Oligarchy And The Bill of Rights

A History of Oligarchical Collectivism and The Bil of Rights

The oligarchical collectivism of the pyramid system provides more pleasantries and a better view the higher one ascends. Those on the lower levels experience more pressure. In the past people were born into a situation, and there was no leaving that station, the son of peasant would be a peasant, and that was that. Systems of nations were set up to keep the majority held in their place, unquestioning and unmoving.

In the past, no matter one’s place in the pyramid, ignorance prevailed and served well. Most had no desire to question or were kept so ignorant it was difficult to perceive questions. Serfs were just lucky to be alive and often grew accustomed to the local oligarchical enforcement. Pyramidal autocracies violently ruled most of the world. Those at the base worked the hardest and were forced to pay upwards.

If born into nobility at the top, one would receive the best education of the day and most likely would still be ignorant. Oligarchies set up education as a privilege and program too. The best education of the past taught that those in the base were a “them” among an “us” to the point some of the base believed it.

Education was more institutionalization, propelling the notion that certain people were more valuable than others. This led to war, genocide and slavery. Institutions taught individuals to understand others according to their race, or anything other than their reaction to information, how they think.

The people in the lower portion of the pyramid were deprived and repressed so that they did not know how to question or what to ask, or dared not to. Those in the base of the pyramid were happy to have a bowl of gruel without a beating. It was difficult to see other ways of interaction in order to properly question. Anyone who was so bold and brave enough to question the system would get their tongue cut off, or worse. Lacking questions perpetuated the system.

Those at the apex of the pyramid system were comfortable, so rocking the boat with questions would be foolish. The only questions among the elite pertained to maintenance of the status quo. The royalty, nobility and clergy were often free to perpetuate exploitation and not responsible for their wrongdoing. Typical individuals were so beaten down or held so lofty, that just asking a question was out of the question.

“The few who could understand the system will either be so interested in its profits, or so dependent on its favors, that there will be no opposition from that class, while on the other hand, the great body of people mentally incapable of comprehending the tremendous advantage that capital derives from the system, will bear its burdens without complaint and perhaps without even suspecting that the system is inimical to their interests.”

~John Sherman, U.S.A. Senator and politician 1848–1898.

Throughout recorded time, individuals have been left unconsidered next to the functions of institutions. It took centuries of individually instigated progression to enable individual rights among the mechanics of elite institutions. The U.S.A. wasn’t the first nation to sanction the right of individuals to question and to steer their country. The original patriots were not original in their attempts at liberty, only original at attaining it.

FACT: Thomas Hobbes was a political philosopher born in England, 1588. Thomas penned “Leviathan” among other works. The book was about the basic rights of people relative to formations of people, institutions and authority, which he named leviathans. His political theories angered royalists of the time, though many people supported his revolutionary ideas of basic rights.

The Magna Carta is a collection of documents written in 1215–1225. Parts were copied from the Charter of Liberties, written in 1100, England. These documents provided people with Habeas Corpus, protection from being jailed for nothing, but it mainly addressed royalty, nobility and clergy privilege. It was written as a legislation to prevent the King of England from taking advantage of church officials and other nobility. Those at the base of the pyramid were mostly unconsidered.

The Charter limited the power of kings over the bishops and barons. These documents were mostly concerned with the privileges of the haves, relative to the despotism of the king, the have-all. The Magna Carta inspired the original patriots, but the documents were limited in scope and mostly recognized the institutionalized rather than all individuals.

The 1689 English Bill of Rights set forth certain rights for certain individuals as well; many concepts were shared by the Colonies. Yet the rights were prescribed only for certain individuals. The Colonists believed they were included in the English Bill of Rights, but soon it became apparent they were not.

The original patriots used ideas from England, but they also had other influences. The Haudenosaunee as they called themselves for generations, now known by the name they became associated with by outsiders, The Iroquois, directly influenced the original patriots. The exact etymology of the word Iroquois is unknown, but in all likelihood, the word was once derogatory. The Iroquois Nation of Haudenosaunee is a generations old democracy that was long established. The Iroquois Nation influenced and assisted the European newcomers to North America, formerly known as Turtle Island.

The newcomers, as illustrated by Thomas Jefferson, essentially advocated the genocide of indigenous peoples, while at the same time looked to many of them as exemplary of tribes forming one common league. The Colonists not only adopted native knowledge, but also, at the same time legalized the theft of their land and institutionalized their expulsion and murder. This must have required a certain amount of doublethink.

