No indictment in Eric Garner chokehold death

[cmdrjones]

If rights are a human construction then why are they endowed by our creator which is enshrined in the declaration? You contradict yourself.

Your failure here is assuming that our rights come from our 'creator'. The people who wrote the Declaration believed in one, and believed that their rights derived from him. It was a sentiment of the time, and one that is not reflected in the Constitution apart from the occasional 'in the year of our lord', which is a contemporary form and no indication of belief or disbelief. And while the Declaration of Independence is a lovely document, it does not have legal standing as it has been superseded by the Constitution. It does form a basis for a number of legal decisions upon Constitutional issues, but those are irrelevant to our discussion as the rights we currently have are derived from the Bill of Rights, not the Declaration of Independence.

Even the courts don't have the right to remove your rights otherwise interning Japanese Americans without due process would have been fine.

What do you think a prison sentence is? Removal of the right to liberty, perhaps? Among other things. The internment of Japanese-Americans was certainly injust, probably illegal, and eventually recognized as such; it's a regrettable example of prejudicial action by the nation. If an individual breaks the law, however, they lose their rights.

If I want to carry a Shotgun in public as part of my right to bear arms, then those laws restricting that are unjust. ANy agency that says: you can't defend yourself in our mall/Bank/Post Office" inherently takes the responsibility for defending me upon themselves. Forgive me if my 1st thought is "Fuck that!"

Certainly open carry is legal... unless you start doing something stupid with it, such as threatening police officers in the execution of their duties. That's why armed protestors is a stupid idea, it's only going to result in an even bigger flap than the original protest was. As for inside buildings: If it's private property, the proprietors of that building have a right to regulate what happens inside their property. If it's a government office and it's banned in your state (it's banned in all federal buildings, IIRC), you're breaking the law, regardless of what you think your rights are. There are occasional exemptions for CCW permit holders and what not, but I don't care to take the time to list them. You are free to challenge the ban in court, of course... it's your liberty and property to waste. The fact of the matter is that the law is constructed to (theoretically) protect your rights. In breaking the law, you forfeit your rights and become a criminal. It's up to you.

#1 to your first point, I respectfully disagree. I share the same sentiment, and am of the opinion that the Declaration informs the very purpose of the Constitution. Just because there is a legal case that says the Declaration is invalidated, or superseded doesn't mean that I will necessarily agree that that was a Good Idea.
#2 as far as this paragraph goes, I totally agree, aside from one nitpick: once you start threatening somebody with a weapon it becomes brandishing, which is a crime. Mere bearing arms shouldn't be a crime IMHO. Private property rights I agree with. I don't think it's necessarily WISE to limit others rights on your property, but if people want to be dumb, they can do so.

[cmdrjones]

Listen dude, you can play barely believably stupid internet tough guy or meta barely believably stupid internet tough guy (I hope for the latter) all you want, but the only organization in Europe with the "right" aka "capability" to overthrow the Government of Nazi Germany are the Waffen SS. Period.

Fixed it for you.

The only organization with the "right" to do something is the one with the "capability" to do it?
WOW. Just WOW.

So if the Army of Finland can't defeat the Soviet Union then they don't have the right to fight back?
Oh wait.

[Kamakazie Sith]

You could easily avoid injury by not, you know, carrying out an unlawful arrest?
You're supposed to be a LEO. And yet you seem to be advocating that the police shouldn't be required to abide by the law.

Not once have I called for or even implied that unlawful arrest by police should be decriminalized. I do, however, agree with the logic of the court that the court is the place to "fight" the police and not out on the streets.

[cmdrjones]

You could easily avoid injury by not, you know, carrying out an unlawful arrest?
You're supposed to be a LEO. And yet you seem to be advocating that the police shouldn't be required to abide by the law.

Not once have I called for or even implied that unlawful arrest by police should be decriminalized. I do, however, agree with the logic of the court that the court is the place to "fight" the police and not out on the streets.

