An address by A. Ross McWhirter, M.A., delivered originally to the 54th Annual Congress of the British Israel World Federation at Sheffield on the 29/9/1973, was reprinted in The Queen Betrayed - and the nation sold into captivity. I include this condensed, but still unusually long quotation because I believe it will not only help explain the British situation but also help us understand the history and meaning of our own Australian Constitution.
It is important that we know something of the basic foundation of our Constitution and of how the events of recent years have acted in betrayal of our rightful heritage as free and self-governing people. The betrayal of the British system of Common Law, as it is happening in Britain, is not only very similar to what is happening in Australia, but is equally a betrayal of Australia.
It is on record that Mr. McWhirter was shot down and killed on 27/11/1985 by two IRA gunmen. What is not on record is who ordered the killing.
If we allow those who would tell us the truth to be killed then we share the guilt. The sins of the fathers (and mothers) will be paid in the blood of our children. Here is the essence of Mr. McWhirter's address:
The principle at Law is that the 'Queen can do no wrong'. Now, if the Crown performs an illegal act, and of course the Crown acts by advice of the Ministers, then - since the Queen can do no wrong - there is apparently a paradox or impasse to be resolved. So lawyers use the formula that the Queen has been 'deceived in her grants' of the power or whatever prerogative act gave rise to the illegality. It is my submission that much that has been going on in Government in recent years has been illegal in that it was contrary to the constitution of this country. The greatest of these illegalities culminated in the ratification of the 'Act of Accession to the Treaty of Rome'. At that moment, this country lost a very substantial slice of its Sovereignty and I hope to be able to show to you that this was achieved by a series of illegal acts and that the Queen's part in it was undoubtedly an example of her being 'deceived in her grant'. . . .
- I should like to take, by way of illustration, this whole question of the handing away of the Sovereignty of this country; why it was illegal and what in technical terms could be done to correct it so that we can get on with the job which is our destiny.
The Treaty of Rome is not a Common Law conception in any sense. Legally, it is entirely alien to our Common Law traditions and also to the twenty-six counties of the Republic of Ireland. It was therefore perhaps reasonable to expect that, if we were going to accede to such a treaty, we might require certain amendments.
The fact is that in 1972 we ratified the agreement seeking accession to the Treaty of Rome without the alteration of one dot or comma. Except for the fact that the name of our nation is included in its new preamble, the Treaty of Rome remains absolutely unaltered and does not draw anything from the constitutional experience or,this country, nor does it reflect our own national aspirations as an Island, a maritime, mercantile race .... People seem to forget that we still have thirty Crown Colonies. It was considered by various politicians, of both major parties, that there would be material advantages in going into Europe. Accordingly, they decided to pursue this end by every conceivable means, without any attempt to procure the consent of the people, as a whole, to such a move.
It stands to reason that it should not be and indeed cannot be, an easy thing to deprive an ancient and great nation of its Sovereignty. It will be appreciated that part of the Treaty requires that the institutions of the Community will have pre-eminence over all national institutions. In other words the what the European Parliament decides ... what the European Courts decide . . . take precedence over what they refer to as our 'Municipal law' - our Law - which is made by our own elected representatives and is part of the contract between Sovereign and people. So you have a situation in which we have voluntarily given away our Sovereignty, and at no time have the people of this country been effectively consulted on the matter. Those who take a contrary view make a point that Parliament is composed of our elected representatives and therefore, 'what am I complaining about?' l make the accusation that the so-called entry into Europe was and is, illegal. . . .
The Heath Government (I quote) 'picked up the hand of cards.' There were the words used in the White Paper of that month, for there was an agreement - or some might say conspiracy - between the major parties to press this matter through. . . .
With Mr. Heath, it became a point of total obsession and obstinacy that this would succeed. Negotiations were not over any words of the Treaty of Rome, as I have already indicated. They were only on the transitional entry provision. And the public were deceived - they actually thought that we were negotiating about the conditions under which we would join and the basic constitutional point of view. . . .
None of this was in tune with what was said on the last occasion on which the people were given an opportunity to vote.
The commitment of the Government was 'we are committed to negotiate terms of entry, no more, no less.' In other words, on that occasion when there was an opportunity for people to speak on this, there was no talk of actually entering and ratifying. That came only after we had given a five-year mandate to the administration. Thus there was a basis deceit with the famous phrase 'we wouldn't go into Europe except with the wholehearted consent of the people and Parliaments' (Parliaments in plural meaning the Parliaments of the other countries). The opportunity for the wholehearted consent or disapproval had not been given.
