WEBVTT NOTE Section VI 1 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:29.000 Section 6 It is no exaggeration but a literal truth to say that by the Constitution, not as I interpret it, but as it is interpreted by those who pretend to administer it, the properties, liberties, and lives of the entire people of the United States are surrendered unreservedly into the hands of men who, it is provided by the Constitution itself, shall never be questioned as to any disposal they make of them. 2 00:00:29.000 --> 00:00:35.760 Thus, the Constitution, Article 1, Section 6, provides that, for any speech or debate 3 00:00:35.760 --> 00:00:41.400 or vote, in either house they, the senators and representatives, shall not be questioned 4 00:00:41.400 --> 00:00:43.060 in any other place. 5 00:00:43.060 --> 00:00:47.680 The whole law-making power is given to these senators and representatives, when acting 6 00:00:47.680 --> 00:00:52.920 by a two-thirds vote, and this provision protects them from all responsibility for the laws 7 00:00:52.920 --> 00:00:54.200 they make. 8 00:00:54.200 --> 00:00:59.500 The Constitution also enables them to secure the execution of all their laws by giving 9 00:00:59.500 --> 00:01:05.200 them power to withhold the salaries of and to impeach and remove all judicial and executive 10 00:01:05.200 --> 00:01:07.840 officers who refuse to execute them. 11 00:01:07.840 --> 00:01:12.360 Thus, the whole power of the government is in their hands, and they are made utterly 12 00:01:12.360 --> 00:01:15.760 irresponsible for the use they make of it. 13 00:01:15.760 --> 00:01:19.400 What is this but absolute, irresponsible power? 14 00:01:19.400 --> 00:01:23.920 It is no answer to this view of the case to say that these men are under oath to use their 15 00:01:23.920 --> 00:01:47.120 Neither is it any answer to this view of the case to say that the particular individuals 16 00:01:47.120 --> 00:01:52.740 holding this power can be changed once in two or six years, for the power of each set 17 00:01:52.740 --> 00:01:56.640 of Men is absolute during the term for which they hold it. 18 00:01:56.640 --> 00:02:01.380 And when they can hold it no longer, they are succeeded only by men whose power will 19 00:02:01.380 --> 00:02:04.860 be equally absolute and irresponsible. 20 00:02:04.860 --> 00:02:09.380 Neither is it any answer to this view of the case to say that the men holding this absolute 21 00:02:09.380 --> 00:02:16.100 irresponsible power must be men chosen by the people, or portions of them, to hold it. 22 00:02:16.100 --> 00:02:21.060 A man is nonetheless a slave because he is allowed to choose a new master once in a term 23 00:02:21.060 --> 00:02:33.180 What makes them slaves is the fact that they now are and are always hereafter to be in 24 00:02:33.180 --> 00:02:40.060 the hands of men whose power over them is and always is to be absolute and irresponsible. 25 00:02:40.060 --> 00:02:45.680 The right of absolute and irresponsible dominion is the right of property, and the right of 26 00:02:45.680 --> 00:02:50.240 of Property is the right of absolute irresponsible dominion. 27 00:02:50.240 --> 00:02:55.160 The two are identical, the one necessarily implying the other. 28 00:02:55.160 --> 00:02:57.660 Neither can exist without the other. 29 00:02:57.660 --> 00:03:04.580 If therefore Congress have that absolute and irresponsible law-making power which the Constitution, 30 00:03:04.580 --> 00:03:10.620 according to their interpretation of it, gives them, it can only be because they own us as 31 00:03:10.620 --> 00:03:11.880 property. 32 00:03:11.880 --> 00:03:17.900 If they own us as property, they are our masters, and their will is our law. 33 00:03:17.900 --> 00:03:23.020 If they do not own us as property, they are not our masters, and their will as such is 34 00:03:23.020 --> 00:03:24.880 of no authority over us. 35 00:03:24.880 --> 00:03:30.580 But these men who claim and exercise this absolute and irresponsible dominion over us 36 00:03:30.580 --> 00:03:36.800 dare not be consistent and claim either to be our masters or to own us as property. 37 00:03:36.800 --> 00:03:42.840 They say they are only our servants, agents, attorneys and representatives, but this declaration 38 00:03:42.840 --> 00:03:46.280 involves an absurdity, a contradiction. 39 00:03:46.280 --> 00:03:52.000 No man can be my servant, agent, attorney or representative and be at the same time 40 00:03:52.000 --> 00:03:57.100 uncontrollable by me and irresponsible to me for his acts. 41 00:03:57.100 --> 00:04:02.080 It is of no importance that I appointed him and put all the power in his hands. 42 00:04:02.080 --> 00:04:08.680 If I made him uncontrollable by me and irresponsible to me, he is no longer my servant, agent, 43 00:04:08.680 --> 00:04:11.340 attorney, or representative. 44 00:04:11.340 --> 00:04:17.980 If I gave him absolute irresponsible power over my property, I gave him the property. 45 00:04:17.980 --> 00:04:24.080 If I gave him absolute irresponsible power over myself, I made him my master and gave 46 00:04:24.080 --> 00:04:31.040 myself to him as a slave, and it is of no importance whether I call him master or servant, 47 00:04:31.040 --> 00:04:59.080 If a man is my servant, agent, or attorney, I necessarily make myself responsible for all 48 00:04:59.080 --> 00:05:03.480 All his acts done within the limits of the power I have entrusted to him. 49 00:05:03.480 --> 00:05:09.080 If I have entrusted him, as my agent, with either absolute power, or any power at all, 50 00:05:09.080 --> 00:05:14.400 over the persons or properties of other men than myself, I thereby necessarily make myself 51 00:05:14.400 --> 00:05:19.440 responsible to those other persons for any injuries he may do them, so long as he acts 52 00:05:19.440 --> 00:05:22.320 within the limits of the power I have granted him. 53 00:05:22.320 --> 00:05:27.400 But no individual who may be injured in his person or property by acts of Congress can 54 00:05:27.400 --> 00:05:32.680 can come to the individual electors and hold them responsible for these acts of their so-called 55 00:05:32.680 --> 00:05:34.960 agents or representatives. 56 00:05:34.960 --> 00:05:39.800 This fact proves that these pretended agents of the people, of everybody, are really the 57 00:05:39.800 --> 00:05:41.820 agents of nobody. 58 00:05:41.820 --> 00:05:47.360 If then, nobody is individually responsible for the acts of Congress, the members of Congress 59 00:05:47.360 --> 00:05:49.280 are nobody's agents. 60 00:05:49.280 --> 00:05:54.140 And if they are nobody's agents, they are themselves individually responsible for their 61 00:05:54.140 --> 00:06:24.140 and for the acts of all whom they employ and the authority they are exercising is simply their own individual authority and by the law of nature the highest of all laws anybody injured by their acts anybody who is deprived by them of his property or his liberty has the same right to hold them individually responsible that he has to hold any other trespasser individually responsible he has the same right to resist them and their 62 00:06:24.140 --> 00:06:28.140 There are agents that he has to resist any other trespassers.