The trinity of liberty was influenced by native ideas as well as European concepts. These ideas formed the foundation of the U.S.A., and were themselves a paradigm. Meant to insure the liberty of colonies among empires, they have since changed the world. Individuals have set on a course for increased liberty ever since, for the documents allow progression. The Declaration of Independence was meant to inspire the Colonies to shun the blood right of kings, and has gone on to inspire generations to seek liberty. And the Haudenosaunee influence cannot be overlooked.

Through the trinity of liberty individuals countered the framework of generational, global, oligarchical collectivism. The original patriots questioned and rejected the status quo. Throughout recorded time, nearly everywhere, were fiefdoms, kingdoms and oligarchical empires. Any place and people that weren’t designed in such a way, or were weaker, were rolled on and capitalized on. Empires set sail on the Seven Seas to institutionalize the world over, and were then challenged.

The Declaration of Independence was an open letter to the royal and noble oligarchical collectivism of King George III. It stated that the people had enough and would no longer support their oligarchical collectivism. They demanded liberty. They could taste liberty, being far from the dominant European institutions and they could see liberty exemplified by the autonomous indigenous, and they announced their discontinuance of institutionalization.

The Declaration of Independence was a direct insult to George III and the well cultivated oligarchic and monopolistic institutions. It is a declaration of discontinuance. The Colonists, people without an actual nation to call home, began flattening the slant of the empirical exploiters with an open declaration. The Declaration of Independence boldly questioned the King’s actions and announced that the royal exploitations were detested and that they desisted.

The Bill of Rights protects the basic rights of individuals in a complex institutionalized world. They are elementary rights preventing exploitation of one, under another. No institution or individual can supersede the Bill of Rights. It exists to protect individuals from religious, corporate and government institutions. People around the world aspire for the universal rights the trinity of liberty assures. The Bill of Rights was arguably written with the hindsight of The Revolutionary War, with the knowledge of what rights needed to be secure and counters institutional exploitation by providing individual rights.

The Constitution provides framework to a government of the people, for the people and by the people, an institution with checks and balances to guarantee that all actions are questioned and all powers limited. The Constitution did not set up the most effective government, but attempted to set up the most impartial and fair government. The Constitution is adjustable, it develops along with people; its laws are changeable so the government acts without interfering with the individuals and on their behalf.

The checks and balances restrict institutional monopolization, or oligarchical collectivism. Liberty allows for progression; development is possible via democratic principles within republic structure. Processes are questioned at every turn and no one individual or entity is given complete control. The Constitution keeps power among many offices that ideally function together in partnership. It put into place the complexities of cooperative government in liberty.

December 16, 1773 Boston Tea Party.

1775–1783 American Revolutionary War.

July 4, 1776 Declaration of Independence signed.

June 21, 1788 The U.S.A. Constitution went into effect.

December 15, 1791 Bill of Rights adopted.

The Boston Tea Party was one of the original protests and patriotic acts that led to U.S.A independence from English oligarchical collectivism. The Boston Tea Party engaged questioning the situation, the monopolistic taxation of the tea, trees and other commodities. After communication, the original patriots openly ceased support and proclaimed their reasoning in the Declaration of Independence. Then the original patriots set up a system that was stable and yet, changeable to allow development.

The trinity of liberty provided equality and limited institutions among individuals. Royalty and familial power were more or less banished. Ideally people were valued on their merit instead of their heritage. The documents provided a government that could be questioned and improved upon, but conditions were not ideal. Today the phrase “all men are created equal” is acceptable in ways that it originally was not.

FACT: In 1834, the Tennessee Constitution was changed. What once read “the freemen of this state have a right to bear arms for their common defense” was changed to “the free white men of this state have a right to bear arms for their common defense.”

“The soldiers never explained to the government when an Indian was wronged, but reported the misdeeds of the Indians.” ~Geronimo

There were setbacks and underhanded exploits, but the documents intended to provide everyone the ability to rise above their circumstances. Today, whoever can reflect, question and speak whatever they want. Anyone can choose any path and take it, so long as it does not harm others. Therein lays the responsibility of true liberty, overcoming the wrongdoers.

Freedom is not liberty. Freedom means one is free to ignore exploitation, free to let it happen, free to profit from it and/or free to prevent it. With liberty comes responsibility because liberty is for all individuals.