It's the best place for it.... I agree, hence my point about our form of government being meant for a moral people. People who are willing to trust the system to provide justice might go along with that. Does that seem to be the case now?

[Flagg]

Listen dude, you can play barely believably stupid internet tough guy or meta barely believably stupid internet tough guy (I hope for the latter) all you want, but the only organization in Europe with the "right" aka "capability" to overthrow the Government of Nazi Germany are the Waffen SS. Period.

Fixed it for you.

The only organization with the "right" to do something is the one with the "capability" to do it?
WOW. Just WOW.

So if the Army of Finland can't defeat the Soviet Union then they don't have the right to fight back?
Oh wait.

[Kamakazie Sith]

You could easily avoid injury by not, you know, carrying out an unlawful arrest?
You're supposed to be a LEO. And yet you seem to be advocating that the police shouldn't be required to abide by the law.

Not once have I called for or even implied that unlawful arrest by police should be decriminalized. I do, however, agree with the logic of the court that the court is the place to "fight" the police and not out on the streets.

It's the best place for it.... I agree, hence my point about our form of government being meant for a moral people. People who are willing to trust the system to provide justice might go along with that. Does that seem to be the case now?

I think we are a long way from a time when it is appropriate to fight the police out on the street. Frankly as long as congress has a 90% re-election rate along with failure of the populace to vote out corrupt or indifferent government officials then I will never support such an idea. The people need to first use the methods that are available to him.

Example - I bet the NY DA that decided on shifting his responsible to a grand jury in the Eric Garner case is re-elected if he runs come next election.

[cmdrjones]

You REally wont let that go will you? You go on and on about the female snipers thing like a dog with a bone, and I think to myself: Why does he keep on bringing this ONE thing up again and again like he's got some kryptonite somewhere, so I looked it up on the other thread (which is a MASSIVE thread derailment BTW and which we shouldn't even be talking about, but hey, WTF, right?)

YOU: How many have you been in?

ME: Combat missions 200+ Ambushes meh, 10 or so... actual fire fights ~3. 1 big one lasting more than an hour.

YOU: How many snipers have you observed in person, female or otherwise? What qualifies you to judge a sniper's competency and behavior? What are your credentials?

ME: Cav scout for 5 years. My lieutenant was a former infantry E6, sniper, sniper instructor and sniper team leader. No I am NOT sniper trained, but I got to observe them and talk with them quite a bit.
Would you like me to explain what a Trash Suit is?

So do you see it? C'mon, you can do it! Notice the relevant phrase is "female or otherwise"? You keep saying that I claimed to have observed female snipers in action and that I admitted that I hadn't, which makes me a liar when YOU put in the phrase "female or otherwise" well, the ones I observed were otherwise, being that there ARE NO FEMALE SNIPERS IN THE US ARMY.

Now, can we move on from this?

oh wait, you never answered my question you "THUNDEROUS CUNT" how many battles have you been in? WHat are your military qualifications?

Note that I won't automatically assume that your reply is a lie... because I don't debate in bad faith right off the bat.

AS for the 3/5th compromise, again it WAS moral to CLAIM that black people were 3/5th of a person FOR THE PURPOSES OF REPRESENTATION in order to KEEP THE SOUTH FROM SECEDING or NEVER SIGNING ON IN THE FIRST PLACE. But it's NOT PERFECT, hence the reason why its' called a COMPROMISE.... YOU DOUCHENOZZLE!!!

And finally, I have already posted on the other thread about my military experience. I feel no need to scan in any military documents or otherwise PROVE a goddam thing to you, who has failed to answer the above questions about YOUR extensive combat experience....

http://forums.spacebattles.com/threads/ ... -1.105699/

Oh yeah, I forgot, I wrote an autobiographical account of one of these non-existent battles in 2006, just to create a plausible backstory! I'm THAT clever that I did this almost 9 years ago, just knowing I'd need it someday!

[cmdrjones]

So you think that the best vision for human freedom we've had is to consider black people 3/5 of a human being? Because that was the founder's vision as well.

