Today’s UK Supreme Court decision preventing the Scottish Parliament from holding an advisory referendum is not only irrelevant but also illegal because Scotland’s constitution is still in force, in principle and under international law. There was never any need for the SNP leadership to ask another nation’s court for permission to do something we’ve always had the power to do for ourselves.
The principle of the sovereignty of the Scottish people over any government or parliament was upheld in the 1689 Claim of Right, which was inserted into the 1707 Treaty of Union by the Scottish negotiators as a precondition of the Treaty and Union. It was ratified by the two parliaments as a guarantee that the Scottish Constitution would remain in force after the UK was created. King Charles III swore allegiance to the Claim of Right and Westminster has acknowledged it 3 times – in 1989, 2012 and 2018.
By contrast, England’s unwritten constitution is based on parliamentary sovereignty over the people, which is the polar opposite of Scotland’s popular sovereignty. Westminster is not sovereign in Scotland – the people are.
The Claim of Right gives the Scottish people the power to sack a government that fails to uphold their rights and interests – the common good. The Convention of the Estates, a tribunal of Scottish citizens, had the power to depose a corrupt government and replace it with one that served the common good and upheld the people’s sovereignty.
Here’s the thing. Either we are in a voluntary political union, or we’re not. Today’s ruling makes it crystal clear that we’re not. Our colonial status explains the ongoing plundering of our resources, the feudal system of land ownership where just 432 families own half the rural land, and the loss of 4 million Scots who were killed, displaced and deported to overseas English colonies. It explains the vast wealth inequalities, the persistent poverty, the absurdity of an energy rich nation with fuel poor citizens, and the lowest state pension in the developed world. It explains decades of Westminster governments we did not vote for. And it explains why Scots don’t know their own language, history and constitution because the colonial power has suppressed them. And it explains why a UK Supreme Court believes it can tell Scotland what it can and can’t do.
The nation of Scotland was NOT extinguished with the union. The UK tells the world Scotland is in a voluntary political union, but tells Scotland it’s in a colonial prison.
Political parties won’t liberate us. Only we can do that. We the people have always had the keys to break out of this union and restore our sovereignty. To do so, we must unite, create a mass liberation movement and revive a modern Convention of the Estates. Because when we are united, the British State will be powerless to stop us.
peteryoung.dk 