The Queen has more power over British law than we thought

> Yes but the converse is also true, claiming that something is being done as an unfair punishment, as an argument against it.

No, in this particular case, it can only be claimed if there be no law against it.

The principle is quite simple: no man can be punished for any act that was not illegal when he committed it, no matter the act.

No matter how unfair the punishment, if it were indeed legal as he committed the act, the argument cannot be raised.

> In this case, it's also worth noting that most of the monarchy's private assets are vast amounts of property and land, of which they are the landlords. The state seizing and administering this property for the benefit of the country, rather than to perpetually enrich this elite, is a public good.

Perhaps it is, and the same argument can be made for seizing the property of the very rich, but this is entirely unrelated.

The difference is that a new law can be passed that the rich should surrender their property, and if they not do so, then they commit a crime, at the time it is so written in the law books.

Likewise, the former monarchs can be punished for being unwilling to surrender their power if ever the law change, and it no longer permit them to monarch; — they simply cannot be punished for their time as monarch when this was still legal, under this scheme.

> Rather than taking this to be a punishment on the royals, consider it an anti-punishment on the people afflicted by their predatory rent-seeking behaviour.

The argument was about their exile, not their assets being seized.

Their assets can easily be seized without any retroactive application of the law.

Of course, if the new law target only the former monarchs, and not every similarly wealthy man, then it goes against the other human right of fair justice and æquality before the law.

You appear to have imagined that I suggested there is one and only one narrow motivation for Presidents/monarchists regarding their own personal wealth and that single narrow motivation would be the only thing impacting their behavior. I made no such suggestion. Therefore all of your extrapolations are invalid.

How are rich families still having a significantly larger influence over our societies in the 21st Century? This is inexcusable. It's like we traded lords and nobles for politicians bought and sold by lords and nobles.

Beg you pardon, but note page 7, question 2, and I quote:

>The United States, under its Constitution, is a federal, represent- ative, democratic republic, an indivisible union of 50 sovereign States. With the exception of town meetings, a form of pure democ- racy, we have at the local, state, and national levels a government which is: ‘‘federal’’ because power is shared among these three lev- els; ‘‘democratic’’ because the people govern themselves and have the means to control the government; and ‘‘republic’’ because the people choose elected delegates by free and secret ballot.

Nowhere does it say it is a representative democracy, but it does state there is the occasional town meeting which is purely democratic in nature.

It explicitly states a republic with a democratic character, specifically in the sense whereby the democratic part refers to that character by which the people are the ultimate source of control over the government.

Props for the citations though. I had to check. Also, note that Congressional Resolutions are a glorified instance of "Hey voters, we have an opinion!" and are largely irrelevant to anyone that actually is already a citizen. Many would prefer that Congress spend more time not making resolutions, and more time solving actual problems.

Now your 0th source is interesting, and I see no indication of when that document entered circulation. However, depending on the administration in power, or who has approval authority, it's best to just kind of average things out based on what you're trying to do.

Though note, if this document is part of the process of becoming a citizen, this is taking surprising liberties with more foundational documents, and shown to the right representative in a bad enough mood, that it may ruin a civil servant's day by having to be rewritten. It's a back and forth sort of thing.

In short, try not to take it too seriously, like those of us that obsess over documents do. It just leads to migraines and frustration.

> Nowhere does it say it is a representative democracy

I quoted page 8 saying exactly that! (Question 5, "The Constitution") "The original charter, which replaced the Articles of Confederation and which became operative in 1789, established the United States as a federal union of States, a representative democracy within a republic"

It says the US Constitution established the United States as "a representative democracy within a republic". This isn't talking about direct democracy at the local level – the US Constitution has nothing to say on that topic. It is saying that the United States itself, federally, is "a representative democracy within a republic".

> In short, try not to take it too seriously, like those of us that obsess over documents do. It just leads to migraines and frustration.

You claimed I was redefining words. I provided evidence that the US Citizenship and Immigration Service and the US Congress uses definitions closer to mine than to yours. You then tell me not to "take it too seriously"? Maybe you could just have said, "No, I was mistaken to say you were redefining words, you aren't".

Definitions are based on usage after all. If the way I (a guy in Australia) use a word is (roughly) the same as the way the US Congress uses it, that is pretty strong evidence that way of using it is mainstream and legitimate