 How do you put your trust in someone else? How can you trust that they will do what they agree to do? Even back in the Bible, Jesus tells the parable of the two brothers, the one who said he would do what his father asked of him but did not, and the brother who said he would not but went and did what was asked. In this course, we are faced with a like question. And it is how we as students can trust one another to support what we all agree to do. How can we trust those who are elected or hired into public office to promote justice and domestic tranquility? How can we trust them to do what is required for the welfare of our nation? These are the purposes on which we the people are agreed as our constitutional foundation for ordaining and establishing the United States government. It is an ancient question, and it is answered daily by every human being in contrast with others. How do children trust their parents will care for them? How can one spouse trust that the other will not be seeking to break away from family responsibilities? How does a kid playing a game trust that the others are going to stick to the rules? There is no perfect answer. In Jesus' parable, one son had shown honor to his father in a request but did not do what his father asked. The other refused what his father requested but then does what was asked of him. Jesus seemed to favor the second, the performance, and our law also favors performance. There is a partial answer in the use of contracts. And in the trust we have that our contracts are to be performed as agreed by the parties. There is a partial answer in a court system that has proven willing and able to address bad faith efforts with various methods of restitution and directed action. It is not support for whatever two people would agree but support for those promises that need to be trusted if our system of commerce is going to work to our benefit. This is nothing new. It was known since the early time before there was well-developed civilization. There has always been value in the person who would keep his or her word. There is distrust in the person who would promise one thing and do another. Trust is a human value. Trust relations were supported in feudal England by law and they established a system of laws to determine which promises would be supported. These are laws that support commerce. They are laws supporting contracts and agency. These are laws that are still commonly applied to our commercial interactions. Consider that the interference in colonial commerce was one of the major drivers for colonial revolution from English rule. It was taxation laid on commerce where the colonial citizens got no benefit. They received no effective voice in the government that taxed them and very little service from the aristocracy that laid the taxes and claimed ownership of the land they farm. The limitations on government interference in commerce were clearly and forcefully written into our constitution and the new government was not only forbidden to challenge the system of commercial laws that supported contract but were directed to protect we the people from even any infractions by states that would do the same. Congress even given the ability to regulate commerce but only to interstate commerce to assure uniformity in the application of commercial law for U.S. citizens in every state. It was specifically forbidden to establish non-uniform taxes on the people and there were specific purposes for which taxes could be applied. There was language to minimize even the taxing on international commerce limiting it to cover the costs of operating the inspection systems. The writing is very strong on this, that the government was not to be in the business of laying taxes on commerce as a way to fund what aristocratic leaders decided to do. When the constitution was enacted we had suffered a war that was partly driven by English taxation of colonial commerce and these limits on government were strict. Trust? The uniform lesson of history is that those who cannot be trusted are the ones who are often put into positions of public authority. They will in the long term give witness to that ancient parable saying that they feel what they feel people want to hear but doing something else. As people who pay the price the question for us is who is it that will represent us and what we agreed that our constitution should be doing? One ancient answer is that you can generally trust the promise that is in writing with someone's signature attached. The person who violates that trust will be held up to ridicule and be worth less as a person. The political leader who sets forth what he will do and affixes a signature to a published document is the one who can be trusted to follow through on pain of being worthless in the eyes of others. It is unsecured promises that our common law will not support. Contracts are trusted where each party promises to do their part of the same action and the parties agree upon the value of the result, the leader who promises what they will do without what you must do to gain the result is not dealing in contract but defining how they intend to rule over people like you. For contract, when two people agree to do what benefits both of them they each can trust the other to complete their part of the agreement because it is in their own interest to do so. The legal principle for this is consideration. This is a term that addresses some loss that is suffered by the parties to the contract if it is not performed. For contracts, when there is something that is lost on failure to complete what has been agreed then there is a level of trust in what each person will do as their part to keep them suffering a loss. These few simple concepts are the foundations for contract. One concept is personal history and the one signing as to keeping past agreements. Another is mutual benefit and what is contracted and the personal loss suffered if the contract is not fulfilled. Where these are the basis for agreement the parties to the contract have reason to trust each other to perform their part of the contract. You should note that the one who affixes his signature to a promise has set his reputation on the line and can be held to ridicule and contempt for non-performance. There is a loss to be suffered in non-compliance when the contract is reduced to writing and signed by the parties. For there to be a legal contract there must be an agreement on who are the parties