You keep saying that, as if the British were still in power, and as if we didn't live in a nation that specifically and explicitly proclaims a right to leave a larger Union.
Why do you keep saying that? It's like you just assume the Founders were all Liars, and didn't really mean what they said when they espoused a right given by Nature and Nature's God to leave another nation.
Why should there need to be a fight if people follow the tenets of the founding document? If Lincoln hadn't rebelled against the Declaration of Independence, there never would have been a war.
And, no matter what path you choose, you should not pretend to speak for God on the matter.
I am not speaking for God, I am pointing out that the Founders regarded it as a Divine right of mankind to leave a nation which they no longer believed suited their interests.
If you have a bone to pick about the invocation of God regarding the Declaration of Independence, you need to pick it with the Founders, and not with me. *I* didn't put it in there. They did. *I* merely point out that it IS in there.
you can make a good case
Do you have to "make a good case" to decide how you will worship? Do you have to "make a good case" to keep police from searching your home without a warrant? Do you have to "make a good case" to publish a newspaper?
Because, silly me, I thought those were rights, and that you could exercise them for whatever reasons you choose, and that you didn't have to "make a good case" in order to exercise a right.
The Right to Independence is no different. It is either a right, and therefore not requiring permission, or it is not. The founders said it was, and I believe them, and so did most people until a clever Lawyer came along and turned the whole thing on it's ear.
Now people no longer know or understand the distinction. You color as a "privilege" what is actually a right.
The problem with your interpretation of the Declaration is that you render it meaningless. Your proposal regarding the right to independence is simply not workable. That is why you get flustered if anybody asks you any practical questions like how should the existing government should determine which declarations of independence that it must honor and which declarations of independence it may properly ignore. Similarly, you are unable to cope with simple practical questions like what percentage of persons in a certain geographical area need to support a declaration to make it worthy of being automatically accepted or what geographical areas are to be considered valid for questions of independence (cities, counties states?). Without some guidelines, the government will of course be flooded with declarations. But, you can't come up with any principled guidelines and you certainly aren't going to find those answers in the Declaration of Independence. This whole model is actually coming from you.
The colonists claimed that under the circumstances they found themselves, they believed themselves to have a right to declare the colonies independent. They didn't take the next step that you take - that the existing government had no right to contest the Declaration. That's the part that you have come up with, but again, you have no specific proposals as to how that kind of system would work. And, that's because your proposal isn't workable. Don't try to hang that error of yours around the necks of our Founding Fathers. They expected a fight from Britain and they got one.
As a matter of fact, if your theory were right, you not only have an unfettered right to declare independence, you have a duty to declare independence - "But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security."
Now, do really think that the Founders meant that you have a duty to declare independence? Can you be sued for not declaring independence? Or, do you think maybe they were using the word "duty" in order to emphasize how frustrated they had become?
The Declaration was an explanation, an argument designed to justify what they were doing. It wasn't an attempt to "change the rules" of life or of revolution. They would never have imagined that anyone was going to try to use their argument to pretend that governments could no longer put down rebellions or challenge declarations of independence. You are the one who is trying to change the rules and the new system you propose is just obviously unworkable.
I have suggested that you forget about the secessionists of the 1860's. For the life of me, I can't figure out what attracts you to their attempt to challenge the obvious currents of history in which they were swimming. They were another group of history's losers.
If you want to propose some sort of secession in the future, then go for it. Learn to articulate your complaints (your "long train of abuses") and build a movement. Present the facts to the country and make your case. If you have a good case and enough support, you'll probably succeed. But forget this idea that the Founders have granted you a "right to succeed" as a new entitlement.