<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>... that there is a mysterious Original Thirteenth Amendment which revokes the citizenship of anyone using a title of nobility and that this refers to lawyers, and thereby the judges, prosecutors, and even the Congressmen who enacted the law are not citizens and couldn't do anything to the
nitwit. D.A. Anderson v. US (ND IL unpub 4/27/98)("These arguments may be amusing to some but are meritless and must be rejected"); suing to "restore the 'missing' Thirteenth Amendment to the US Constitution", and have copies of this revised Constitution sent "to all homes, prisons, hospitals
and churches nationwide" and for $385 Million in damages; suit dismissed and an appeal in forma pauperis would not be taken in good faith because meritless. Smith v. US President (D. Conn unpub 11/6/96) in Conn. Law Tribune, 12/2/96; {This is a very widespread myth among the militia movement, evidently dating from around 1980, and apparently begun by David Dodge (apparently of Miami) who calls himself an "archival research expert" and seems otherwise to be unknown, and Alfred Adask (of Dallas) who publishes amateurish quasi-legal advice in a magazine warmly titled "Anti-Shyster". They have "discovered" that in 1810 the Congress proposed a Thirteenth Amendment (the Twelfth having been adopted in 1804) to the effect that "If any citizen ... shall accept, claim, receive or retain any title of nobility or honor ... from any emperor, king, prince or foreign power, such person shall cease to be a citizen ... and shall be incapable of holding any office ... or either of them". This proposal is appended to some editions of the Constitution as an unratified proposal. The nitwits, however, insist that it was adopted ... and to do so they insist on very dubious evidence, the very opposite of the methodology some of the same nitwits use to argue that the 16th Amendment (income tax) was not adopted. This 1810 proposal was inspired by the instance of Elizabeth Patterson, a Baltimore socialite who, in 1803, apparently married the brother of the
Emperor Napoleon and insisted on being identified as a duchess (the bona fides of her alleged marriage were eventually disputed by the Bonaparte family, which eventually obtained a divorce); the story is told in "The Phantom Amendment & the Duchess of Baltimore" by W.H. Earle, American History Illustrated, November 1987. The proposed amendment had accumulated only 12 state ratifications, the last in December 1812 by which time it would have required 14 to be
adopted. However, in 1815 there was published by Bioren & Duane of Philadelphia, under a government contract, a five volume set titled "Laws of the United States", which printed the proposal as "Article 13" immediately following the authentic 11th and 12th Amendments on page 74 of the first volume; however more than 75 pages earlier, in the volume's introduction, the editors had
cautioned (on page ix), "There had been some difficulty in ascertaining whether the amendment proposed, which is stated as the thirteenth, has or has not been adopted by a sufficient number of the state legislatures.... It has been considered best, however, to publish the proposed amendment in its proper place, as if it had been adopted, with this explanation, to prevent misconception." It thereafter appears that several editors or publishers of other editions of the US Constitution relied on the Bioren & Duane edition when working up their own texts of the Constitution (sometimes mentioning the Bioren & Duane edition by name as their source) but missed this editorial caution and thereby were misled into including this 1810 proposal as if it had been adopted. The story is told in
"The Case of the Phantom Thirteenth Amendment: A historical and bibliographic nightmare" by Curt E. Conklin, 88 Law Library Journal 121 (winter 1996). The inclusion of this phantom 13th Amendment is, in fact, virtually the only noteworthy characteristic of the Bioren & Duane edition, as shown in its lengthy description in the Checklist of United States Public Documents (1911) p.964. Of course, the mere fact that a typographic error occurs in an officially published lawbook does not elevate that error to the status of a valid law; Pease v. Peck (1856) 59 US (18 How.) 595 at 596-597, 15 L.Ed 518 at 519; City of Atlanta v. Gate City Gas Light Co. (1883) 71 Ga 106 at 119. In 1813, the Secretary of State, James Monroe, sent a circular letter to all the governors
inquiring about further ratifications of this proposed amendment, without result. However, in 1817, the House of Representatives arranged to have a pocket edition of the Constitution printed up for distribution and when these copies arrived containing the so-called Thirteenth Amendment, the House on the last day of 1817 formally asked the President for verification of whether this was validly part of the Constitution. The President, James Monroe, presented the House with two reports of his Secretary of State, John Quincy Adams, which confirmed that there had been only twelve state ratifications, an insufficient number for adoption, and these were published as Messages from the President on February 6, and March 2, 1818. The Congress was apparently satisfied with