It's worse than that. They're counted as 3/5 of a person for demographics purposes, not in terms of actually having 60% of the value of a citizen (which would, treated consistently, mean they still have some rights, that it would be unjust to oppress six blacks for the benefit of three whites, and so on)

Being second-class citizens would be (and was, after 1865) a huge step up from the real status of slaves in the antebellum South.

All because the southern contingent of the Founding Fathers were too determined to keep their slaves for any condemnation of the institution to make it into the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. Which, as moral compromises go, makes the Constitution a pretty damn compromised document, no?

You want a "more moral" document signed by US presidents, go look up the Atlantic Charter. That's before we even go looking elsewhere.

How the Atlantic Charter work out for Poland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Czechoslovakia, Bulgaria, Romania, Yugoslavia and Albania?

It's a fine document no doubt, but hardly perfect.... which is kinda the point.

[Thanas]

To me, "don't start none, won't be none" IS the standard. I am not pro-cop, anti-cop, pro-black or anti-black. I am pro-constitution. Y'know why? Because it is the most inherently pro-freedom document ever created.

LOL. Thanks for the the laugh, I needed that. I can name off hand at least twenty actual documents that are more pro-freedom than the US constitution.

Haven't had much time to post, but if any of these 20 superior documents are supposed to be the supreme law of the land and taken seriously as such, that would be great.

You're in luck then, move to Europe and they will be.

Its the inalienability of rights for people and cultural belief in enforcing this, which seems to set the American constitution apart. Some very oppressive countries have very nice bills of rights, which don't seem to matter except as examples of mass cognitive dissonance.

Your ignorance is showing, read up on other nations.

If rights are a human construction then why are they endowed by our creator which is enshrined in the declaration? You contradict yourself.

Your failure here is assuming that our rights come from our 'creator'. The people who wrote the Declaration believed in one, and believed that their rights derived from him. It was a sentiment of the time, and one that is not reflected in the Constitution apart from the occasional 'in the year of our lord', which is a contemporary form and no indication of belief or disbelief. And while the Declaration of Independence is a lovely document, it does not have legal standing as it has been superseded by the Constitution. It does form a basis for a number of legal decisions upon Constitutional issues, but those are irrelevant to our discussion as the rights we currently have are derived from the Bill of Rights, not the Declaration of Independence.

That is debatable, considering at least a significant number of influential members like Jefferson were atheists or at the very least ambivalent about it.

Yup. Germany is only a free democracy because everybody has free access to nukes and tank battallions and stuff.

The soviet union had democracy too.
Also, if the government of Germany becomes oppressive, do the people reserve the right to remove it?
Oh yeah, they don't.

Oh yeah, they do. In fact, they even spell it out in the German constitution. Even a complete fucktard like you could find out. Go on, try it. I have faith that even you will be able to read words.

I have never said it was perfect, I said it was the MOST perfect.

Citation needed.



Also, as this seems to come up: CmdrJones, you have 72 hours to provide proof of your claims of military service and your military record. Feel free to provide it to any of the admins or supermods. Some of them are even past military members (like Edi). Do it now or I will ban your ass for lying.

[cmdrjones]

That is debatable, considering at least a significant number of influential members like Jefferson were atheists or at the very least ambivalent about it.

Oh yeah, they do. In fact, they even spell it out in the German constitution. Even a complete fucktard like you could find out. Go on, try it. I have faith that even you will be able to read words.

Just like homeschoolers have the right to not have their kids taken away, and anyone can say anything they like regarding the holocaust too right, oh wait...



Also, as this seems to come up: CmdrJones, you have 72 hours to provide proof of your claims of military service and your military record. Feel free to provide it to any of the admins or supermods. Some of them are even past military members (like Edi). Do it now or I will ban your ass for lying. [/quote]


http://www.centerforsecuritypolicy.org/ ... -families/

Being that fuckhead never answered any of MY requests for his military experience, not to mention that the killing the messenger is a logical fallacy anyway...

