Are people property?

Is the United States going into a new era of slavery, and dragging the world along in its wake? A question such as this seems ludicrous at first glance, not worthy of a second thought, but.. wait. What is slavery anyway?

International law defines slavery as any practice by which a person exercises any or all of the powers of ownership over any other person. Those powers of ownership, in the legal realm, are powers of dominion and control, powers of alienation (as the legal term of transfer), lease, lien, and severance.

But how does this affect our understanding of slavery? Severance is the power to remove from the property parts of that real property (such as a tree, or rock thereupon) and transfer ownership in full or part to that part of real property. Lien is the ability to transfer the use or nominal control of a property for a fee paid to the owner, with the understanding that failure to pay that fee results in the return of that property to the owner. Alienation is an absolute transference of the property (to alienate or make alien to the original owner) and placing all such property rights in another. Dominion is absolute control over the property, the ability to do whatever one might wish with it. Control is part of that dominion, an exercise of the power of dominion, rather than its mere presence.

These things all are keys to property. They are the fundamental powers involved in all legal property litigation in the United States. One exercises dominion and control by refusing the use of one's property to another, or by allowing it with a simple or complex fee, or contractual obligation. Some properties, however, are considered inalienable, i.e. the possessor has no property rights allowing that transfer of property. These properties are held in trust, or have been vested in such a way that the powers to transferal are also specifically denied in the absolute property grant.

One of the tenets of real property, and personal property, is that once an absolute investiture of property is granted, no subsequent legislation, or court case may take it away. Those absolute investitures are mandated by both common law, criminal law, and civil law as being untouchable by later decisions, save for fraud, coercion, or actual malice in such a transfer.

Such were the investitures of our recognized, legal, civil, and human rights in the United States. They were not created by the constitution, as they existed, arguably, as a recognized legal property before it. These rights, these 'inalienable' rights, were invested absolutely in each individual as a part of the protected property established before that constitutional contract, and recognized therein as being untouchable by our legislatures.

But what does this have to do with slavery either? There is something about property that we all recognize, but rarely think about consciously. When we own property, we have to have proof that we own it. In the old days, they marked property with owner's marks, brands, stained with ink, burned with acid or etched into steel or flesh. Today, we mark our properties with registries, numbers and information unique to the property.

It is via those registration marks that we establish our dominion, control, and proprietor's right to that property. If our vehicles' VIN number does not match the information within our title to the property, we cannot exercise that dominion and control over that vehicle within a court of law, and no court of law will accede to our property interest, no matter how well vested, within it.

We do the same, however, with people. Just as we branded them, in the past, we brand them today, with registries, with numbers, allowing others to exercise dominion and control over their lives. With blandishments, apparently reasonable and proper, we tend to look away as more and more of our lives are signed over to others. We allow people to rent driver's licenses, for a period dependent upon the state, which establish our legal identity in the land. We register ourselves with numbers, for instance, our 'social security' number, unique to us, and an identifying mark allowing others to garnish the fruits of our labors, and the sweat off our brows, and in our name, to place us in debt and tax us.

We register our dogs, our cars, and our property, not our people. We place liens on property, not on people. We register things... not people. How can something be civil, and regulatory, creating a registry that does not affect the transfer of a tangible good or property, but that of an intangible? The intangible in question is life itself. How can we allow others to exercise that dominion and control over ourselves, our children, our children's children, and in the name of 'prosperity' or 'safety' or anything else, exercise that dominion and control, that assize of property gains, the registration that turns us into chattel?

But yet, we can look over, and say 'At least I don't have it as bad as the felon/sex offender/murderer'. But do we? We can, at this very date, have our properties seized on any pretense, have our homes, our bank accounts, our monies, and all real property within the United States seized with no recompense, no remuneration, and no consideration by people that do not answer to our will. Our position is precarious, inherently insecure, and the government claims the power to remove not only our ability to live, but our ability to complain, and even our ability to resist their actions.

In 1650, the first step in disarming the British was not to ban weapons for the purpose of protecting the Crown, but to ban them for the purpose of protecting the game and reducing crime. Today, the only people who may legally own arms in Britain are the British Army and security forces. They, however, have no duty to the individual taxpayer or individual safety, but to some intangible higher law.

We register the whereabouts of our criminals and our citizens, create databases to track them, then regulate further upon what we discover. The term 'to regulate' has become synonymous with 'to ban or control', but it was not always thus. It was originally 'to make operate smoothly' 'to make hit the aim point' or 'to operate within specified bounds'. To regulate a clock, you'd shave minute amounts from the pendulum, to alter the time required in its swing until it matched a reference point. To regulate a rifle, you'd test it to ensure its point of aim, firing, and such were all reliable. One regulated by rules, but no such rule had any punishment other than fine and public censure. It was a remedial system, not a punitive one.

But yet, we claim the power to imprison now with our regulation, the power to seize intangible properties immutably vested in the people, the protected property interest in their own self-defense, their lives, and even in property itself.

Can you claim not to be a slave, if they can come, without discussion, and dictate to you in your own home how you shall live? If they can tell you what you must eat, how much exercise you must do, are you still free? If they can tell you how you must speak, how you must raise your biological children, determine how much you must pay to exercise any such inalienable property right, who owns you?

Is it not an exercise of dominion and control to force a person into a 'contractual' agreement from which they cannot extricate themselves, and could not refuse to sign without facing jail terms? Is it a power of free agency and will to be told how one must pray, or where? Is it not an exercise of dominion and control to force a person, against their own will, interests, and at the cost of their own life to exposed themselves to ruin?

And is it not an exercise of dominion, and control, of the powers of ownership to declare that they must work, and exercise all the duties of a citizen, but have none of the rights of citizenship, or even human rights? Is it not an exercise in disposition to declare that they have no recourse for such a 'civil' act? Is it not an exercise in the power of severance to declare that the properties inherent in the person are no longer their own, but to be sold for the benefit of others?

Where are registries taking us, as a nation, and as a world, and is such a world truly one that we would wish to live in?

Not one I'd wish to live in, even spoken as a self-proclaimed, and recognized total idiot.