 be clearing all people born in the United States to be citizens, would have freed the slaves in a single generation, and would probably not have caused the southern states to deny their membership in the United States. It would not have stolen the workforce from the people of the southern states. It would have given time and opportunity for those people most affected to find their way through this monstrous and magnificent change, a change in the nature of the United States. There would still have been many challenges, as in a few ignorant people arranging abortions for their slaves so they would not have to deal with free people. There would still be challenges raised by some who were born as slaves, declaring that they were younger and born free men and women. These would be matters for the court rather than for legislation. And why would this be ignorant? The work the slaves were doing would still have to be done. Simply killing the workers or disrupting their freedoms would not accomplish anything for the slave owner. Those who were born free would still need to grow into productive people and their parents would even as slaves be doing productive work. It is most likely that free men born as slaves would grow up to be the next generation of workers. There would still be racist divisions, but they would not arise as cause for tearing the very fabric of American life. There would be time to adjust, a new generation raised in an environment where they share citizenship, however uncomfortably, with one another. Instead, this was enacted as an attempt to further legislate a massive social disruption. It was the use of law to try to mitigate the damages already initiated through the constitutionally forbidden acts that legislature had taken. With the continued recognition of government sovereignty, we have referenced to the ability to abuse citizens so long as it is done through due process of law. The sovereignty recognized in the states was looked upon to continue some past citizen abuses so long as the requirements of legal process were observed. The concept of equal protection of laws can only be called brilliant leadership. Our founders wrote this common law principle into the constitution that laws cannot treat citizens differently. It was a stumbling block to every leader's attempt to use law to benefit the right people at the expense of others. Accordingly, it has also become one of the legal provisions most seriously violated by all branches of government. For example, a graduated income tax involves a law that intentionally penalizes citizens based on their financial success. As written, the equal protection of the law has been so effectively misread as to say it supports legislative abuse of somehow demanded for fairness. Again, the executive branch has arranged for some favored businesses to be excused from having to follow all the regulatory rules that are applied to other less favored businesses. It has been used to misread, to authorize the president to treat selected friends differently than others. Then again, the issue of pardons for crimes is not supported where it would simply treat one convicted criminal as different than others. Releasing one prisoner and not another who has the same basic cause to be imprisoned is an open violation of this provision. The judges who are called to adjudicate a crime against some people where others are not prosecuted for the same crime should be able to refuse the action. There is no good way to authorize a prosecutor to pick and choose among criminals which will be prosecuted and which will not. The police authority who is told to excuse some people from arrest while arresting others should be able to refuse the order or continue application to all. Both would have the backing of the courts. Does issue of a warrant addressing one citizen while refusing to issue it on another in like circumstances entitled the one who takes damage to proceed on those damages against the judge and officers? It is not so under the current reading of this provision. Equal protection of laws and assault on the very concept of sovereign right to rule it reintroduces the purpose of justice as in the preamble. It is such inherent power that the courts have had to actively misread it to keep from interfering with sovereign legislation and privileged execution of law. The most common misreading addresses the equal protection provision as the equivalent of the due process clause but applied to state legislation instead of federal legislation. There it is again so long as government leadership adheres to the processes permitted to leaders the courts will back up whatever they do. Section two in this amendment is somewhat independent from the first. It addresses the necessary and convenient changes to voting laws. These are acts to implement and enforce what the Civil War imposed on people of the southern states. Again we have to note what is imposed upon the people is not what the people support. It necessarily involves misrepresentation. In this case it is misrepresentation of the people in the northern states at the expense of the people in the southern states. It is legislation of a change that would not be supported by any agreement among we the people but by some of the people who would overcome the rest. Our Civil War had killed 165,000 citizens but the damage did not stop even after the military hostilities had ceased. This was indeed a dark time for our nation. Section three addresses another issue with questionable approach. It set a new requirement upon those who would be in leadership positions. It applied a sovereignty loyalty test to those who might serve in public leadership positions limiting the choice of the people to elect those who might represent interest contrary to the northern states political leanings. This same was rational in the sense of preventing sharply discordant voices of those who would not support the sovereign government and its rule over the people. It was the abused people in the southern states who would no longer have the option of being represented by anyone who had challenged the sovereignty of the administrative leaders in the northern states. Section four continues the general theme of supporting sovereignty in government. It declares that debts incurred in accord with the federal legal process cannot be officially questioned. The sovereign will not even hear the cause of limitation but will do what leaders think is right. It is here that the conflict with sovereignty in people is given economic substance. When parents died, their debts could not be passed to their children. The common law included inheritance laws that cut off all such further debts and the estate process closed off all debts public and private. The children were to be free. This provision simply ignores citizen freedoms or they would challenge the sovereign government. Where public debts are incurred on behalf of by representing the fathers, these would continue even after the death of those who were represented. It would hold the citizens responsible for public debt overriding the very purpose for probate law and denying its benefits to the people of the United States. The 15th amendment was just one more in a series of benevolent sovereign actions ignoring both the sovereignty of the citizens necessary for the legality of government and the recently passed requirement for equal protection of the law. We have an addition to the Constitution that would address some citizens as special. The loss of focus on legality and sovereignty of the citizen is inherent in addressing voting as a right. Voting is a privilege. It only arises as a result of having a government. It is not something that the created government can choose to withhold from citizens who have an ownership right in their nation and in the government created under their authority. Election is a hiring process, not a temporary coronation. Election is not choosing those who will rule over the people. It is choosing representatives who are supposed to be fulfilling the requirements of the Constitution and the will of the people. Yet here is the written witness to a government that thought it had to hand out benefits to some of the people to make them equal to other citizens. Worse far, they felt the need so deeply that they engaged in the process to witness to their lack of understanding by appending it to a document that only existed for the purpose of ordaining and establishing a government. Could voting equality have been done by common legislation? It could have been so accomplished, and regulating voting was granted congressional authority. But application would require recognition that we the people who are the states are to represent the same people who we the people who are citizens of the United States. It would require a denial of the sovereignty of the states over U.S. citizens. Indeed, the 15th Amendment is a witness to both the times and a result of the lack of education concerning our foundation as a legal nation. With the 16th Amendment, we have a witness to almost total rejection of almost any constitutional limitation upon how our benevolent government can abuse its citizens. The leadership had learned nothing from the Civil War beyond what they as benevolently leaders had accomplished for some Americans through the expense and death of others. The deaths of 165,000 American citizens and smoldering resentment of those who still smarted at having their government seize their property was a political victory only. The shattered we the people continued suffering from this abuse. The same smug government not satisfied with this breach of both law and purpose stepped into a new atrocity. They put their hands into the pockets of the sovereign citizens that they were only empowered to serve. The loss of slaves received no compensation. Any citizen who put his hand in another citizen's pocket would be subject to prosecution. It was a criminal act. The people could not authorize, not even by original signature, their representatives to take such an action. This is theft by government. With the collusion of the courts because it was accomplished through an authorized process. A graduated income tax is not a legal way to fund the U.S. government. It is a criminal abuse of sovereignty of citizens. There are legal ways to do things under the original Constitution. These would all have required recognizing sovereignty of citizens. And leadership had already rejected that outright. It would have required accountability to the people and political leaders found that to be unacceptable. And so we fight amendments to authorize what the Constitution forbade. And that could only be sold as acceptable to a people who are ignorant of their personal sovereignty. This is our history as a nation. And it is written in the form of constitutional amendments. We need to learn from our history so that we will not repeat the mistakes of the past.