Don't wait... in fact, it'd be nice if you'd just go ahead and delete everything I've ever posted.

I'd like to talk to Edi then since YOU haven't provided proof of military experience Who are you to adjudicate this?

[Agent Fisher]

Jones, there is a usergroup on this board made up of former and current US military as well as members of militaries from across the world. And Edi is from Finland, where they have conscription, so he had to have served. Or spent 173 days in prison.


Edit:

Never mind, I see you were challenging Thanas.

[cmdrjones]

Jones, there is a usergroup on this board made up of former and current US military as well as members of militaries from across the world. And Edi is from Finland, where they have conscription, so he had to have served. Or spent 173 days in prison.


Edit:

Never mind, I see you were challenging Thanas.

Im sure hes a fine man.
My problem is I was asked about my opinion, I cited my military service as anecdotal evidence. I was asked to be more specific, I was. The I was accused multiple times of being a liar and a general scumbag. That's all well and good. My problem is that once I gave specifics, I asked him to reply in kind and he never did.
I left the discussion on the other thread because it became not about the subject, but about fuckstick following me around like an asshole, and now the same thing here.
Look, we can argue about Why a man died in NY and how the best way to organize society and about founding documents and about all the rest (I admit I've learned a few things on this board and that's why I come) or we can argue about "why cmdrjones is an asshole"
I propose you guys just sticky a "5 minutes of Hate" thread and be done with it.
I stand by my position: I refuse to provide that moron any proof of my military service. It's a fucking insult.
Ban me if you don't like it.
trust me, I'll get over it.

[Metahive]

http://www.centerforsecuritypolicy.org/ ... -families/

You can't ask Cobra Commander here for proof of his military service, those evil ISIS goons will go for his loved ones if he reveals himself. And you know what happened when Spider Man revealed his secret identity, so it's totally legit, goddamit!

BTW, Fox News sourced article, so thumbs down for credibility.

[cmdrjones]

http://www.centerforsecuritypolicy.org/ ... -families/

You can't ask Cobra Commander here for proof of his military service, those evil ISIS goons will go for his loved ones if he reveals himself. And you know what happened when Spider Man revealed his secret identity, so it's totally legit, goddamit!

BTW, Fox News sourced article, so thumbs down for credibility.

Sure I'll send you the FOUO Alaracts I get on this right away.... oh wait... how about NO.

[Gunhead]

Jones, there is a usergroup on this board made up of former and current US military as well as members of militaries from across the world. And Edi is from Finland, where they have conscription, so he had to have served. Or spent 173 days in prison.


Edit:

Never mind, I see you were challenging Thanas.

No actually. There is also a civil service you can do instead of going to the army. About 83% of the eligible males do military service each year.

-Gunhead

[Metahive]

7th cavalry, eh? The regiment infamous for Little Big Horn and the one prominently featured in the warmovie We Were Soldiers. In other words, a highly likely target to get appropriated by uncreative web bullshitters for fake cred. I think it's time for Cobra Commander to announce a strategic withdrawal.

[Flagg]

http://www.centerforsecuritypolicy.org/ ... -families/

You can't ask Cobra Commander here for proof of his military service, those evil ISIS goons will go for his loved ones if he reveals himself. And you know what happened when Spider Man revealed his secret identity, so it's totally legit, goddamit!

BTW, Fox News sourced article, so thumbs down for credibility.

Sure I'll send you the FOUO Alaracts I get on this right away.... oh wait... how about NO.

Because soccer is a healthy sport, Just ask Edi in private what information he needs, give him that information and nothing else, and you won't be permbanned for being a lying scrotum who impersonates idiots (punchlines coming...) who put their lives on the line to protect pot smoking cripples like me.

[Edi]

All right folks, settle down a bit.

I've had a word with cmdrjones and from where I'm standing, I have no reason to question his military service. I don't agree with his views on most issues, but he has been consistent in what he has said of his service and named the unit, time of service and his commanding officer if anyone is dogged enough to go and check that independently.

