I stole this from an anonymous posting on the Cedar Rapids Craigslist. I hope you enjoy it.
Principles of A Well Regulated Militia
Whereas the Constitution declares; “A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state”; and whereas “all men capable of bearing arms for the common defense” constitute the “militia of the several states”; we the people are the only constitutionally authorized defenders of the Republic and guardians of the rights of the people. Therefore to preserve freedom and liberty, we re-affirm the self-evident truths set forth in the founding document of our Republic, the Declaration of Independence:
1. All men are created equal and endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights, among them Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness(Private Property). You are born with natural rights that come from God, not from the government. The very word “unalienable” means that no man or government may infringe, usurp or nullify your rights.
2. To secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men. Government is merely the creation of the people. The only legitimate purpose of government is to protect your rights.
3. Governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed. Governments have no inherent or intrinsic powers — only those delegated to it by the people. When governments claim powers never granted, such government is illegitimate.
4. 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. When the government violates the rights of it’s citizens, it violates its only legitimate purpose and voids the compact by which the people created that government. The people retain the right to decide when that has happened, and retain the right to throw off such oppressive government, just as our forefathers did in the American Revolution.
5. Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes. Therefore, as long as possible, the American people will continue to use every peaceful means at our disposal to protect our unalienable rights and obtain a redress of grievances despite a relentless, sustained assault on those rights by the government.
6. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism . . .. Among the abuses and usurpations were:
[the national government] “declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever,” erecting “a multitude of New Offices,” and sending “swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance”; Denial of jury trial, with trial instead by admiralty courts (military tribunals); warrantless searches (the writs of assistance); confiscation of property; Imposition of martial law — the suspension of legislatures and the appointment of a general to rule the people, rendering “the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.”
The parallels to our time are obvious and ominous.
7. . . . it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government. We the people will determine when that point has been reached. We do not expect, nor require the national government’s approval of that decision by the people. Every tyrannical government throughout history, has twisted and perverted the law and the courts into a weapon against the people. In our own history, every oppressive act of Parliament and the King in the years leading up to the Revolution were upheld by the English courts. But that was not the end of the argument. Nor will it be today.
