Territorial “states”?

Gangsters–within and without government–fight for territory.
[courtesy Google Images]

A Reader Wonders—Art. 1.10.1 vs. Art. 4.3.2

In the aftermath of that article, some readers have asked for statutory evidence of when those “territorial states” were created by law.

I don’t know where and when these hypothetical “territorial states” were created in law.  If the hypothesis is true, that information remains to be discovered and confirmed.

But if it were true that: 1) the governments of the States of the Union did not become legally insolvent until after both the gold- and silver-based currencies had been removed from domestic circulation; and 2) the last of the silver-based currencies disappeared between A.D. 1964 and A.D. 1968—then it would seem to follow that the governments of the States of the Union didn’t stop functioning until the early 1960s.  Therefore, the hypothetical territorial-state governments did not come to full power until sometime in the early 1960s (when, incidentally, the Viet Nam war was heating up).

This is not to say that the territorial “state” governments suddenly and instantly replaced the former State-of-the-Union governments at specific moment (kinda like flipping a light switch). If a system of territorial-state governments replaced the system of State-of-the-Union governments, the process was probably fairly slow, steady but not sufficiently dramatic to attract public attention. Thus, while the process of supplanting State-of-the-Union governments with territorial-governments must’ve been complete no later than A.D. 1968 (when paper dollars could no longer be redeemed with silver), the process might’ve slowly started as early as A.D. 1933 or even before that.

In other words, although I don’t know when the governments of the States of the Union ceased functioning on a constitutional basis, it couldn’t have been later than A.D. 1968.

This doesn’t mean that these territorial “states” were created in A.D. 1968. It means the governments of the States of the Union would’ve ceased to function no later than A.D. 1968, but might’ve ceased functioning in part or in whole some years earlier.

If the governments of the States of the Union became insolvent for lack of gold or silver money and therefore stopped functioning, the territorial-state governments would supplant them–probably under the guise of an “emergency“.

If my “conspiracy theory” were roughly correct, we could presume that The Powers That Be planned the loss of governments of the States of the Union, and prepared for that loss by creating the territorial “states” some years or even decades before they were really needed. If I had to bet, I’d say the creation of the territorial “states” occurred during the 35 year period between A.D. 1933 (when the gold coins were removed from domestic circulation by executive order of President Roosevelt under the guise of a banking emergency) and A.D. 1968—the last year that the government and/or Federal Reserve redeemed paper dollars with silver dollars.

(Incidentally, I’ve been told that the banking “emergency” of A.D. 1933 continues to this day. How can we have a 81-year long “emergency”?  We elect people to Congress, Senate and Presidency to deal with “emergencies”. I.e., when we have an “emergency” that disrupts our “state” or condition of “peace,” we expect Congress et al, to enact legislation to solve and eliminate that “emergency” and return the nation to a “state of peace”. We do not expect our government to maintain the “state of emergency” for, now, 81 years in order to exploit the American people and strip us of our rights and freedoms. But that’s what’s happened.)

•  In any case, on June 25^th, A.D. 1948, Congress enacted a hoard of legislation under circumstances that some find mysterious and perhaps malicious. Part of that legislation included 28 USC 81-131 which lists the judicial districts of the  “states” and Washington DC.

For example, 28 USC 81 lists “Alabama”; 28 USC 124 lists “Texas”; and 28 USC 131 lists “Wyoming”.  Note that the names of these “states” is as I’ve written in quotes.

These names strike me as odd since I know from the federal Act of March 30, A.D. 1870, that the State of the Union that we casually refer as “Texas” was expressly readmitted to representation in Congress after the Civil War as a State of the Union under the proper name of “The State of Texas“. That name (“The State of Texas”) appears in quotes in the Act of March 30^th, A.D. 1870.

So far as I know, to this day, Article 1.23 of the Texas Code of Criminal Procedure, Rule 15 of the Texas Rules of Civil Procedure refer to “The State of Texas”–also in quotes.  Article IV Section XV of The Constitution of The State of Texas of A.D. 1869, and Article V, Section 12 of The Constitution of The State of Texas of A.D. 1876, indicate that the proper name for the State of the Union that we casually refer to as “Texas” is “The State of Texas”.

I assume that the proper names of the other States of the Union follow the same format that I’ve seen used for “Texas”. If my assumption is correct, the proper name for the States of the Union that we casually refer to as “Alabama” or “Wyoming” would be “The State of Alabama” and “The State of Wyoming”.

If my assumptions are correct, why has Congress passed laws at 28 USC 81-131 that refer to “states” with names like “Alabama,” “Texas,” and “Wyoming” rather than their proper names of “The State of Alabama,” “The State of Texas” and “The State of Wyoming”?

Given that the “states” described at 28 USC 81-131 don’t appear to list the proper names of the each of the States of the Union, is this omission merely due to oversight or mistake?

Could it be that the efficiency of writing “Texas” rather than “The State of Texas” allows the shortened form (“Texas”) to carry the same legal significance and describe the same State of the Union properly known as “The State of Texas”?  Or is the law a matter of linguistic precision where you must say exactly what you mean, and if you faile to express yourself precisely you may lose your claim or case–even if you are in the right?  If efficiency or brevity were a legitimate goal in legalese and provided the rationale for using the shortened form (“Texas”) rather than “The State of Texas” in national laws, why do Texas codes to this day declare that “The style of all writs and criminal process shall be ‘The State of Texas’”?

Is it possible that the name “Texas” (as seen in 28 USC 124) is a name for a “territory of the United States” while the name “The State of Texas” is the proper name for a State of the Union (i.e., a “State of The United States of America“)?

I’m not arguing that the “states” named at 28 USC 81-131 are definitely the territorial-states rather than States of the Union.

I am arguing that the use of the seemingly shortened and improper names of “states” at 28 USC 81-131 could be evidence that the “states” listed at 28 USC 81-131 are something other than the States of the Union and therefore might be a list of the territorial “states”.

And, again, note the date when 28 USC 81-131 was first enacted: June 25^th, A.D. 1948—about midway between the A.D. 1933 loss of gold coins from domestic circulation and the A.D. 1968 loss of silver.  The “creation” of these what may be “statutory states” would therefore be ready and waiting for use as “territorial states” when the silver coins were removed from circulation in the 1960s.

The previous analysis is almost purely hypothetical. I can’t yet argue that my conclusions are correct. But I am arguing that my conclusions are, so far, plausible.

• It occurs to me that one way we might be able to discover approximately when territorial-state governments replaced State-of-the-Union governments would be to search state archives for any state statutes that allowed the particular state and/or state government to transact its business with fiat dollars (FRNs) rather than gold and silver coin mandated by Article 1.10.1 of the Constitution of the United States.  If there were state statutes that allowed the use of FRNs, those statutes would probably correspond closely to the moment when the government of that State of the Union was “officially” supplanted by a territorial government.

If one of us found such statute at, say, Texas, and another found a similar statute at, say, Ohio, and a third found another similar statute at, say, California—and if all three state statutes were enacted at roughly the same time—then we’d have decent evidence of the time when the territorial state governments first started to function and were enabled to conduct business with FRNs.