There is no reason to pull an Axis Kast on him and that is where this thread is fairly rapidly going. Reading what he has posted with a critical eye, all of his claims of combat experience that I have seen are plausible. In case anyone has doubts about the 200 combat missions, 10 ambushes, 3 protracted firefights comment, a patrol counts as a combat mission and outside of ongoing hostilities in hot zones, most patrols are ones where nothing of note happens. His time in Iraq certainly allows for that number of missions.

Time to end the dogpile on that particular issue.

[Ziggy Stardust]

Fair enough. I maintain that his lie about the snipers is reason enough to question his other claims, but if the mods want me to shut the fuck up on the issue, then shut the fuck up I shall.


EDIT: I realize belatedly this post could be interpreted as a lame "get the last word" post, but that wasn't my intention. I mostly wanted to clarify my position, since it may have gotten lost in my longer posts earlier in this thread. I just wanted to make it clear that my crusade against cmdrjones wasn't arbitrary and random, it was specifically a response to his contradictory posts about the snipers that raised my suspicion. Anyway, as Edi said, it's time to end this tangent, I just wanted people to understand my position before we all collectively move on to better things.

[Thanas]

Just like homeschoolers have the right to not have their kids taken away, and anyone can say anything they like regarding the holocaust too right, oh wait...

Oh how about you just shut the fuck up? You claimed there was no right to resistance in the German constitution. There is. Some religious nutjobs deciding to break school law is not the same as the government turning into a tyranny and you know it.

I'd like to talk to Edi then since YOU haven't provided proof of military experience Who are you to adjudicate this?

A supermod on this board you chose to enter and post in. Don't like being challenged? Don't make claims about personal expertise.

[Edi]

Fair enough. I maintain that his lie about the snipers is reason enough to question his other claims, but if the mods want me to shut the fuck up on the issue, then shut the fuck up I shall.


EDIT: I realize belatedly this post could be interpreted as a lame "get the last word" post, but that wasn't my intention. I mostly wanted to clarify my position, since it may have gotten lost in my longer posts earlier in this thread. I just wanted to make it clear that my crusade against cmdrjones wasn't arbitrary and random, it was specifically a response to his contradictory posts about the snipers that raised my suspicion. Anyway, as Edi said, it's time to end this tangent, I just wanted people to understand my position before we all collectively move on to better things.

In reply to this, some of his posts can easily enough be attributed to personal bias on how he sees things, as well as things imperfectly recalled. Human memory is not surveillance video you can play back and get the same result every time. Instead, it is an imperfect reconstruction of an earlier experience. Basically, from a mechanistic point of view, it comes in pieces with a note "Some assembly required", and the results of that assembly can vary over time or due to how a question related to the memory was asked, as well as attitude, bias and other similar not easily quantified factors.

Once the sniper comment is qualified with the above, everything else checks out to within plausible parameters and doesn't set off any red flags, so for my part it is settled.

[Dominus Atheos]

Anyway, cmdrjones' military service and discussions of the US Constitution completely unrelated to Eric Garner, so maybe those discussions should be split?

[General Brock]

Haven't had much time to post, but if any of these 20 superior documents are supposed to be the supreme law of the land and taken seriously as such, that would be great.

You're in luck then, move to Europe and they will be.

Its the inalienability of rights for people and cultural belief in enforcing this, which seems to set the American constitution apart. Some very oppressive countries have very nice bills of rights, which don't seem to matter except as examples of mass cognitive dissonance.

Your ignorance is showing, read up on other nations.

Europe's a big and very diverse place and distilling that complexity into a short post on this topic probably isn't wise, but I'll try.

The Colonial revolutionaries hoped to correct what they saw were the Enlightenment fails of Europe, some of whose nations were very Enlightened, others, not so. How they often went about it wrong under Manifest Destiny way is another topic or even series of topics.

