RESEARCHER
The Original 13th Article of Amendment
Sun Jan 25 16:38:31 2004
64.140.158.84

The Original 13th Article of Amendment

"If any citizen of the United States shall accept, claim, receive, or retain any title of nobility or honour, or shall without the consent of Congress, accept and retain any present, pension, office, or emolument of any kind whatever, from any emperor, king, prince, or foreign power, such person shall cease to be a citizen of the United States, and shall be incapable of holding any office of trust or profit under them, or either of them."



Knights In The News:

It is commonly believed that United States citizens cannot receive from a foreign government noble honors such as a Knighthood. To show that this belief has no basis in law or practice, this is a listing of United States citizens (whether famous or not) who have appeared in the news because they have received Knighthoods. Our sources are newspapers, magazines, and journals.



Wesley Clark, U.S. General and NATO Supreme Allied Commander in Europe made Knight Cokmmander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire March 28, 2000.

General Wesley K. Clark, US Army

http://www.nato.int/cv/saceur/clark.htm



Foreign Honors and Awards
http://www.jaymarlowe.com/clark.htm

General Wesley Clark

From Waco to Yugoslavia:

http://www.apfn.org/apfn/clark.htm

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http://www.apfn.org/apfn/knighthood.htm

Queen and the law/judiciary

http://www.royal.gov.uk/today/law.htm
Sovereign as 'Fount of Justice'
Queen and the law/judiciary in Scotland
Queen's role in the administration of justice
Queen's position in United Kingdom law
Queen's position in European Union law

Sovereign as 'Fount of Justice'

The rendering of justice is one of the oldest of royal functions.
From late Anglo-Saxon times, the concept of the Sovereign as
the 'Fount of Justice' grew in importance as it helped to ensure
that a single system of justice prevailed over competing local,
civil and ecclesiastical jurisdictions. Ethelbert's reign (560-616)
saw the first law code written in the vernacular; kings such as
Alfred the Great (reigned 871-99) extended the law codes by
codifying community custom, administrative regulations and
ancient law. Successive kings preserved and adapted the body of
English laws which had been accepted by the community and
which past kings had published, and case law supplemented
these law codes.

This accumulated legislative power placed responsibilities on
the king as a dispenser of justice to ensure order and punish
crime. From William the Conqueror (reigned 1066-87) onwards,
royal justice was more effectively enforced by the king's
appointment of local sheriffs, travelling justices and other
officials to administer justice in the Sovereign's name throughout
the kingdom. A chronicler of 1179 wrote of Henry II (reigned
1154-89): 'he appointed wise men from his kingdom and later
sent them through the regions of the kingdom assigned to them
to execute justice among the people ... This he did in order that
the coming of public officials of authority throughout the shires
might strike terror into the hearts of wrongdoers.'

The royal courts were therefore at the centre of the
administration of justice in both civil and criminal cases, and
Sovereigns themselves took an active part in their own courts,
with the king sometimes presiding over the proceedings. By the
fifteenth century, the central courts had settled at Westminster,
and the Courts of Justice remained housed at Westminster Hall
(built in 1097 and renovated in 1394) until 1882.

However, there were limits to royal enforcement of justice or
'the king's peace'. These limits included the geographical distance
of the more remote shires (particularly on the troubled borders
of the Welsh Marches and Scotland), the independent
jurisdiction of 'palatine counties' (where royal powers were
granted in franchise to an individual), ecclesiastical jurisdictions
and, above all, the Sovereign's reliance on local barons and gentry
to uphold the law in the regions - which was liable to break
down in times of civil war.

Moreover, as Parliament's legislative role grew and day-to-day
power came to be exercised by Ministers in Cabinet, so the
Sovereign's role in actually administering justice declined. The
Bill of Rights (1689) (in Scotland, the Claim of Right in the same
year) confirmed the fundamental constitutional principle that
the Sovereign no longer had any right to administer justice. The
Sovereign's responsibilities regarding the judiciary also waned -
under the Act of Settlement (1701), judges were to hold office
during good behaviour rather than by the Sovereign's will.
(Judges can be removed by the Sovereign on the advice of
Ministers, either following an address presented by both
Houses of Parliament or without an address in cases of official
misconduct or conviction of a serious offence). The Act
therefore established judicial independence.