these reports and thereafter this 1810 proposal never again appears as part of the Constitution in any edition published by any part of the federal government. On April 20, 1818 Congress enacted a law making the Secretary of State responsible for accumulating the state ratifications of proposed amendments and announcing when these are sufficient for adoption (in 1951 this responsibility was shifted to the head of the National Archives). Dodge, Adask, and others allege some great but vague conspiracy caused this "original" 13th amendment to vanish from the books by the time the genuine 13th Amendment (the abolition of slavery) was proposed in 1865, but they are very vague
about the date this occurred. Of course, it would require more than just the appearance of new editions omitting the 1810 proposal to accomplish this if the 1810 proposal had ever been a genuine part of the Constitution, since too many adults would have remembered it despite new editions. Yet the silence is deafening; no one protested the 1865 anti-slavery amendment on the grounds that
there already was a 13th Amendment dating from 1810. Working backwards, in 1861 Congress had proposed an entirely different amendment (which was not adopted) with the title of "Thirteenth" and nobody protested the numbering then. In 1847, Supreme Court Associate Justice Levi Woodbury wrote there were "only twelve amendments ever made to" the Constitution, and nobody quibbled
with his numbers; Waring v. Clarke (1847) 46 US (5 How.) 441 at 493, 12 L.Ed. 226 at 251
(dissent). In 1845 Congress authorized the Boston publishing house of Little & Brown to publish a collection of federal laws to replace the 1815 Bioren & Duane edition, this was the Statutes at Large, whose printing has been continued to this day by the government; in this 1845 edition the Constitution stops at 12 amendments and the 1810 proposal is several volumes away as merely a Congressional resolution. In 1833, Associate Justice Joseph Story of the US Supreme Court
published his Commentaries onthe Constitution, which included a text of the Constitution with only 12 amendments and the clear statement that there have been only twelve amendments (sec. 959) and further that the 1810 proposal had not been adopted "probably from a growing sense that it is
wholly unnecessary" (sec. 1346). There is no known state or federal court decision treating the 1810 proposal as a bona fide part of the Constitution, nor did Congress ever enact any enabling legislation for it (which would have been necessary, for example to determine which of the three penalties to impose). The phantom amendment is not known to have appeared in more than two or three dozen books, out of literally thousands, that purport to reprint the Constitution, and these dropped off very sharply after 1845 when the Statutes at Large first appeared. Since then, the US Supreme Court very explicitly described the 1810 proposal as unadopted, in Dillon v. Gloss (1921) 256 US 368 at 375, and in a dissenting opinion of two justices in Coleman v. Miller (1939) 307 US 433 at 472, and in some detail in a dissenting opinion of four justices in Afroyim v. Rusk (1967) 387 US 253 at 277-278. It appears that the Congress determined in 1992, when the 27th Amendment
(on Congressional pay raises) was declared adopted, that the 1810 proposal had lapsed and was no longer capable of being ratified (cf. speech of Sen. Terry Sanford, D-NC, in Cong.Rec., daily ed., May 20, 1992, p. S-6949 col.3). On the other hand, Dodge, Adask, and other propagandists claim that the mere fact that this 1810 text, derived from Bioren & Duane, appeared in collections of laws
that had been issued by various state governments constituted that state's formal ratification of the proposed amendment. This is clearly contrary to the Pease and City of Atlanta decisions already mentioned. Why do they go to all this trouble? Because they then argue that lawyers cannot be US
citizens because esquire is a title of nobility from a foreign power -- Adask goes further and includes bankers in this disenfranchising although he cannot explain what title is involved in banking -- and they provide strange and absurd explanations for the significance of esquire and how lawyers
could get it from a foreign king. Of course, all along the real Constitution has forbidden the federal and state governments from issuing titles of nobility, and since law schools and court systems are subsidized and supervised by federal and state governments you'd think these nitwits would have tried to make a fuss about a domestic title of nobility, but no, they have to stretch for something that's not part of the Constitution. More recently, in Alabama, a militia-movement couple who shot a policeman to death have been claiming that this Phantom Amendment makes it impossible for a judge and prosecutor to put them on trial; cf. Associated Press report, "Death row couple take aim at system" by Michael Pearson, 2 Sept 1996, and printed in the Houston Chronicle, 1 Sept 96; L.A. Times, 8 Sept 96; Ft Worth Star Telegram, 8 Sept 96, et al.; claiming that a lawyer’s use of "esquire" is somehow a title of nobility: US v. Frech (10th Cir unpub 6/16/98) 149 F3d 1192(t);
