Inokita Ilo, Gus Litulumar, Gordon I. Marciano, Alfreda Odoshi, Manuel Jr Rabauliman, Cons R. Fitial, Millie Rabaulimanfaisao, Millie Odoshi, Jess Ruben, Elia M. Odoshi, Lorenza Iginoef, Ray Odoshi, George Fitial, Jeannie Tanaka, Virginia Odoshi Mettao, Jacob Ilo, Jake Zachary Rabauliman, Joseph James Omar, Jesse Lenn Sablan Faisao, Jesse Rabauliman. My profound apologies for there must have been a computer glitch that prevented my posting earlier to be shown. Please see below. Inokita Ilo wrote: Partner... In relation to you posting your comment defending the very turf you were born to. You have every right to defend it since your Refaluwasch ancestors are here before them, the supporters of amnesty as you state your point. You die Refaluwasch, one who is born and raised on Saipan....In relation to theoretical Amnesty. It will be a government taking actions against a persons or certain groups having committed a criminal offense unpleasant to an origins, whereby escaping danger on their life seeking shelter elsewhere......In this situation., These Amnesty supporters must understand that these lives are NOT endanger but Business operation or political nature (connection?) in laundering money. Just remember.... Their up roaring is mainly to defend their profit gain and it’s a despicable fullest action. Therefore, a total investigation by authorities must proceed to put a stop to it. To: Inokita Ilo Thank you very much, and I humbly like to present my own scrutiny in a perspective that may bring about challenges or not to the matter at hand. it is just my individual opinion to present in light of the matter relative to Amnesty issue as you have placed a strong emphasis on this matter at hand. In 1975, the United States and the people of the Northern Mariana Islands entered into a Covenant of a political union, which established a self-governing Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI) under the sovereignty of the United States.2 From the end of World War II until that time, the United States had governed the Northern Marianas as a part of the Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands, under the auspices of the United Nations. Prior to that, the Northern Marianas had been ruled successively by Spain (1695-1898), Germany (1898-1914), and Japan (1914-1944). Thus, at the time the first Commonwealth government took office on January 9, 1978; this represented the Northern Marianas people’s first exercise of self-government in more than 280 years. The Covenant established a political relationship unique in American history, and at least rare in the history of the world. A major power and small island people have achieved a permanent and peaceful union, without the islands being either assimilated into the larger power, or ruled by it as a colony. The terms of the union, however, can be confusing. For example, the CNMI has “self-government,” while the United States maintains “sovereignty.” But if “sovereignty” means the right to govern, as it does in some contexts, then has not the power of government been vested in two different places at once? Similarly, the United States has the power to legislate for the CNMI, but in doing so cannot infringe on local self-government. But does not any federal legislation for the CNMI infringe, to some extent, on self-government? Needless to say that since the Northern Marianas people has a representation in the federal government (US Congress) now as of 2008. However, the current CNMI Delegate has blatantly continued to have a pay no attention to on the specific provisions in the Covenant relating to Self-Government. We need someone that will protect those specific provisions in the Covenant relative to Self-Government. Judicial decisions have sometimes acknowledged this confusion, and other times contributed to it. Feasibly, in a predictable and discrete manner, the overall federal tendency has been to ignore the unique circumstances of the CNMI, and lump it together with the traditional U.S. territories, although those territories do not have the same guarantees of self-government. This has resulted in occasional friction and misunderstandings between the United States and the CNMI, but so far most of these misunderstandings have been worked out at the practical level without a head-on confrontation. I take this solemnly in a very humble opportunity to present herein my opinion and view as to try to address a critical concern that has not yet needed to be conclusively determined, but which, nonetheless, lurks in the background of every dispute and difference of opinion between the United States and the CNMI, should in the event of an irreconcilable disagreement arising between the Northern Marianas people and the United States government regarding an internal matter of the CNMI, who must prevail? Or let’s put it in another way, does the United States governments have the legal power to impose its will on the Northern Marianas people with respect to their internal affairs? I remain steadfast to conclude that the Northern Marianas people, not the United States government, have final authority over their internal affairs, and that any federal law impacting such affairs can therefore apply to them only to the extent of their continuing consent to such law. If the Northern Marianas people, through their elected representatives, ever act to suspend the application of any federal law impacting their internal affairs; or any such provision of the federal constitution, other than those essential to the maintenance of a free government; then that law must immediately cease to have any legitimate or binding force in the CNMI. This conclusion flows inevitably from either of two lines of analysis; the construction of the Covenant itself, and the constitutional power of the United States to enter into the Covenant. A section within the Covenant, which provides for United States “sovereignty,” is not the obstacle to true self-government in the Northern Marianas that it is sometimes assumed to be. It is of course true that, at the broadest possible level, “sovereignty” has been defined, as “supreme, absolute, uncontrollable power, the absolute right to govern.” In the context of the CNMI, this definition would be problematic because it conflicts with the Covenant’s guarantee of self-government as properly read in light of the U.N. resolutions on self-government, indeed with any meaningful definition of self-government. It has long and widely been recognized, however, that absolute power to rule is not the only, or even the ordinary, meaning of the term, and that other meanings of “sovereignty” exist that are fully capable of accommodating a “self-government” conformable to the U.N.’s definitions. One such meaning of sovereignty is “international independence. The most obvious example of the difference between “international independence” and the “absolute right to govern” is found in the structure of the United States itself. To say that the entire territory from the Atlantic to the Pacific between Canada and Mexico is “under the sovereignty of the United States” does not mean that the United States has unlimited legislative power over all that territory or over the states. It means only that the states do not have separate international personalities, but instead are subsumed within a larger political entity, the United States, which acts as their common international voice. In other words, the assertion that the states are “under the sovereignty of the United States” carries no intrinsic assumptions regarding the internal workings and relative distribution of legislative power within that political unit. In fact, the United States does not have unlimited legislative power over the states, but rather has carefully circumscribed and delegated powers which it lacks lawful authority to exceed and yet the United States is nonetheless “sovereign” on the international stage. With that said, I remain to ask is the Covenant provisions created by an Act of Congress or an agreement that we may consider as a Treaty between the people of the Northern Mariana Islands and USA government? Before you even answer, please take time to consider the fact that foremost “The United States could not, however, unilaterally impose any law on the Northern Marianas people against their will.” Secondly, Federal legislative power over the CNMI may also be reconciled with self-government by construing “self-government” to include an implicit right in the Northern Marianas people to repeal (as to the Northern Marianas only) a federal law that would otherwise bind them. As claimed by an author (Van Dycke) who calls this practice “territorial nullification” and recommends it as a workable system, noting that it was used with success in Alaska. Olomwaay me Ghilisow Tumwoogh siya aschighschigh, Ngaang Malfitaagh Suupesoor
Posted on: Thu, 20 Mar 2014 14:18:25 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015