 We have to put the Constitution into its historical framework to gain a deeper understanding from how it was handled and the actions of governance and amendment that followed from its being written and ratified. To begin, I would bring in a modern observation that has bearing, a government that has no people, has no powers, no authorities, and no control over its own resources. The potency of government comes from the people, no matter what its political form or claim to sovereignty. A government whose people have no power can gain none from them and will also necessarily be without any real power or authority. Where the British government had taken acts to reap economic benefits from the American colonies, it had effectively oppressed its own citizens. Not having learned the lesson from the oppression that yielded the English Magna Carta, that government had to face rebellion by the people of the colonies. I note this because the United States has not learned from this either. It has divided the people against each other and has selected one side to support while oppressing the other. Hopefully, with a little more perspective, we can avoid the need to enter into armed conflict to resolve our political problems. That path has always proven to be horribly expensive. The colonial settlers were not commonly educated or otherwise versed in the common law and probably only had a vague understanding of what sovereignty meant. Yet they found themselves represented by state legislatures and those representatives had signed the new constituting agreement to create the United States. The citizens were faced with a whole new concept of citizenship, one that reversed the relationship they had with the British government. This did not appear to be common knowledge and many leaders still maintained their earlier understanding of sovereign government purpose. A sovereign citizen under the Constitution is not subject to the national government, but is the owner of their nation. Instead of citizens legally owing allegiance to this government, the government and its leaders owe allegiance to the citizens. The Colonials were not informed of this prior to signing of the Constitution that initiated this new government. Did they come to understand it? There was no apparent effort to provide the knowledge to common citizens and even a large part of the more educated leadership seemed unsure of the new sovereignty relationship their Constitution had initiated. In fact, there has been no concerted effort to provide this type of foundation to citizens until quite recently. This course of study is part of that effort. Its purpose is not simply informational, but developmental for young citizens as they grow into effective adult citizens who are able to take a more direct part in self-governance. With this lack of understanding and confusion of relations, the effort to amend and improve the Constitution for the protection of the common citizens began during the convention that proposed the Constitution. For perspective, this was such a radical change that even the people who were putting it forth for signature had difficulty with the concept of sovereign citizens. They rightfully worried about whether others like themselves might find the concept so troubling that they simply ignored it and treated citizens as subject of government under this new agreement. The founders realized they had an immediate problem, a challenge that setting the new government into place did not resolve even as they realized that they could not resolve their differences in legal slavery. They also had no solution for the ignorance of people to their ownership in the nation. Both slavery and legal ignorance were known problems that were simply passed down to the following generations for eventual resolution. As a side matter, resolving these problems was not even a constitutional purpose. The purpose of the central document was arranging and establishing the government and it included unifying the people and states for the benefit of people. Focus on the people's divisions and disagreements could only be counterproductive. As a forerunner to our study of the amendments, we have to address the results of the common ignorance concerning the sovereignty of the people. It results in attempts to use the Constitution to defeat its own stated purposes. It results in government leaders attempting to act as sovereigns to the detriment of the people who are governed. As long-term results, we have an avoidance of public education on the subject wherever it might constrain those who would rule over the people. The very concept of development and empowerment of we the people has been actively discouraged and there is little official support for the purpose of empowering a next generation of citizens even though it is a universal purpose of people. We have some performance rules to apply in our ongoing analysis of law and government and these are essentially universal. The first principle already encountered is that people are the public. Those things that the people are forbidden to do or are powerless to do, they are unable to legally authorize or empower the government to do in their name. Whether government or its leaders would act in violation of this principle, they act in misrepresentation of the people. A like principle is that any government order that people must be compelled to obey is in violation of citizen sovereignty. If the people would not do it on their own, then the government order is open and obvious misrepresentation. This does not address criminal law or tort law where certain behaviors are banned with active support from the public but acts of government that address regulatory enforcement as intruency laws where the government arranges for legal punishment of those who would withhold their children from public schooling. It includes like regulation of non-public schools so that they must accept the purposes and restrictions of public education. Consider the legality of the US courts ordering the bussing of children to satisfy the purpose of racial policy. Just whose policy is this? What public supports such a policy? If the sovereign citizen must be ordered to comply, then it is not what the common citizen supports. Such actions are just beyond the proper authority of the court. They are beyond the authority that people can even delegate to their government. It has gone so far as laws that forbid people to gather as militias without government direction. Our constitution is not just a document authorizing and limiting government. It is an agreement by and among we the people on how we are to govern ourselves. We are the source of all government authority and all the powers that leaders can ever have under our constitution. Our history demonstrates in stark terms that our government leaders have not been willing to represent us in the past and are likely to avoid representing us in the present and future unless we recognize our own personal potency as citizens. As a third practical rule to empower citizens, we'll also empower their representatives and disempower those who do not represent us. Our leadership has as a general direction of sovereignty acted to represent created beings, corporate entities instead of citizens. There will be reaction to the teaching of this course and it will likely come from more corporate sources than from people or citizens. Citizens own the government. They do not have to be paid to see to their personal interests to insisting that their government represents and supports them. There are many others who are paid to represent other interests. This is not a theory. It is a witness of our history. Employment law, the balancing of corporate and labor interests is just a witness to not supporting the people as individuals. Our final rule comes from performance studies. People working together in coordinated efforts are more than twice as effective as people working as individuals. People working against each other can only accomplish what the other side cannot prevent. There is no less effective approach than dividing into competing efforts which has become the national norm. It continues through government, even with the government of the United States being ordained and established for the purpose of perfecting the union. The very operation of our government is put to the test. Can two neighbors legally decide to invade the home of their joint neighbor, stripping him of his rights and taking what is his because the two of them agree that it serves some public purpose? If the people cannot do this as individuals, then they cannot authorize their government to do it in their name. This is the very nature of sovereignty. You cannot vote away the rights of your neighbors and a majority vote does not authorize government to ignore the sovereignty of a citizen. Our government is to serve, not to rule. Can two people decide to spend their joint neighbors' money? If they cannot do such a thing as individuals, they cannot authorize our government to do it in their name. Such things are strictures that the common law would put on the government over a sovereign people. It is no wonder that many states have declared that their legislative laws have replaced the common law. That is a definition of sovereign authority. That sovereign legislation overcomes any constitutional restrictions. Still, a whole village can decide to expel a violent man from within their midst, that for their own protection, so a supermajority can act against a sovereign citizen. This is the basis for criminal law, a realization that there are many such destructive behaviors that people will not allow continue. This is the basis for requiring a jury in our government proceedings against a sovereign citizen. We have this basis in law, even if our leaders would prefer to act as rulers. The solution is not revolution. A man does not have to revolt against what he owns. He just takes charge and uses what is his. This requires only two things, that the man realizes that it is his and that the man has a purpose for using what he owns. This course is designed to provide that sense of ownership that comes with being a sovereign citizen. The purpose must be your own. If it is a purpose that is common to all citizen owners, then it will also become a purpose of those who represent the citizens. With these understandings, we are able to look at the original Bill of Rights amendments in the perspective of the times and with a sense of both our purposes and our accomplishments.