Today, the only other nation that prefaces their constitution with "We, the People" is India. Then they go on to enshrine socialism. Socialist measures that support individual rights are fine, but socialist measures can also deny individual rights (such as nationalist socialism; nazism). The saving grace is that "We, the people" states that India's People are the final arbiter of how to interpret their constitution. Europe generally falls under The European Convention on Human Rights, which is prefaced with "The Governments signatory hereto...".

I'm not an expert on every constitution of every European country, but it seems likely that many play into that same legalistic/philosophical hoodwink; we think government is for the people by the people, but how well does it stand up to reasonable interpretations of what's actually written down as fundamental law (let alone practiced)? There's a running joke about EU referenda; if you don't vote for what they want and win, you've also voted to hold another referendum till you do. The People can be reduced to a rubber stamp; morally wrong, but where's the material law to back that up and what can people do about it when it happens?

The European document(s) have their merits and when times are good work just fine. If their provisions were able to be applied in full inalienable force, certainly competitive with the American. But where they are essentially top-down contracts between the rulers and the ruled, drawing legitimacy from the government, not the governed, as to what is reasonable, that's a lockout on inalienable. A separation of interests between the ruler from the ruled can be exploited in times of crisis against the public good. However good any individual European nation's constitution may be, its still subject to the democratic deficit of the EU, although the United Kingdom and Poland have opted out of the EU Convention on Human Rights. Poland invests sovereign power in the Polish Nation, which can be interpreted far more narrowly than 'the People', but a step up from drawing legitimacy from 'the government', and reflective of the reality that people enforce laws; laws do not enforce themselves.

Framers such as Thomas Jefferson intended that the American constitution be interpreted from the grassroots-up, not just left to a coterie of legal experts and government reps. The People were expected to police the government according to the Constitution. There is supposed to be a balance of power between the governed and the governing body, written and implied in so many words that from some perspectives, is better than what the Europeans have done so far.

Although the U.S. Constitution does not explicitly enshrine a right to revolt, some individual state constitutions do. These state provisions are far more explicit than say Germany or Greece. The right to revolution is part of America's Constitutional tradition as a moral right with means also provided. Notwithstanding the irresponsible folly of shooting up one's own country, the right to keep and bear arms characteristic of a militia is enshrined in the Second Amendment.

These checks, though modern arms may render civilian-legal arms symbolic, against the government's otherwise monopoly of coercive force, make "We, the People" more than just pretty words. Its also notable that the American armed forces are sworn to protect the Constitution, not the Government. There is an organizations called the Oathkeepers all about backing that up.

Without a sentiment like 'We, the People', a charter of rights and freedoms and even the right to revolt (an axiom of natural law) are suspect. The Government (or rather, the minority of persons in office and their patrons) may see its welfare, however petty, as having priority over that of the People, however grave. Elites of the day, in power as government, cannot act independent of popular censure, contrary to the common good, and just plain wrong, or spurn the check-and-balance of legislative, executive and judicial bodies and democratic elections.

Or just ignore a constitution anyway, as the American COG (Continuity of Government) may be doing. That most people seem too intimidated to look at the COG, doesn't change the fact that these apparent actions fail the "We the People" test; the American Revolution was very upfront. Wholehearted support for the COG seems relegated to an aggressive minority, dependent on the fear and ignorance of everyone else for implementation.

COG is predicated on the assumption that the military will act as a “force-multiplier” for local law enforcement, which in this age of militarized policing are already highly-repressive organizations replete with military-grade firepower, but also “less than lethal” weaponry, equipment and “special operations” units better-suited for the battlefield than an urban setting in a typical American city.

While September 11 may have been the “catastrophic and catalyzing event,” referenced by the now-defunct Project for a New American Century, COG planning has been in the works for decades, as were Pentagon blueprints for the invasion and occupation of Central Asia and the Middle East.

Predating 9/11, COG is viewed by elite policy planners as an instrument for the continuity of a repressive national security state, one targeting first and foremost, the American people. COG, as an instrumentality for containing the internal threat, is predicated on defending the [crony] capitalist mode of production and the political/social relations of class society as it enters a period of profound crisis.

