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Back to Table of Contents, A Declaration of Universal Rights

Article 5 — Civil Government

Section 4: Separation Of Legislative, Executive, And Judicial Departments

The legislative, executive and judicial branches shall be separate and distinct, each only exercis­ing their respective powers.

This section follows the separation of powers noted in Isaiah 33:22 which indicates legislative, judicial and executive types of civil power. See also Article 2, Section 4.

Section 5: Government By Consent; Citizenship

A people have the immutable right to establish themselves as a nation and to form their govern­ment by their own consent. All citizens of that nation, by either birth or naturalization, who are of lawful age have the right of suffrage. All elections shall be without charge and no person shall be taxed, or deprived of, or damaged in their property without their own consent.

The rule outlined in this section is that a people have the right to establish a nation and form of civil gov­ernment. The immutable right of civil government by consent is not the right to vote for the various individu­als whom they desire to retain as their civil agents. The right to vote is not a universal right, but appertains only to citizenship. Once a nation and form of government are established, only its citizens may vote, but the rule is that all must be free to vote on an equal basis. There can be no other factor except citizenship, and citi­zenship is a function of birth in the nation or naturalization. Citizenship is not an universal right, nor is vot­ing. Naturalization involves conferring on an alien the compact rights and privileges of the nation. Compact rights are those rights which the civil government may give or revoke and are possessed in addition to the im­mutable rights possessed by all men, whether alien, denizen or citizen. See also Article 5, Section 3 commen­tary for further discussion of compact rights.

Section 6: Laws Should Not Be Suspended

All power of suspending laws, or the execution of laws, by any authority, without consent of the representatives of the people according to law, is injurious to their rights, and shall not be exercised.