Agents in Rebellion: The Administrative Supersession of the Massachusetts Constitution
Summary:
Agents in Rebellion argues that the modern government of Massachusetts has progressively departed from the fixed constitutional structure established in the Massachusetts Constitution of 1780 and has instead evolved into an administrative system operating outside the lawful chain of delegated authority. The work is written from a strict constructionist and natural-law perspective and contends that every legitimate governmental act must be traceable to an express delegation from the sovereign People through the Constitution. Powers not expressly delegated are treated as constitutionally prohibited under the doctrine of casus omissus.
The article develops what it calls the “Firewall of Law,” a hierarchical framework placing divine law, natural law, common-law maxims, constitutional limitations, and validly enacted statutes in descending order of authority. Under this framework, statutes, regulations, agencies, and adjudicative bodies are valid only if they remain consistent with higher constitutional and natural-law principles. The Constitution is presented not as a “living document,” but as a fixed and binding contract limiting government power.
A major focus of the work is the claim that the Massachusetts administrative state unlawfully merges legislative, executive, and judicial powers in violation of Articles XXIX and XXX of the Massachusetts Declaration of Rights. Agencies, administrative tribunals, licensing boards, and rulemaking bodies are characterized as unconstitutional because they allegedly exercise powers never expressly delegated by the Constitution and because they combine rulemaking, enforcement, and adjudication within single institutional structures. The article repeatedly invokes the maxim nemo debet esse judex in propria causa—that no one should be judge in his own cause—to argue that modern administrative adjudication lacks lawful impartiality.
The article further challenges the constitutional legitimacy of the Massachusetts General Laws as currently compiled and codified, asserting that editorial compilation, non-positive-law codification, and the removal of formal enacting clauses sever statutes from constitutional authentication. It also criticizes modern taxation systems, emergency governance mechanisms, income taxation, public funding of private entities, delegated legislative authority, and executive reorganization plans as unconstitutional departures from the original constitutional compact.
Throughout the work, the author argues that the Commonwealth’s institutions have gradually replaced constitutional limitation with institutional self-ratification and administrative convenience. Courts, agencies, and executive actors are portrayed as exercising assumed powers rather than delegated powers. This shift is described as a form of “administrative supersession,” whereby constitutional government has been displaced not through formal abolition, but through procedural and bureaucratic expansion.
The article concludes by calling for peaceful constitutional restoration through renewed adherence to strict constitutional construction, separation of powers, common-law principles, and direct accountability of public officers to the sovereign People. It advocates a gradual reversion away from administrative governance and toward what it describes as the original constitutional order established in 1780.
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Executive Summary
Agents in Rebellion: The Administrative Supersession of the Massachusetts Constitution presents a strict constructionist critique of the modern Massachusetts administrative state and argues that substantial portions of current governance operate outside the lawful authority delegated by the Massachusetts Constitution of 1780.
The article begins from the foundational premise that all legitimate governmental power originates in the People and must remain continuously traceable to express constitutional delegation. The Constitution is treated as a fixed legal compact rather than an evolving charter, and constitutional silence is interpreted as jurisdictional prohibition under the doctrine of casus omissus. Any governmental power not expressly delegated is therefore considered withheld.
Using a framework called the “Firewall of Law,” the work establishes a hierarchy of authority in which natural law, constitutional structure, and common-law maxims supersede statutes, administrative rules, and institutional practices. Governmental acts are deemed valid only if they conform to this hierarchy and remain within the Constitution’s enumerated limits.
The article’s central argument is that the modern administrative state violates the Massachusetts constitutional structure by fusing legislative, executive, and judicial powers into agencies and tribunals insulated from meaningful constitutional accountability. Administrative agencies are criticized for exercising quasi-legislative rulemaking, executive enforcement, and adjudicative functions simultaneously, contrary to Articles XXIX and XXX of the Massachusetts Declaration of Rights. Administrative law judges and agency hearings are characterized as unconstitutional substitutes for independent courts and jury adjudication.
The work also advances several related claims:
- The Massachusetts General Laws are portrayed as constitutionally defective because codification and editorial compilation allegedly sever statutes from proper constitutional form and enactment.
- Modern taxation systems, particularly progressive income taxation and redistribution through public expenditures, are argued to exceed the Constitution’s original taxing limitations.
- Emergency powers, executive reorganization plans, and delegated rulemaking are presented as unconstitutional transfers of legislative authority.
- Public funding of private organizations and administrative contractors is characterized as violating constitutional anti-aid and anti-credit provisions.
- Licensing schemes and administrative permitting systems are described as transforming natural rights into conditional privileges controlled by unelected bureaucracies.
The article repeatedly emphasizes that constitutional deviation has occurred incrementally through administrative expansion, procedural substitution, and institutional self-ratification rather than through formal constitutional amendment. According to the work, modern institutions increasingly derive legitimacy from bureaucratic process and judicial deference rather than from the fixed constitutional delegation established by the People.
The concluding sections call for “restoration without rupture,” advocating peaceful constitutional recurrence to first principles, dismantling of unconstitutional administrative structures, strict adherence to original constitutional meaning, and renewed public accountability of all governmental officers and institutions.
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