So how does all this relate to Eric Garner? Well, its pretty obvious his killers weren't Oathkeepers.

[madd0ct0r]

um Brock, the UK hasn't left the convention on human rights. and of course the EU refers to signatory goverments - it's an international level organisation. Were it to refer directly to the people it'd be a goverment.

that's for starters. sadly I've got to go to work.

[Edi]

The Colonial revolutionaries hoped to correct what they saw were the Enlightenment fails of Europe, some of whose nations were very Enlightened, others, not so. How they often went about it wrong under Manifest Destiny way is another topic or even series of topics.

Today, the only other nation that prefaces their constitution with "We, the People" is India. Then they go on to enshrine socialism. Socialist measures that support individual rights are fine, but socialist measures can also deny individual rights (such as nationalist socialism; nazism). The saving grace is that "We, the people" states that India's People are the final arbiter of how to interpret their constitution. Europe generally falls under The European Convention on Human Rights, which is prefaced with "The Governments signatory hereto...".

I'm not an expert on every constitution of every European country, but it seems likely that many play into that same legalistic/philosophical hoodwink; we think government is for the people by the people, but how well does it stand up to reasonable interpretations of what's actually written down as fundamental law (let alone practiced)? There's a running joke about EU referenda; if you don't vote for what they want and win, you've also voted to hold another referendum till you do. The People can be reduced to a rubber stamp; morally wrong, but where's the material law to back that up and what can people do about it when it happens?

This here quoted bit betrays a fundamental ignorance of the roots of constitutional law, which go far deeper than merely the presence or lack of the words "We the People..." on a written constitution. That phrasing, or its lack, is in the context of western constitutional law, utterly irrelevant.

The roots of constitutional law go as far down as the principles of sovereignty, who and what constitutes a people and what constitutes a sovereign state. Most often the requirements for that are a contiguous geographical area, usually (but not always) with a homogenous population, or a population that has enough in common that it functions as a workable society. That population must be able to exert control over said geographical territory as well. Before you have these factors, you don't even have the basic requirements for statehood and any question of constitutional law is irrelevant.

Once you do have the requirements, you can get down to the business of organizing how that area and its population are governed. There are a number of options, from kingship, warlordism, autocracy, despotism, direct democracy, representative democracy, kingdom with representative democracy etc. If we go by the most common form of government in the west, representative democracy, that has a set of assumptions built in.

The first of those is that a government is only legitimate if it has the consent of the governed, or the majority of the governed at the very least. Every citizen of majority age gets a voice in the determining of the representatives (by whatever electoral method chosen), and the representative body then makes the rules for everyone.

The constitution itself is more or less a set of both data and metadata. It determines what is and is not part of the nation it is intended to form the basis of government. It sets the rules on how the governing bodies (such as the head of state and the legislative body) are constituted. It sets down the rules of how other rules are formulated and how much support they must have to come into effect. Usually it also sets certain limits that cannot be altered by other rules, but which can only be altered by changing the constitution itself. The process of altering the constitution is also one the rules set out in it, since the document cannot be the subordinate to other rules that rely on it as their foundation.

Most European constitutions have a far greater set of rights and liberties as well as protections against certain kinds of behavior enshrined in them than the American constitution, and crucially, many of these protections do not apply only to actions by the government, but also by other citizens and entities under the nation's jurisdiction.

These things are true regardless of the exact wording of each particular constitution. Whether a nation actually follows its written constitution or not is a different matter and does not reside in the realm of the theoretical, but practical (e.g. Soviet Union, China, the former DDR etc.) and if it does not, if the government goes rogue, then getting things back where they are supposed to be usually requires upheaval of some sort, whether violent or not.

You make the same mistake as most Americans, confusing a constitution as a document for the underlying foundational principles, which are taken more or less as assumptions and axioms that underlie the entire construct. Without them, the document has no meaning, purpose or function and collapses in on itself. This confusion and ignorance leads Americans by and large to worship their constitution as if it were a god, and regard it as an object of religion, without any understanding of its underlying principles and assumptions.