Charles J. Reid

    One should ask the question "When did a third branch or the Government
become a system?"
    The judicial branch of governmemt has ceased to be a branch of gvmt.
Rather, it is now a system to process complaints.  As it was systemized,
power was transferred to public officials in the executive branch such as
prosecutors and administrators who make most of the basic policy decisions
with out any feedback from Judges or juries.  The system is therefore a
closed one.
    Precedent becomes secondary to a code which can be applied globally
without regard to local mores, convention, etc.  The problem is not  that
corporations have the status of persons, but social contract is destroyed in
favor or the written code.  The power to write and define the code is with
the corporations.
    In a common law system, power is distributed from the bottom up, whereas
in a Napoleanic one, power is from the top down.  We have abolished our
legal system and have replaced it with a Napoleonic one.  Structure
influences behavior, which can possibly explain some of the change now being
discussed
Dennis L. Blewitt