-- all citizens are obligated to support the Constitution, as our oath of citizenship makes clear.
Natural-born citizens, like me, never take that oath.
Very few would refuse. I'd like to see an amendment that taking the oath be a prerequisite to voting for candidates to national office.
When you say I'm "obligated," you're back to talking about a contract I never signed.
Would you refuse? Ever served on a jury? Voted? If so, you've exercised some of the duties of citizenship.
It happens that, as part of my church's beliefs, I have never done either of those things. I'm also a conscientious objector.
That explains a lot. Thanks.
And before you get all righteous about it, please recall, as I said earlier, that colonial America was perfectly lousy with Quakers. Tommy Jefferson was OK with it, so you should be too.
Yep, you don't like our Constitutional social contract?
Never said I didn't like it; in fact I'm quite fond of it, and have already demonstrated that, despite my disagreements, I'm much closer to the original intent than you are.
Dream on. I've actually defended it. You refuse.
However, as for the "social contract" part, I remark that the Constitution isn't one of those, seeing as I've proven there's no such thing.
Again, you're begging. -- Poor logic.
-- You are a US citizen by birth, but you are free to renounce your citizenship when you are no longer a child.
Which, if you actually learn something about contracts of adhesion, is not a valid contractual arrangement. It's difficult discussing the subject with you, if you won't inform yourself on any relevant aspect of the subject. Contracts of adhesion are limited in certain critical ways, and here I'm talking about actual US law. Most importantly, in US law any presumption or doubt is resolved against the adhesing party. One great-big gonzo doubt is that "I could not have entered such a contract, on the grounds that I wasn't even legally a person at the time." But the part that you're missing is extremely fundamental. Namely, if a "social contract" is indeed a contract, then I come under it by means of some sort of agreement between myself and another party. I can't possibly make that agreement as a newborn, and more than a mongoose can ever make such an agreement.
Your parents made it for you. -- and theirs for them, back to the founders. -- Anyone can renounce citizenship.
Yet I'm deemed to be subject to that "contract" from the moment I'm born.
Yes, you are a part of our Constitutional contract from birth. - Most people are proud.
Thus, a "social contract," even if it exists, is not a contract. QED
People are deported every day, for a multitude of reasons.
Your proof? Hint: don't wear yourself out! Afroyim v Rusk found that no citizen may ever be involuntarily stripped of his citizenship. This applies equally to natural and naturalized citizens.
Thanks for the Afroyim cite, interesting case. I see you've studied this subject in detail.
The deportation of non-citizens, of course, has nothing to do with any "social contract" binding citizens.
I'm arguing the humans are mammals that make social contracts.
And I'm countering with the observation that mongooses have similar social arrangements, and yet clearly do not make social contracts.
Apples & oranges. Our Constitution is a detailed social contract; mongoose 'social arrangements' have no similarities.
The apes from which we sprang had social groups, but did not make social contracts. The conclusion follows that human social groupings are a product of evolution, pre-dating the development of sentience, and therefore cannot possibly be the result of a social contract. Get it?
No, -- your 'following' conclusion is illogical nonsense.. No one 'gets it'.
-- man has had social contracts for a long time. You shot your own foot again izzy.
You're failing to notice how long! Man has had "social contracts" ever since he was a gerbil-like rodent hiding from the dinosaurs. This proves that no "contract" was involved, unless gerbil-like rodents can now make contracts.
Gerbils? Good lord izzy. Get a grip.
That explains a lot. Thanks.Actually, it doesn't--but I'm sure it tempts you to draw all sorts of unwarranted conclusions. What else is new?
Your parents made it for you. -- and theirs for them, back to the founders.
I can't sign a contract for you. You can't sign one for me. I can't sign one for my parents, and they can't sign one for me. That's how contracts work. You are proving my point: the "social contract," if there is such a thing, is most certainly not a contract.
Apples & oranges. Our Constitution is a detailed social contract; mongoose 'social arrangements' have no similarities.
On the contrary, the Constitution is hardly the first "social contract"; in fact Thomas Hobbes died more than a century before the Constitution was written. His "social contracts" include tribal arrangements of the sort formed by stone-age man... which are exactly analogous to mongoose social arrangements.
Gerbils? Good lord izzy. Get a grip.
The earliest known placental mammal lived 75 million years ago, and resembled a shrew. Here's an artist's reconstruction from fossil evidence:
That creature undoubtedly had social groupings, given that it gave birth to live babies that it then nursed. So not only did man have social groupings; so did our earliest mammalian ancestor, which as I've remarked resembled a gerbil. That's not the earliest example, however: evidence from dinosaur tracks suggests that they also had social groupings, which in turn suggests that a common ancestor of dinosaurs and mammals also had social groupings. So social contracts predate man even in his "gerbil" phase, back when he was an amphibious amniote some 350 million years ago.