Wright v. Leasecomm Corp. (MD Fla 1993) 817 F.Supp 106; or that lawyers (and judges) are, by virtue of their law degree or admission to the bar, "enfranchised creatures of the law" and thereby "are without standing in this court or any court of this land!" R.E. Goode v. Sumner County Commissioners (D.Kan unpub 2/17/95); -- this overlooks the explicit statements in Blackstone's Commentaries & Stephen's Commentaries that Esquire is a title of commonalty and not of nobility
and carries none of the characteristics or privileges of nobility, and the statement in Noah Webster's 1828 American Dictionary that "In the United States, the title ... is bestowed on any person at pleasure, and contains no definite description. It is merely an expression of respect." See also the unabridged Oxford English Dictionary for its entries on "esquire" and especially "esquiress". For the past three centuries (at least) there is no instance of the British monarch "bestowing" an Esquire on
anyone, and the British courts have held that the title is altogether unregulated and anyone can adopt it at whim. Stephen's Commentaries on the Laws of England ranks it, emulating Blackstone's editors, between "gentleman" and "doctor", neither of those being either nobility nor bestowed by
royalty. Apparently it became a mark of distinction for lawyers at a time when, and because, the lawyers had no academic titles or degrees to put either in front or after their names, and the Oxford English Dictionary notes that it is used only with the full name and without any other embellishments
(e.g., Mr., Dr., Hon., Rev., LL.B., J.D., Ph.D.). Approximately the late 17th century in England it was taken up by "outer barristers", those trial lawyers who, being junior grade, were not entitled to put KC (Kings Counsel) or QC after their names, but there are a couple of 18th century British
court decisions indicating that the use of 'Esquire" is expected or required of all grades of barristers, and evidently QCs still use "Esq." . Altho there is no law regulating the use of Esquire in the US, in
several prosecutions for unauthorized practice of law the fact that the defendant was attaching "esq." to his name while doing whatever he was not supposed to do is treated as further evidence of holding himself out as a lawyer; e.g. In re contempt of Mittower (Ind.Supm 1998) 693 NE2d 555; Florida Bar v. Gordon (Fla.Supm 1995) 661 So.2d 295; In re Wm. Patton (ED Penn unpub 11/6/98); altho one defendant argued, and the court appeared willing to concede, that "esq." related to his graduation from law school and did not necessarily imply passing the bar exam or practicing law. In re Apollon (1997) 233 App.Div.2d 95, 662 NYS2d 815; and in allowing prison officials to examine letters from unknown persons whose return addresses include "esq" the court evidently conceded
that the use of "esq" was unregulated. Deutsch v. US Dept of Justice (DDC 1995) 881 F.Supp 49 aff'd 320 US App DC 323, 93 F3d 986. In 1863 the Arkansas Supreme Court said that Esquire was applied "not infrequently to officers of all grades, to attorneys at law, and sometimes bestowed upon persons at pleasure as an expression of respect." Christian v. Ashley County (1863) 24 Ark 142 at 151, and quoted in the definition of Esquire in the old (1920) Corpus Juris. Bouvier's Law Dictionary says, "No one is entitled to it by law, and therefore it confers no distinction in law." -- and Bouvier's adds that the proposed 1810 amendment was never adopted. Adask and other have suggested, without the slightest evidence, that the founders of the Republic distrusted and detested the use of
"esquire" and regarded it as indicative of ties to the British monarch, but in fact the Articles of Confederation of 1781 contained (Art. VI) a prohibition of titles of nobility, and while it was in force
various of the founding fathers addressed each other in official documents and letters as "esquire". Instead of despising trained lawyers, the founders enacted laws requiring trained lawyers -- such as requiring the Attorney General to be "learned in the law", in the Judiciary Act of 1789, 1 Stat 93. In
attempting to relate the American lawyer's use of "esquire" to a monarch, Adask and Dodge have concocted a fantasy that all American lawyers are members of the International Bar Association, which they claim was established by King George III at an unspecified date before the American
Revolution, but it is an undeniable fact that the International Bar Assn was not established until 1947 and that it consists of fewer than 18000 members, only a small portion of them American. They also assume that an individual's admission to the bar is controlled by the American Bar Association and that somehow each new lawyer gets a document or goes through a ceremony which confers the "esquire" on him. More recently this myth has been debunked in The" Missing Thirteenth Amendment": Constitutional Nonsense and Titles of Nobility by Jol A. Silversmith, 8 Southern Calif. Interdisciplinary Law Jrnl 577 (spring 1999) }[/quote]
I'll see if I can dig up the URL for this.
LawDog
[This message has been edited by LawDog (edited March 25, 2000).]
