrectly referred to as laws by barristers and solicitors trained
by the State to serve the State’s legal system, but the correct interpretation
would be ‘black letter law’ (meaning Statutes) which are distinguishable from
‘law’.
The word ‘Statute’ is legally
defined as: “A legislative rule of society given
the force of law by the consent of the governed, a rule, as of a
corporation.” By its own definition it
is not a law, it is only given the force of law by the consent of those who
have entered into an agreement to be governed.
The Latin maxim - Consensus Facit Legem - means ‘Consent makes the law’,
and to be lawful the consent must be free and fair and should not be induced by
fraud, misrepresentation, coercion or mistake.
A law differs
from a statute in that law applies to all individuals in the land regardless of
consent, for example nobody is above the Common Law crime of murder. Equality before the law is the principle that
each independent being must be treated equally by the law - principle of
isonomy - and that all are subject to the same laws of justice. Whereas statutes require consent and apply to
defined sectors of society, as per the details of the relevant Act of
Parliament.
The
1689 Bill of Rights makes a distinction between laws and statutes – “All which
are utterly and directly contrary to the known laws and statutes and freedom of
this realm”.
Acts of
Parliament become Statutes – primary legislation which in turn are enacted and
enforced by statutory instruments – secondary legislation. For example, council tax is a statutory
instrument enacted under its primary legislation the Local Government Finance
Act 1992.
If Acts
of Parliament were laws they would be called ‘Laws of Parliament.’ Parliament
knows the distinction which it quite rightly maintains. Look at any Act of
Parliament and you will notice the absence of the word law – that will give you
the first clue that there is a difference.
Parliament maintains the distinction between statutes and laws because
those ‘in the know’ use this knowledge for their personal benefit. Parliament can only create, amend and repeal
Acts of Parliament, and according to its own parliamentary constitution, the
Acts created by previous Governments cannot bind successive Governments. Parliament cannot create, amend or repeal Common
Laws as it does not have authority over the higher jurisdiction of Common Law. Parliament is in fact bound by the preeminent
jurisdiction of Common law, which means that all its statutes must not breach Common
Law.
Laws
take time to evolve and remain for long periods of time. Statutes can come and go based upon the whims
and agendas of Government. The fabric of
a law may be copied into a statute but if later repealed as a statute, the Common
Law obviously remains in force. Only a
proper convention of the People or the jury of a properly convened Common Law
Court de Jure may change the law though a unanimous decision.
The 1297 statute
version of the Magna Carta is a perfect example. When referring to the Magna
Carta, the misinformed will sometimes state that it has been repealed, but they
are referring to the statute version without awareness that there is a Common
Law version. The statute version has
been mostly repealed by Government, but the 1215 Common Law Magna Carta is out
of the reach of Parliament and remains perfectly untouched.
The
land commonly known as Britain is a Common Law jurisdiction, and Parliament and
the National Government of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern
Ireland are legal incorporated entities.
Legal entities of any and all natures and descriptions necessarily
require voluntary agreements in order to make claim to or assert authority and
control over other parties and their property.
As mentioned earlier, the jurisdiction of the statutory legal system is
voluntary, where legitimate members must be fully informed and lawfully
consenting volunteers, being fully aware of the system into which they are, or
have been, contractually obligated.
Government
has the task and duty to pass lawful and just legislation in an equitable administration
of the uncontroversial ‘nuts and bolts’ of day-to-day life. This is, of course,
provided government operates legitimately; always within the legal and lawful
parameters set by its own self-regulating statutes but most importantly in
accordance with the common law Constitution, as defined by the 1215 Common Law
Magna Carta.
Whilst
the Common Laws are of the People for the protection and empowerment of the
People, the statutory legislation is created and modified by the State to
regulate the privileges, obligations and punishments of its consenting
membership. It is the generally accepted
viewpoint that Government is elected into ‘office’ not ‘power’, as they
frequently like to claim. As the
electorate, the intention is never to give ‘power’ to those that are elected,
but merely to lend it to them for representation, trusting that that
sovereignty should be returned to the electorate complete and intact at the end
of a term of government.
Government
legislation is created to both protect and limit its subjects’ civil
rights. Subjects can only do what the
State’s legislation, rules and regulations allow them to do. For the allowance of some statutory rights a
subject must seek permission, through an application for a permit or license to
do certain activities or practices which would otherwise be classed as illegal
without a permit or license. Subjects
must comply with the State’s regulations or face liabilities, such as warnings,
suspended sentences, fines or imprisonment.
As a
voluntary subject of the State’s statutory legal system, an individual is
presumed to have knowingly consented to step into the much more limited
jurisdiction of the increased regulations of the State’s authority and control,
in return for whatever benefits the State provides. As with joining any society or corporation,
an individual may have to accept increased regulations as part of that society
or corporation’s contractual obligations, but he shall remain protected by the
legal and lawful jurisdictions above, obviously including the preeminent Common
Laws of the land.
To be
recognised within the statutory jurisdiction of the State an individual must be
registered into the system as a ‘legal person’.
By doing so, that individual is entering, or being entered by his
parents, into a system of contract, where both parties, the State and the
‘person’, seek to benefit from their interactions as per the terms and
conditions of what should be a fully
disclosed and lawful agreement. This may
involve some of an individual’s sovereign liberties being conceded in order to
meet the terms required to participate in the State society.
As men
and women, in Common Law we are all equal and subject to all the laws of
British common law jurisdiction. The
State’s statutory jurisdiction should rightfully only have authority over its
registered citizenship. Not all members
of society are of the same status, therefore, the legislative Acts of
Parliament within that statutory jurisdiction do not apply equally to all
members. Members must have consented and
contracted with the statutory jurisdiction of Parliament in order to become
subject to its regulations, whereas we are all automatically subject to the jurisdiction
of the Common Law of the land.
To
satisfy true and lawful consent of contract into statutory jurisdiction, the
process of contract must have included full and proper disclosure, with clarity
of meaning, and without deception, fraud or operation based upon assumption or
presumption. Without full disclosure, a
‘meeting of the minds’ and lawful consent, the validity of all contracts in the
statutory jurisdiction can be challenged.
But it is my understanding that most people don’t even know that there
are two different jurisdictions of regulation in Britain, and most certainly
are not aware that lawful compliance with statutes should be properly informed
and agreed rather than being based upon the presumption and assumption of
consent, as is the reality today.
“The theory of government is that we have surrendered some of our rights to the Government, so that the Government will protect the rights that we have not surrendered. That’s the idea behind, the Government derives its powers from the consent of the governed. Does anyone… know anyone now living, who consented to the Government? The answer is no. The idea that Government derives its powers from the consent of the governed is a fiction. The fiction is that we have consented to the surrender of our rights. The reality is that our rights have been stolen from us because the Government monopolizes force. It’s a sad and terrible reality but it is a reality.” – U.S. Judge Andrew P. Napolitano
Parliament
played no part in the creation of the people’s great Common Law Magna Carta of
1215. The Great Charter was made by the People directly, to reiterate and
reassert their existing Common Law rights of self-rule and sovereignty,
explicitly to preclude tyranny, injustice and misgovernance by binding all Heads
of State and the modus operandi of government for all time under judicium
parium - equal justice - the Trial by Jury justice system of the Law of the
Land.
The British Parliament has always
been bound by the superior jurisdiction of the Common Law Constitution of the
1215 Magna Carta, with the additional but obviously forgotten promise of the
Monarch to protect the laws of the land, as detailed in the Coronation
Oath.