The trinity of liberty was a response, and instills responsibility. The documents intended to empower individuals and to cast off the royal and elite grip. The Bill of Rights prevents institutional exploitation by providing explicit rights to individuals to prevent specific exploits, but still these rights were not applied universally, they were exclusive, relegating some to caste existence.

The trinity of liberty was a response to exploitation, directly experienced and known historically. The exploitations of elite monopolistic institutions were disbanded. And yet, certain individuals and institutions infiltrated what was designed for individuals and institutionalized situations in to favor oligarchical collectivism. Liberty is pliable, but also permeable.

The original patriots questioned and renounced the wrongdoing of institutions despite global establishment. They questioned what was wrong swore them off with the Declaration of Independence. Despite the wrong being the global status quo, despite the majority tolerating it, despite it being beneficial to some, they stopped sought to stop the exploitation.

Who knew how King George III would react to their gallant words? They stood up for what is right, without consideration of the drawbacks to standing up against the exploits of empire. They made themselves independent of wrong by ceasing it, simply because it was the right thing to do. The original patriots chose to stand up to British exploits because it was the right thing to do, not because it was a battle they wanted or one they counted on winning.

The trinity of liberty made the state independent of any royal family, church, corporation or other institution. The trinity of liberty also makes institutions accountable, including government institutions. Until then, oligarchies were predominantly familial institutions and always had supportive churches as well as lucrative corporate charters. Church and state had been joined at the hip and corporations were their whips, and they were unquestionable. The trinity of liberty allowed for open inconsequential individual worship. But it prevents churches from intertwining with government because when institutions collectivize oligarchy is cemented. The trinity of liberty provides freedom for religious interpretation and more importantly freedom from religious institutions.

To question oligarchies was disallowed. Protesting was practically unheard of. The Bill of Rights guaranties the right for individual interpretation of God in whatever manner one sees fit. It provides the right to gather and communicate and the right to make public any information. It guarantees the right to question and petition the government and any institution under its governance. The First Amendment provides for the freedom of speech and the freedom to question all, but it is more than that. It is the First Amendment because it enables and supports all the other following Amendments and covers the most important material relative to individual empowerment.

The Second Amendment gives people the right to bear arms, the right to possess the same might as institutional authorities. This is meant to level the slant. The original patriots were reacting to the violent age-old battle between institutions and individuals and attempted to level the field. The Second Amendment is for self-defense certainly, but also to influence institutions to listen to people who might be armed when they question and protest. Also, if the First Amendment rights do not work, the Second Amendment and following Amendments back it up. The Bill of Rights is in a specific order for specific reasons.

Because British soldiers were invading homes with accusations and forcibly procuring provisions and housing from colonists, the Bill of Rights disallowed unannounced entry. The Bill of Rights prevented institutional search and seizure of property without justification. These were reactions to protect individuals over institutions without concern for institutional agenda. The Third and Fourth Amendments protect these liberties.

Because oligarchical institutions had always confiscated property as punishment the Fifth Amendment gives individuals the right to eminent domain. Because of the difficulties in receiving a fair trial for individuals, the Bill of Rights addressed trials in the Fifth, Sixth and Seventh Amendments. One need not speak if one doesn’t want to and one has the right to a trial by a public jury.

The Eighth Amendment prevents institutions from holding individuals without possible payment of bail. It also prevents excessive institutional fines and cruel punishment.

The Ninth Amendment ensures that these are not to be the people’s only rights. The original patriots knew very well how institutions flip words and intentions. The Ninth Amendment ensures the intention behind the Bill of Rights is clear. No one down the line can ever say that people do not have the right to clean water because it is not written in the Bill of Rights.

The Tenth Amendment puts power in the hands of people and state representation. The Bill of Rights provides liberty, and direction to protect and progress liberty.

The disdain of royal oligarchical infallibility led to the formation of a democratic republic, the likes of which the European world had not known since the ancient Greeks. The Greeks had an exclusive freedom, democracy for Grecians and slavery for everybody else, a quality the early U.S.A. shared with ancient Greece.

FACT: The original draft of the Declaration of Independence, drafted by Thomas Jefferson on hemp paper, included a denunciation of the global slave trade; this was removed from the final document approved by Congress. Thomas, a slave owner, wrote: “He has waged cruel war against human nature itself, violating its most sacred rights of life & liberty in the persons of a distant people who never offended him, captivating & carrying them into slavery in another hemisphere, or to incur miserable death in their transportation thither.”