Then came what I call the 'clicks of the ratchet'... The clicks in this case were, first of all, the negotiations of the terms about which we were deceived. Then came the declaration of principle by Parliament. Next came the drafting of the Treaty by the Treaties Department of the Foreign Office . . . An important part of the Treaty, which was signed on the 22nd of January, 1972, was the part in the preamble which said that the Contracting Parties would assent to this Treaty in accordance with their respective constitutional requirements.'... I suggest that our constitutional requirements were not then met and never have been met on this matter. I think I must make this point clearer, in order to explain why I take that view so strongly.
The next 'click' of the ratchet was the drafting of this Treaty of Accession. Before this country signs a Treaty it is necessary that signatories receive from the Queen what are called the 'Full Powers' - which are in fact a document saying this man or this woman is empowered by the Nation to sign this Treaty on behalf of the nation. That is what 'Full Powers' are, and they have to be signed by the Queen. None of this has been published. The Queen delayed as long as she could, hoping presumably for an earthquake or something of that sort, and the Full Powers were in fact only signed 48 hours before Mr Heath, Sir Alec Douglas Home and Mr Rippon took themselves off to Brussels to sign the Treaty of Accession. . . .
You will recall that day, 22nd January, 1972, when Mr Heath had a bottle of ink thrown at him . . . It made me think back to something almost prophetic and I would like to read you eight lines: 'England, bound in with the triumphant sea, whose rocky shore beats back the envious siege of watery Neptune, is now bound in with shame. With inky blot and rotten parchment bond, that England that was wont to conquer others, has made a shameful conquest of itself .... ' (John O'Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, in Shakespeare's Richard II).
Extraordinarily prophetic . . . On the 22nd January, 1972, these three gentlemen signed away something which was not theirs to give, namely the Sovereign Power of this country to determine laws with the consent of our people. They purported to hand all that away. One thousand years of Sovereignty was handed away at that moment, subject to two things, namely the enactment by Parliament of the necessary statutes to confirm all the changes of law and the Royal Assent to the Bill, and then also the ratifications of the Treaty. So the ratchet clicked up to about two points from home, from Mr Heath's point of view.
The Labor Party, who had given a great deal of thought, of course - for they were attempting exactly the same thing until they were dismissed by the Nation in 1970 - said that it would require two acts to get us into Europe. One would be a short Constitutional Act, and the second would be a Bill of 1,000 Clauses - in other words a massive piece of legislation so that every conceivable Act that was affected (and of course practically every Act is affected by the giving away of Sovereignty) would have to be amended .... The Law Officers and their Advisers, the top echelon of Whitehall, brought their brains to bear on this and they thought, 'a Bill of 1,000 Clauses - that will keep us up all night for months and months and give endless possibilities for the destruction of our determination to succeed.' So it was abandoned - there was now no Bill of 1,000 clauses. Clearly, for them, the attractive thing was to have a little short Bill, just one clause - 'which we can whack through the House.'
So there was a Bill of thirteen clauses and a very short repeal schedule - nothing of which mattered in the least, the only repeals being things like the Film Quota Act and various agriculture Acts. None of the basic constitutional Acts were amended or repealed at all, and that is one of the main facts of my accusation of illegality. This Act went through Parliament and, you will recall, there were a series of 'cliff- hanger' Government escapes . . . It is significant that there never was a defeat on it, because there were essential elements in the Opposition who wanted this to go through . . . The Labor Party very conveniently furnished whatever majority was necessary to defeat the element in the Conservative Party, led by Enoch Powell, who was determined to resist this outrageous giving away of sovereignty . . .'
. . . I think that, theoretically, it is possible that this country could legally give away its sovereignty, provided of course that it was by the plain, clear, majority consent of the people. But it would involve a very elaborate constitutional proceeding, including an alteration of the basic constitutional contract under which we have lived since the year 1688 'the Glorious Bloodless Revolution' when James II fled to France. And what happened was that the contract from that point on was, that the people would 'owe allegiance,' which is a personal contract between themselves and their sovereign. I say a 'personal contract' for this reason - if you break your allegiance and commit an act of treason, you can jeopardize your personal neck on the gallows.
The idea of this allegiance in theory being an 'impersonal' thing is absolute nonsense - it is duty in persona, as Lord Haw Haw for example found out; for which he was executed for treason . . . Everyone has an individual contract of allegiance to the Sovereign. In return, our Sovereign swears at us in accordance with the laws and customs of this realm.
I submit to you that by the words 'Laws and Customs of this Realm', these are the words which are spoken at the very moving Coronation Service which is legally required by Parliament - the Coronation Oath is not a figment of the imagination. It is a Statute of the Realm . . . She promises then, in return for our allegiance, that she will govern us in accordance with the laws and customs of this Realm. And these do not include laws concocted and designed by the unelected representatives of eight other countries in concert with certain gentlemen nominated by our legislature . . .
