How treaties trump the Constitution (a timely re-post & must read)

World Net Daily ^ | July 04 & 06 | Henry Lamb

[Carry_Okie]

He took it with him?

I talked with him about it, but he had cancer at the time and was rather distracted. He had one explicitly documented example, but since his death I doubt anyone knows where it is within his records.

Did the Feds kill him to keep their little secret?

Specializing in vicious slurs to back your obviously bogus assertion does you no favor.

Interesting little factoids which have zero to do with US Treasury debt.

The hell they don't.

My ignorant assertion? My assertion is that your assertion is wrong.

Allow me to refresh your memory of what you said: Your assertion was that treaties don't trump the Constitution. They routinely do, providing the unconstitutional authority for the laws that underlie those "interesting little factoids."

Nations are created (as was ours) and surrender by treaty. As far as the "international community" is concerned (you know, our lenders), the "law of nations" trumps any internal document. Hell the genesis of the Constitution itself was to placate those who were going to reschedule the debt left over from the Revolutionary War.

To explain the timing and magnitude of economic change, however, we have to return to the national constitutional situation as it stood in 1787. The convention that met in Philadelphia in that year was emphatically an exercise in nation-building, perhaps the canonical case. Officially the delegates had no authority to undertake such a sweeping project in institutional design, having been appointed by Congress only to recommend possible revisions to the Articles of Confederation. But the assembled group quickly agreed that more drastic alterations were required, in effect a new national beginning. Among the delegates, there was near consensus on the federal government s need for an independent revenue source and clearer authority in matters pertaining to foreign trade, the army and the territories. It is far from clear that this consensus was broadly shared among the politically active population in the member states -- as the bitter struggle over ratification confirmed. Thus these events count as a true turning point, without which subsequent history (economics included) would have been very different.

To understand the basis for the ratification debates, one must appreciate the context of the 1780s. Although economic historians have mainly studied it as an example of inflationary war finance, the Revolutionary War itself had significant effects on economic activity. Indeed, the war may be viewed as the first step in the long turn inward towards the opportunities of the domestic economy, as booming markets for farm produce generated new interest in inland transportation.12 The end of the war disrupted this new internal trade, but without restoring access to British imperial markets. The resulting distress caused considerable political turbulence, leading to demands for the remedy with which the colonial legislatures were long familiar, unbacked paper money as a form of debt relief.

Gosh, where have we heard that before? So you see, the principal reason the Federal Convention was convened in the first place was to get access to markets by assuring the lenders that they would get paid in real money.

In one important respect, however, the history of the US was not fundamentally different from that of European nations, in that financial policies were dictated by the fiscal needs of governments. On this count the Constitution of 1789 left much unsaid, giving the federal government access to tax revenue only implicitly through its control over customs. Of equal importance in defining the US nation-state was the Federalist program enacted during George Washington s first term of office (1789-92), under the leadership of Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton. Hamilton s reports on the public credit, on the Bank of the United States, and on manufactures, are classics of US political economy and national definition. With the exception of the report on manufactures, virtually the entire plan was backed by the President and promptly voted into law by Congress. The immediate results included a sweeping assumption of debt by the federal government (  funding at par the long-depreciated war debts of the states); launching of a banking system based on liabilities convertible into a specie base; and a dramatic improvement in the status of US federal government debt in the capital markets of Europe. Source

As I have said, capital markets dictated the formation of our government in the first place. They still determine the context of international law under which it finances operations. Without the supercedure of that law, there would never have been the loans upon which the building of this nation was financed. Treaties constitute the bulk of that law, which entirely explains why multilateral treaties held by the United Nations are so important to the likes of the Rockefellers.

If you think for one minute that lenders don't demand collateral from governments, you are smoking something. Such deals trading soverignty for solvency are not popular with the people. Politicians hide them. It's been that way since the beginning.

[Toddsterpatriot]

Allow me to refresh your memory of what you said:

They hold collateral on the note. As I understand it, this includes the entire mineral estate of the United States and (more recently) water resources. The way control of these is transferred from Americans to foreigners is via environmental regulations empowered by (IMO unconstitutional) treaties held at the UN.

Given that interest rates on bonds don't pay very much, there has to be a way to sweeten the deal given inflationary pressures on the principal, else the lenders aren't very enthusiastic at bond auctions and interest rates would otherwise rise rather sharply. Needless to say, once regulatory power has been consolidated in administrative government, a selective permitting and enforcement process is a very easy way to deliver a politically opaque return.

Carry_Okie fantasy

If you think for one minute that lenders don't demand collateral from governments, you are smoking something.

Secret collateral. That's funny.

Politicians hide them. It's been that way since the beginning.

Is that a black helicopter hovering over your house? Now that you've discovered the secret, you won't last long.

[Toddsterpatriot]

Given that interest rates on bonds don't pay very much, there has to be a way to sweeten the deal given inflationary pressures on the principal

Almost forgot, collateral doesn't sweeten the return on your bonds, but that was the least of your errors.

[expat_panama]

It has never yet been ruled upon, to my knowledge, what happens if a provision of a ratified treaty directly contradicts one or another portion of the Constitution.

This was tossed aside years ago.  Standard doctrine now is is that treaties are contracts between governments, and laws define actions of citizens within states.  There is no longer any credence to that "supreme law of the land" BS..

Example: the 1977 Carter Canal Treaty said I wouldn't have to pay any income tax.  The IRS said the treaty doesn't matter.   We took it all the way up the appeals court and the majority voted against the minority (Scalia) saying we were right.  Scalia got named to the SCOTUS and with the IRS he managed to overturn the appeals court ruling on the SC level.  Scalia didn't know what a recusal was back then.

Bottom line: treaties are all well and good but lawmakers can and do ignore them inside the US.  Treaties do not trump the Constitution  Hell, they can't even trump the IRS!

[SAJ]

I hope to hell you're right about that in the general case, mate.

[expat_panama]

I hope to hell you're right about that in the general case, mate.

If you're honestly concerned, I can dig out my copies of the court docs out of some trunk in the attic. 

The only thing that's the law of the land is the fact that treaties are not the law of the land.  That fact took several million dollars out of our pockets for stuffing into the US treasury.

[Retch_Sweeney]

"Treaties are legislation, nothing more. The constitution may be changed only through the amendment process."

The Senate was given the keys to the store, through treaty power. What is there, something like 1,000 treaties?

The Constitution: ....and the laws of the United States which shall be made in pursuance thereof; and all treaties made, or which shall be made, under the authority of the United States, shall be the supreme law of the land; and the judges in every state shall be bound thereby, any thing in the Constitution or laws of any states to the contrary notwithstanding..."

Of those 1000 or so treaties, I'm sure there is one that makes it illegal to whistle in the dark in the USA and the Congo. Be afraid, be very afraid.