FACT: Edward Rutledge was a Continental Congressman and the youngest signer of the Declaration of Independence from South Carolina. He was a lawyer educated at the Temple, at Oxford University. He led the Southern States in their refusal to vote on the document until the grievance concerning slavery was removed.

The design of the U.S.A. was such that it was left open to all types of forces, including from institutionalized individuals. No longer would one man or one family be able to claim the divine right of kings, but only certain individuals had rights. Every freeman had an equal say, but freedom was exclusive. Originally only white men were considered to be born free because of institutionalized corporate agendas, because of psychological flaws, that transposed freedom for some, as liberty for all. Exclusive liberty is an oxymoronic impossibility.

Ideals that gave no man absolute power over another were radical concepts to most then. Throughout recorded time institutions were violent and slanted oligarchies. Rarely was power vested among people and not a primary royal family ordained with power through God. The same people who eventually fought off the most powerful army and navy of the world in the name of liberty, owned people as slaves; that’s how radical the idea was.

Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson were the primary architects of the trinity of liberty and both were slave owners. Ben was also a Grand Master Freemason. Ben had international connections through the club, such as in France, who helped the founding of the U.S.A. Slavery is a steeply slanted pyramid system, Freemasonry is pyramidal as well. Ben and Thomas wrote opposite ideas to the old world, they also wrote opposite ideas to much of their own behavior.

On many occasions Ben and Thomas met with the Iroquois federation. The generous indigenous people offered resources and information on how to live in the new continent and also ideas on how to live together. Their cooperative autonomy was an inspiration. The ideas of localized government and consent of the people within a greater federation were Iroquois ideas. The notion that a federation of small states provided power and protection for one another was exemplified by the Iroquois.

The ideas of Greek democracy and Roman Republics inspired the foundation of the U.S.A. But the Iroquois were a well-established, peaceful, yet powerful democracy that faced opposition not only because there were corrupt influences that sought to take their resources, but also because of institutionalized biases based on appearance.

Throughout recorded time, people have been divided based on their appearance, birthplace and apparent alignment. People have been harmed, exploited, enslaved and murdered because of numerous conceived, nuanced differences. The differences in appearances have been magnified to mean all sorts of absurdities. People have been subjected to judgment and harm, all because of how they looked or where they lived. The only way to fairly understand people is according to their individual mentality.

It is not how people look that defines them, but how people think. There are four distinct types of people in the world. Idiots only question irrelevance, zealots only question in accordance with their preconceptions, elitists only question to advance their own situation, and patriots openly question all information. To understand people based on anything other than their mentality is at best marketing or polling and normally just a Neanderthal or cavemen notion of division.

FACT: William of Ockham was an English Friar born around 1288. He was a logician and philosopher noted for numerous intellectual contributions. He is associated with, but did not originate the theory of Occam’s Razor. The Razor theory supposes that entities must not be multiplied beyond necessity. Occam’s Razor is symbolic for cutting away extra and superfluous descriptions. “Plurality should not be posited without necessity.”

“Make everything as simple as possible, but not simpler.” ~Albert Einstein

The original patriots installed the idea that information and reasonable and logical thought had precedence over the power of the right of kings. But people still had biases and tolerations that allowed for exploitation based on appearance. The Revolutionary War was as much a war over the freedom to think as it was a war for the freedom from certain oligarchical exploitations. If the British Empire won, they possibly would have been free to exploit and monopolize entirety. The U.S.A. allowed progression and protection from exploitation and from being defined by appearance or heritage or other arbitrary standards.

Many of the original patriots, those at the Boston Tea Party and the signers and architects of the trinity of liberty were Freemasons. Freemasonry is pyramidal; however in those times it was counter to the pyramidal system of the royal oligarchies. Freemasonry, despite its design, countered the pyramid system then conducting exploitation and monopolization.

The original patriots promoted reasoning in intelligent discussion where one was free to speak. They shared information about engineering and God and everything in between. The Freemasons had to exchange this information in secret, so much of it counter to the oligarchical dogma.

The Boston Tea Party was the catalyst for further protest and ultimately revolution against royal monopoly. The planning for the Boston Tea Party took place, at least in part, at the Green Dragon Tavern, a meeting place of Freemasons in Boston.