. . . This is the law and the rule of law requires that no executive Act may be performed unless the performer can point to the due authority to do it ... In the case against proclamations in 1611, one of our greatest of all judges, Sir Edward Coke, in the era of Divine Rights of Kings, stood up to James who was King and said, 'You may not rule this country by proclamations out of your head... you only have the power which the law gives you, and the only supreme power above that is the power of God'.
So the King is ruled by God and Law. and this was the decision of 1611 and the actual words were, 'The King has no prerogative save that which the law alloweth him' - and that is the plain authority for the supposition that the Queen, in 1972, could not invent a new prerogative to make Treaties which give away the Sovereignty of this country .... the Treaty of Rome is totally different from any other Treaty in which we have ever participated, for the reason that it gave away power to another authority to legislate on our behalf on matters unknown and unknowable, without our consent.
. . . the second requirement of any exercise of prerogative power is that it should not be against the liberties of the people. There is excellent authority for that: it is assumed at law that the Queen will never exercise her prerogative to the detriment of the rights and liberties of the people of this country. Plainly the Treaty of Rome is in that category. No prerogative power may be exercised contrary to a statute in force. That was, in fact, the third point on which I particularly held out in the Courts because the other arguments would be regarded by judges nowadays as being somewhat theoretical. So I stood firm - I said, 'A Statute - there are at least eight statutes in force in this country' (because, as you know, we have no written constitution as they have in the U.S.A.) But the idea that we do not have any constitution at all is absolute rubbish.
. . . Now the particular statute on which I relied was the Bill of Rights. The Bill of Rights is a confusing title because people think that it is a Bill, therefore it is not an Act or it is not an ordinary statute. The Bill of Rights is in fact a very special statute. It is better than a statute in many ways. It declares that certain things are to be 'for ever', .for theoretically, under the sovereignty of parliament nothing is for ever, but it was a plain manifestation of what was intended by Parliament. . . .
. . .in the European Communities Act they did not mention it - they did not attempt to repeal or amend any part of it . . . Now, a passage in the Bill of Rights says, 'and that the entire perfect and full exercise of the regal power and government be onely (i.e. exclusively) in and executed by his majesty ... and his heirs at law.' The present queen is the heir at law of William III. So the declaration is that the entire, perfect and full sovereignty of this realm shall be in the Crown . . .
At this moment . . . laws can be made and edicts can be sent from Brussels, from Bonn and Strasbourg. Edicts can be made in the European Courts and we have agreed to be bound by these edicts . . . So it is in breach of a statute in force. The Bill [of Rights] goes on to say, 'and there unto . . . the Lords spiritual and temporal and the Commons do, in the name of all the people as aforesaid, most humbly and faithfully submit themselves (that is the Parliament of 1689 . . .) their heirs and posterities for ever . . . and do faithfully promise that they will stand to maintain and defend their said Majesties. . . and also the limitation and succession of the Crown . . . to the utmost of their power with their lives and estates against all persons whatsoever that shall attempt anything to the contrary.
. . .
The Court of Appeal . . . in a most peculiar judgment? said that all that the Act was doing was handing on the power of King James II to King William III, and that was their judgment. I consider it a patently unsatisfactory judgment . . . After all, part of the Revolution of 1688 was precisely to prevent the abuse of prerogative power.
I had never expected to win that action because I felt that it was not in the heart of the Judiciary of that moment to give a6 individual citizen the declaration he sought that his birthright was in fact being given away without his leave. There is another very important statute called the Act of Settlement . . .
Section 3 of the Act says, 'And whereas the laws of England are the birthright of the people thereof, and all the Kings and Queens who shall ascend to the throne of this Realm ought to administer the government of the same according to the said laws and all their officers and ministers ought to serve them respectively according to the same - the said Lords Spiritual and temporal and commons, do therefore humbly pray that all our laws and statutes of this realm for securing the established religion and rights and liberties of the people thereof, and all other laws and statutes of the same now in force, may be ratified and confirmed. 'That is as good law today as it was in 1701. It is on the Statute Book, it is unrepealed - it is no accident that it is unrepealed - it is a basic constitutional requirement. To be governed by the laws of this realm is the birthright of everybody in this land, and until repealed by Parliament it remains so.
So you now have a situation that the European Communities Act was eventually Passed by both Houses, and Royal Assent was given. You have that Statute conflicting with the basic constitutional Statutes - the Bill of Rights, the Act of Settlement and six others. The Act of Union with Scotland provides . . . there shall be no legislation in future on matters of private rights, except that they be to the evident utility of the Scots.
. . . 'The Declaration of Clergy Act'... the Queen is declared, by Act of Parliament, to be the supreme authority . . . and accepts no foreign supremacy.
We now see something of the evidence presented by intelligent investigators. The deliberate lies told the people of the United Kingdom are so similar to those told to Australians and, if you look into it, also to Americans, South Africans, New Zealanders and many others. The simple meaning of what our (?) leaders are doing reveals that, in their minds, the existing Constitutional Law is canceled!
