Post date: Feb 12, 2017 4:38:29 PM
There is much information to be found on this subject, but none I have found make the following assertion. I shall outline only briefly the subject so as not to divert from the importance and significance of the point I wish to make. It is fundamental to much of our daily lives, both those awake and those that still sleep.
There are those of us that will say upon reading my assertion that either way this is still part of the illusion, but I find it irrefutable that for those that sleep to wake up to this fact would embark on a journey that would lead them equally to this conclusion. If a journey is the first step, then this would be an important step to take.
The subject
Is the power of the UK Parliament unlimited ?
It is said that ‘Parliament can do anything except bind its successors’, yet the very nature of the United Kingdom itself was created by the Union with England / Scotland Acts 1707.
The notion that Parliament can do anything except bind it successors is simultaneously an assertion and a denial of its omnipotence. The omnipotence paradox which states that –
“If a being can perform any action, then it should be able to create a task which this being is unable to perform; hence, this being cannot perform all actions. Yet, on the other hand, if this being cannot create a task that it is unable to perform, then there exists something it cannot do.”
By this reason alone Parliament was created with limited power. If this is so, where would this be evidenced ?
A Constitution !
constitution n.
The fundamental, underlying document which establishes the government of a nation or state.
A legislative charter by which a government or group derives its authority to act.
Aristotle described a constitution as creating the frame upon which the government and laws of a society are built:
“A constitution may be defined as an organization of offices in a state, by which the method of their distribution is fixed, the sovereign authority is determined, and the nature of the end to be pursued by the association and all its members is prescribed. Laws, as distinct from the frame of the constitution, are the rules by which the magistrates should exercise their powers, and should watch and check transgressors.”
Government is bound by the documents which create it, so logically we would look to the founding document(s) of the Parliament of Great Britain, the Acts of Union 1707.
Article 1 –
"I. That the Two Kingdoms of Scotland and England shall upon the first day of May next ensuing the date hereof and forever after be United into One Kingdom by the Name of Great Britain [etc]"
Article 3 –
"III. That the United Kingdom of Great Britain be Represented by one and the same Parliament to be stiled the Parliament of Great Britain"
A document that is ‘the fundamental, underlying document which establishes the government of a nation or state’ is by definition the Constitution of the nation or state. The document by which the government derives its authority to act.
Other documents which that government may stile can be constitutional but none are the Constitution.
Can a Constitution be amended or repealed ?
Yes, providing the constitution makes provision for it, take for example –
The Constitution of the United States – Article V
“The Congress, whenever two thirds of both houses shall deem it necessary, shall propose amendments to this Constitution, or, on the application of the legislatures of two thirds of the several states, shall call a convention for proposing amendments, which, in either case, shall be valid to all intents and purposes, as part of this Constitution, when ratified by the legislatures of three fourths of the several states, or by conventions in three fourths thereof, as the one or the other mode of ratification may be proposed by the Congress; provided that no amendment which may be made prior to the year one thousand eight hundred and eight shall in any manner affect the first and fourth clauses in the ninth section of the first article; and that no state, without its consent, shall be deprived of its equal suffrage in the Senate.”
There are no provisions made in the Acts of Union to reform, amend or repeal the Acts (Constituttion). It is self evident that a government can not alter laws that predate its existence, especially ones from which it draws its authority. To do so undermines its authority to act.
Supporters of Parliamentary sovereignty argue that Articles of the Acts have been repealed and therefore demonstrates that Parliament has the authority to repeal the Acts. This argument is premised on a falsehood, it is only true on the premise that they have the authority to repeal, but there is no authority within the ‘document which establishes the government’. Without such authority the people of the two kingdoms would be denied the rights protected by the Acts of Union on the whim of the newly formed government.
Is it likely that the two parliaments failed to include this provision or is it more likely that they considered it to be the best protection of the rights enshrined to omit such a provision. To consider it to be a failure of foresight does a disservice to those parliamentarians, one can not make that assumption.
Either way, the provision does not exist and as a consequence there is no legal framework for the Parliament of Great Britain to reform, amend or repeal the Acts of Union.
So, to the assertion –
The Acts of Union ARE the ‘underlying documents’ which established the Parliament of Great Britain. The Acts were the dying words of the respective parliaments of the Kingdoms of England and Scotland and set down the absolute rights of the people of the two kingdoms to be retained upon union.
Unlike the US Constitution there is no provision to reform, amend or repeal the Articles of the Acts and so they remain for all time or until Great Britain becomes disunited by whatever means.
The Articles are irrevocable.
Article 25 –
“XXV. That all Laws and Statutes in either Kingdom so far as they are contrary to or inconsistent with the Terms of these Articles or any of them shall from and after the Union cease and become void and shall be so declared to be by the respective Parliaments of the said Kingdoms.”
All Laws and Statutes shall cease and become void to the extent they are contrary to or inconsistent with the Terms of the Articles.
Once again
The Articles are irrevocable, beyond reform, amendment and repeal.
To have done any or all of these things is a breach of trust.
The voice in the wilderness
mark@sovereign-state-fidach.com