j_goose
northfield, Ohio USA
Posted: Mar 9, 2008, 11:34 PM CST
I found that thread and my origional post:
Lakota Indians secede from the U.S. (Lakota Website)
According to Russell Means, an Indian rights activist, the treaties signed with the U.S. are merely "worthless words on worthless paper" and have been repeatedl violated in order to steal out culture, our land, and our ability to maintain our way of life.
Lakota country includes parts of Nebraska, S.Dakota, N.Dakota, Wyoming, and MONTANA.
Speaking of Montana, I've been following this laely. Now I don't live there, but the state I DO live in one that is mentioned.
Secy of state Brad Johnson of Montant delivered a letter to the Washington times about a possible secession of the state depending on the outcome of the U.S. v Heller case currently in front of the Supreme court.
The Us Supreme court will decide D.C. v Heler, the first case in more than 60 yrs in ehich the court will confront the meaning of the 2nd ammendment to the US constitution. Although Heller is about the constitutionality of the D.C. handgun ban, the court's decision will have impact far beyond the district of columbia.
The court must decide in Heller whether the 2nd Ammendment secures a rght for INDIVIDUALS to keep and bear arms, or merely grants states to arm their militias, (national guard). The latter view is called the "collective rights" theory.
A collective rights decision by the court would violate the contract by which Montana entered into statehood, called the Compact with the United States and archived at Article I of the Montana Constitution. When Montana and the US entered into this bilateral contract in 1889, the U.S. approved the right to bear arms in the Montana constitution, guaranteeing the right of "any person" to bear arms, clearly an individual right.
There was NO assertion in 1889 tha the 2nd ammendment was susceptible to a "collective rights" interpretation, and the parties to the contract understood the 2nd ammendment to be consistant with the declared Montana Constitutional right of "any person" to bear arms.
As a bedrock principle of law, a contract must be honred so as to give effect to the intent of the contracting parties. A collective rights decision by the court in Heller would invoke an era a unilaterally revisable contracts by violating the statehood contract between the US and Montana as well as other states such as Idaho, Pennsylvania, Ohio, N. Carolina, Alabama, Wisconsin, New Hampshire, and Georgia.
Numerous Montana lawmakers have concurred in a resolution raising this contract violation issue. It is posted at progunleaders.org. The US would do well to keep its contractual promise to the states that the 2nd Ammendment secures an individual right now as it did upon execution of the statehood contract.
Some Texans have joined the Montana bandwagon due to the recent theft of privately owned farm land taken for the construction of the Texas Corridor.