No permission, no announcement, no beg-your-pardon. The international mafia have simply bought the guard-house and stolen our heritage.
The Sovereignty that is rightly the heritage of Australians, is being stolen. In our ignorance we are sold to, and bound to, alien masters. Not only are Australians coming under despotic law as espoused by the United Nations, but Great Britain is also betrayed to come under the despotic law imposed on a European super-state.
I feel it unwarranted for a book of this kind to devote more space to the British situation, but I must say that later news confirms and expands the situation set out above. The most extreme and illegal changes are being made. As in Australia the guillotine and late night sittings combine with no media reporting or trivial and misleading reporting.
A most critical letter by two Queen's Counsel; Mr. P. Horsfield Q.C. and Mr. L. Price Q.C. was published in 'The Times', London, May 1986 but still the mass media remained quiet. And do not forget this is the Thatcher Government. The most important political changes For several hundred years are being made under cloak of secrecy and treachery.
Other nations are all in a similar state of subversion. These blatant acts of treachery go on unknown to our people because, on the one hand, they do not understand their Constitutional rights and, on the other, because neither their Government, their parliamentary opposition, nor their news media ever reveals what is going on.
In addition to accepting direct money manipulation, the 'free world' governments have each signed hundreds of agreements with the U.N. Among these is the 'Lima Declaration'.
Business people, farmers and others who wonder why Australia cannot now sell enough goods to pay its own way, may be interested to learn that the Lima Declaration, signed by Australia in 1974, provides for the transfer of industry from developed countries such as Australia, to third world and developing countries.
Knowing this we may see reason for the restraints and difficulties placed in the way of small business and the reason for the kind of aid to developing countries that sets up an overseas sugar industry while Australian cane growers go bankrupt. The development of the 'world car' and export of Australian industrial self-sufficiency makes us now beggars to the international money market.
That is the most obvious reason for our present social and economic distress. A deliberate plotting to distract our attention and to destroy our financial ability to fight back even if there should be an awakening.
Knowing the prize is ownership of the whole earth, who can we believe?
Firstly, so long as we are prepared to give fair value to the evidence, we may believe our own intelligence. We may take note of those who present the evidence fairly and expose vested interests. We may also accept that the meaning of the Australian Constitution would have been most reliably expressed before the Australia Act was introduced because the prize is such, and the power of wealth is such, that we can no longer accept the word of people who may support those who so blatantly ignore OUR rights and THEIR responsibilities.
Back in 1981 the Federal and state Attorneys-General reported to state Premiers on ways to sever colonial constitutional ties with Britain. (Reported in The Courier-Mail Brisbane 23/6/1981). In that article was mentioned the need for referendum. Most re-assuring, but in the event there was no referendum or even a public poll. Obviously, to get a public opinion would have required that the public be told what was happening!
You will recall that the British Parliament was told there was no opposition to the Australia Act. Obviously; it is easy to get consensus if these things are kept secret.
An editorial in The Australian (14/8/1986) also mentioned the need for referendum in relation to a new Australian Constitution. Will we get a better deal with a new constitution than with the Australia Act?
Let there be no confusion. We are told that the Australia Act is of no consequence and served merely to delete a few outdated ties with the mother country. If so, why did it take so long to organize and why with so little publicity that even today few Australians know of the Australia Act or have any idea what it is about?
Arthur Chresby (whose claim was that he would not appear on the platform if he could not prove his claims in the courts) in a talk given in 1984 reminded us that the Statute of Westminster Adoption Act of 1942 allowed the political party in power to make Australia a republic and mentioned the three clauses effective in this.
As that power DID NOT apply to the STATES it was therefore ineffectual. Should we be surprised to see these same three clauses now appear in the Australia Act which DOES apply to the states?
Clauses 2, 3 & 4 of the Westminster Act appear as clauses 3, 2 & 1 in the Australia Act and the first paragraph of the Australia Act says:
An Act to bring constitutional arrangements affecting the Commonwealth and the States into conformity with the status of the Commonwealth of Australia as a sovereign, independent and federal nation.
Does that seem to be deleting a few outdated items of no significance?
If our politicians were honestly asking us to consider our historic constitutional safeguards and recommending that these be strengthened within a new republican form of government, that would be fair enough. But no, they do not do that because that is not what they are about. Their clear intent is to impose a dictatorial republic based on a 'Despotic Law' Bill of Rights so as to keep to commitments already signed and which make us subservient to the program of the United Nations organization.
To do that, the political parties must deceive us by use of secrecy and misinformation.
To insist that the Australia Act does not affect the Australian Constitution can, at best, be based only on flimsy technicality such as was used to prevent challenge of the Queensland Act. d&ta05.htm