As I suspect most of you are aware, in Canada the “Freeman-on-the-Land” movement appears to be the predominate ‘flavour’ of anti-state pseudolegal resistance. The prominent gurus of this movement are Robert Arthur Menard and Dean Clifford. Freeman concepts were principally popularized via the World Freeman Society website and forums, though the now defunct FreeManitoba group also made a major contribution.
There are Canadians who call themselves “Sovereign Citizens”, but they are somewhat rare. The other more successful Canadian promoters of anti-state authority concepts fall into the “DeTax Movement”, particularly Russell Porisky, but they have quite discrete ideas that are very distinct from the Freemen.
For some time I have been curious as to whether there are actually conceptual innovations specific to the Freeman-on-the-Land movement, and that are distinct from the precursor U.S. Sovereign Citizen schemes. What I have done below is outline what I believe are the integral, optional, and prohibited memes in the Freeman-on-the-Land scheme. What would be very helpful to me is if those who are more familiar with the Sovereign Citizen movement could identify distinguishing aspects of these two belief sets.
I note in advance that my attempt to ‘distill out’ the Freeman-on-the-Land scheme is almost certainly an approximation. I don’t think I’m saying anything shocking when I observe that Freeman will proclaim utterly contradictory and illogical ideas, and incorporate bits from practically any conspiracy or counter-culture belief set.
Foundational Beliefs:
- 1. Governments are corporations and only have the same legal authority as any other corporation, ie. none unless you enter into a contract with the government.
2. Rules in legislation are strictly optional and can only be enforced if one consents to be subject to legislation. Consent is via contract. Legislation is a form of contract law.
3. An individual has two aspects: a physical “flesh and blood” aspect and a non-corporeal aspect that for convenience I will call a “Strawman”. The Strawman is ‘attached’ to a flesh and blood person by a birth certificate, which is a kind of contract with the government/corporation. (Alternatively, a social insurance number has the same role.)
4. By default, an individual is subject to legislation as the Strawman acts as a link between the individual and government-made legislation. This linkage is via contract law.
5. An individual can sever the Strawman link by voluntarily disavowing the Strawman and associated contracts. Severance is achieved by sending a document demanding that step to government actors. Most commonly this document is named a “Notice of Understanding and Intent, and Claim of Right”.
6. A contract may state as a term that failure to reply within a period of time constitutes acceptance.
[Note – this rule is necessary to make the Notice of Understanding and Intent, and Claim of Right documents work.]
7. Everyone, including corporations and governments, is subject to a kind of law called “Common Law”. Common Law is a freestanding collection of legal concepts independent of court judgments and legislation. Common Law is derived from older or ancient sources, is a kind of natural law, and is defined by texts such as Black’s Law Dictionary (older versions), various collections of legal maxims, and the Magna Carta.
8. Criminal Law is a part of the Common Law, but is not defined by legislation. Criminal Law is restricted to acts that have already caused harm to other individuals or property.
[Note – Freemen do not seem to have a clear position on whether government (as corporations), police, and courts can enforce the Criminal Law facet of the Common Law. Freemen certainly talk about doing that kind of thing themselves, via Common Law police and courts, however they do not seem to have actually taken steps to implement these entities, though see the “C3PO” scheme promoted by Robert Menard: http://c3po.ca ]
9. Courts derive their authority three ways:
- a) by legislation when an individual is still subject to the Strawman link,
b) by mutual agreement of parties who have agreed by contract that the court will mediate their dispute, and
c) to enforce the Criminal Law aspect of the Common Law.
- a) by legislation when an individual is still subject to the Strawman link,
- 1. The Strawman is associated with some kind of secret bank account that can be accessed by Accept for Value / Redemption techniques.
[Note – Accept for Value seems to have been popular earlier in the Freeman movement’s evolution but since no one ever could get it to work this idea has fallen into disrepute. It still shows up, of course, given the tempting nature of free stuff.]
2. It is possible to restrict state action by contract, where state action is not a response to the Criminal Law facet of Common Law. This leads to the Fee Schedule contracts that are directed to state actors and impose various fines for unauthorized (ie. not-Common Law) state actions.
[Note – I have rated this as an optional belief as it is not integral to the Freeman scheme for escaping from state (contract) control. In fact, use of Fee Schedule contracts appears to be nearly universal among Freemen.]
3. It is easy to accidentally re-contract with the government and restore government authority. It is therefore important to avoid any agreement or cooperation with state authorities or the courts.
[Note - I have never seen any clear explanation of whether this would ‘restore’ the Strawman link, or is some kind of separate phenomenon that results from a new contract. This belief appears principally as an explanation of why a Freeman who has supposedly unshackled himself via the Notice of Understanding and Intent, and Claim of Right document was nevertheless subject to state and/or court authority.]
4. Unilaterally disavowing oneself of rules and obligations that flow by the 'Strawman link' does not affect the requirement that governments and government actors continue their legislation-based obligations to the Freeman.
[Note - Naturally this is totally illogical given that Freemen claim the 'Strawman link' is contractual. Severing the contract should seem to nullify state obligation to the now-Freeman. But of course it doesn't.]
- 1. Freemen do not believe that governments derive their authority from Admiralty Law.
[Of course, Admiralty Law and Military Law motifs show up in Freeman materials and arguments, but logically they have no place in the basic belief set, with the possible exception that one could conflate Admiralty Law and contract law as being the same thing, except that Freemen see contract law as a the facet of Common Law.]
2. Freemen do not appear to explicitly derive the Common Law from religious authority or concepts.
[Note - Again, it often comes up.]
As a final proviso, my observations of the UK Freeman branch seems to show that they are evolving some novel ideas that relate to debts, money, and banking. Otherwise, I think this summary applies to them as well.
Very much looking forward to any thoughts and comments by this learned company! Please feel free to suggest other memes that belong on any of the three Freeman concept lists.
SMS Möwe