to the contract. These are the people who are agreed and are the same people who value the intended result and performance. They sign a document that attests to their agreement. For there to be a legal contract there must be a purpose and it must be the basis of agreement between the parties. There can be no contract that are secret from the signatories. There are no supportable contracts that cannot be understood by the parties. The parties cannot be agreed upon some purpose that is not fully disclosed to them as part of the agreement. The contract does not have to be written to be legally effective but the elements of a signature document adds a whole new level of trust to the concept. The final element for contract law is enforcement. There is a need for the contract to be honored by a court of authority as an enforceable agreement. It must have a legal purpose and signatories who are able to legally sign it their promise to perform or give mutual consent when accepting a contract offer. Contracts are generally a matter of offer and acceptance where one party is or several parties are willing to put forth a contract proposal and the others invited to accept or negotiate as is appropriate to establish the purpose and agreement that is the heart of the contract. In accord with common practice the parties to the Constitution of the United States are listed at the beginning of the writing so that it is clear who is an agreement in the court. The Constitution, it is we the people of the United States. There is no other party to this agreement. Neither the US government nor the governments of the States nor the parties to our Constitution. We the people are the only ones who have obligations under this constitutional document. In accord with common practice the purpose for agreement and the intended result are stated in the writing at the beginning of the document. In our Constitution the purpose is to ordain and establish a central government to accomplish the purposes listed in the preamble. The purpose is the heart of the contract. The reason our government exists. It addresses the purposes we share and jointly value. It addresses our joint value in the result and purpose of our joint efforts. The United States comes into existence through an agreement by and among we the people of the United States. The signatures under our Constitution attest to our willingness to take action to ordain and establish the government of the United States. These are not signatures of individual citizens but of state representatives, each attesting to agreement of that part of we the people who live in each state. The challenge we face is modern misdirection. It is not what we can trust the government to do for us. It is what we can trust each other to do our mutually agreed purposes. It is what we do to gain the results as stated in our signed agreement. I note that there is also a contract with those elected into public office and it is also a matter of agency. In that understanding we will address political leaders' obligations of contract with the people they represent as part of addressing the law of agency. When it comes to law, every enforceable contract, whether or not written, involves legal obligations that are set upon the parties to the contract. A contract only obligates the parties to the contract, the signatories, not others. Joshua puts a price tag on a product in his store and this creates an open offer to sell a contractual offer to transfer ownership of the product to the buyer upon acceptance of the seller's price and offer of money or credit. If Bobby does not accept this offer he can make a counter offer a different price or added condition upon which they are not yet agreed. Joshua can accept or decline that counter offer. We call this process negotiation. It has the purpose of coming to agreement so that the parties can trust each other and can gain what each one values. Once there is agreement there are conditional obligations upon the buyer and seller to react appropriately to the other's offer or acceptance. When Jane picks a priced grocery item from the shelf and carries it to the checkout she has taken an action indicating acceptance. She is obliged to pay for the item to secure ownership. The seller is obliged to make the sale and recognize the ownership of the item in the customer who pays the prices agreed. These demonstrate the basic obligations of contract. Jane also has a written contract with Pete, a home service mechanic to repair failing plumbing. There is commonly a simple contract document or Jane contracts for the repair. It usually is for the workman to require a signature to accept the obligation of pay. Jane's obligation to pay is conditional upon Pete's obligation to affect the repair. Pete must do the work before he can hold Jane accountable for pay. In common law the parties are only responsible for what is written into their contract. Government taxation of business transactions sets additional obligations on the parties to the contract. This is interference with the obligations of contract which puts it in open rebellion to the constitutional limitation on commercial interferences. The only authorized exception is for import-export transactions where the purpose of collecting taxes by state is to cover the costs of the inspection and associated legal actions. Government, both national and state, are forbidden to otherwise lay taxes on commercial transactions. There is a good argument that there can be cost-based taxes for other regulatory efforts that perform the legal functions of government. This might be a regulator's cost as he or she assures the healthfulness and or safety of products. The money collected could not then be legally reprogrammed or repurposed. The use of unconstitutional commercial obligations to fund government have been consistently flagrant. Our federal and state governments have simply ignored the restrictions on interfering with contract obligations. The courts, with their general acceptance of the sovereignty of government, have turned a blind eye to the legal restrictions written into the Constitution and refused to enforce restrictions upon those who are elected to rule. If they need resources to rule, then the U.S. courts will not challenge what they do to gain these from the common citizens and their commercial activities. This is an area where corrective action may be so obviously needed as to bring people to agreement.