Ideas of the autonomous natives, concepts of questioning, belief in rational thought and historical examples of liberty inspired the original patriots to create a country free from royal despotism.

“Tolerance implies no lack of commitment to one’s own beliefs. Rather it condemns the oppression or persecution of others.” ~John F. Kennedy

Tolerance might be ambivalence or acceptance, negative or positive behavior. When one is ambivalent to evil one has acquired negative tolerations. When one is open and accepting of individual differences one has positive tolerance. The tolerant indigenous people welcomed the European newcomers. The European newcomers acquired negative tolerations concerning the murder of native peoples.

Well before 1776, there was a confederation of states with localized power and unified representation in the new world. Truly the U.S.A. is the land of the free and always has been. Despite indigenous Americans subsequently experiencing the worst and most institutionalized genocide and gentrification in world history, they were originally an integral part in inspiring the trinity of liberty, and physically enabling the survival of many European newcomers.

The ideas of the trinity of liberty were, and perhaps, still are ahead of its time; more accurately ahead of most people in its time. The wording, “All Men” now equates to everyone, not just white guys with land and loot. Basic freedoms and privileges are now adorned to all.

It took generations for the word “men” to mean human beings, but finally it does. The U.S.A. has evolved into a country that would not have anything to do with the country of the original patriots. In some ways, we have surpassed them. The U.S.A. has evolved to the point where people might consider the thirteen Colonies as repressive and exploitative as the monarchies existent around them. Liberty allows for progression.

The romantic story of the immigrant to the U.S.A. typifies this notion. It is the idea that anyone can come to the U.S.A. and walk streets paved with gold, open opportunity. The U.S.A. offered liberty and open equality that was unavailable elsewhere. In the U.S.A. a pauper could essentially become a king. Starting with nothing in the old world meant one was sure to end up with nothing, in the new world one could end up with it all.

The liberty people experience today is a magical exception in history. In the old world, one was overtly forced to worship one way, live one way and stay in one place. Oppression was normal. The glorious and rebellious nation of the U.S.A. was founded against empire, but greed and corruption infiltrated. Land was taken away from people who already lived there. The liberty enjoyed in the U.S.A. has a bony underside.

Basic liberty was already legislated in parts of the Americas. The new arrivals removed them and then pronounced their own legislation which relegated many as “them” and others as “us”. Progression was allowed and yet the early U.S.A. was no less empirical than most other nations of the time. A partial version of liberty was provided to the privileged and revoked from others. Many people in the past tried to hide from institutions and avoid being implicated as a “them”. Others were violently confronted and forced to defend themselves like Chief Sitting Bull and William Wallace.

The Complete Patriot’s Guide

Ethan Indigo Smith’s book, The Complete Patriot’s Guide to Oligarchical Collectivism: Its Theory and Practice, is an insightful exploration of history, philosophy and contemporary politics of today’s heavily institutionalized society.

An inspiration for positive, peaceful individual action, The Complete Patriot’s Guide is pro-individual in its perspective and, although political, discusses our society and its institutions from neither left-wing nor right-wing perspectives, exploring history, philosophy and contemporary politics relative to the fictional work of George Orwell. Layered with insight, it is in part a literary exploration of the themes of Orwell’s 1984, and provides solutions for individual and collective empowerment.

About the author:

Activist, author and Tai Chi teacher Ethan Indigo Smith was born on a farm in Maine and lived in Manhattan for a number of years before migrating west to Mendocino, California. Guided by a keen sense of integrity and humanity, Ethan’s work is both deeply connected and extremely insightful, blending philosophy, politics, activism, spirituality, meditation and a unique sense of humour.

Ethan’s publications include:

• 108 Steps to Be in The Zone, a set of 108 meditative practices for self discovery and individual betterment, including techniques to develop balance, transmute sexual energy.
• The Matrix of Four, The Philosophy of the Duality of Polarity on the subject of developing individual consciousness.
• The Little Green Book of Revolution an inspirational book based on ideas of peaceful revolution, historical activism and caring for the Earth like Native Americans.
• The Geometry of Energy: How to Meditate: Simple and profound, this book offers an empowering four-step meditation, focused through the sacred dimensions of geometry.

For more, visit Ethan on Facebook and check out Ethan’s author page on Amazon.