PURPOSE & HISTORY
The founding fathers wrote extensively on the need for an educated citizenry, because
Citizen participation is required to enable the proper functioning of the republic,
an uneducated citizenry defaults to looking for powerful “leaders” to solve their problems, and
uneducated "leaders" lead the people and themselves to the slaughter.
Thomas Jefferson puts it this way:
“Who will govern the governors? There is only one force in the nation that can be depended upon to keep the government pure and the governors honest, and that is the people themselves. They alone, if well informed, are capable of preventing the corruption of power, and restoring the nation to its rightful course if it should go astray. They alone are the safest depository of the ultimate powers of government”
America is a Common Law a/k/a Natural Law Republic. The only laws truly binding on any People are the Laws of Nature and Nature’s God. The People live by custom and usage. That is Common Law. Ask someone, "Have you ever read any of the laws?” Probably not, unless s/he's an attorney. People live by their basic sense of right and wrong, not because they read a rule somewhere. People do not need a law to tell them not to harm another, steal, lie, and so on. You feel it in your heart when you break the law.
When the colonies separated from England, King George retaliated by revoking the charters. Technically, the colonies were without any legal authority to operate. However, civics was generally taught and known by the People. They asserted their rights and maintained order by applying the common law. The People united in the form of committees of correspondence (known by various names) and common law grand juries and continued the functioning of government.
"The people of this State, as the successors of its former sovereign, are entitled to all the rights which formerly belonged to the King by his prerogative." Lansing v. Smith, 4 Wend. 9 (N.Y.) (1829), 21 Am.Dec. 89 10C Const. Law Sec. 29
As the legislatures matured, they slowly increased governmental power while simultaneously reduced personal sovereign power. They passed pro-government legislation. People grew pre-occupied and complacent, allowing their servants to take power beyond the bounds of the contract they swore to uphold. Legislatures reduced, then eliminated civics education. Today, hardly anyone even knows the meaning of the word "civics."
The only way for us to have government by consent is if the People are properly educated in civics, the branch of political philosophy concerned with individual rights. Supreme political power is inherent in the People, but they must be sufficiently educated in order to exercise that power.
If the People continue to neglect to identify with our founding fathers and their foundational instructions in Law, we will lose the blessings of liberty and become just like any other godless republic destined to collapse under despotic rule.
If we forget that we are ruled by God, we will fall under rule by men.
You are here to remember who you are, where you came from, and why you are here. You have come to understand that something must be done, so it has become your duty to revive liberty’s flame and spread knowledge of this truth so that we may have government by consent.