"What Makes A Law, A Law?"

If statutes, regulations, rules, ordinances, and codes are laws, then why don't they just call them "laws"?

Because they're often not laws.

"Of course they are. There are consequences for not following them."

Every single word used in government is chosen specifically. They use them to overstep their power, to muddy the legal waters and create backdoor escape hatches so they don't have to live by the rules, regulations, statutes, etc., that they created.

Oh, but they'll make you live by them.

There's a thing called the Texas Occupations Code, (why isn't it called the Texas Occupations Law"?) and in it is all the codes of all the occupations the State of Texas regulate.

It appears it's missing one crucial part:

In the Texas State Constitution, Article 3, Section 29, (page 26) it states,

The enacting clause of all laws shall be: "Be it enacted by the Legislature of the State of Texas."

See that?

Read it again.

"All laws".

It's telling you that "all laws" will have that enacting clause in it to tell you that it is a law.

So you go back to the Texas Occupations Code, and Command+f (or Ctrl+F) to search the document. Then search, "enact" and see if you can find those words, "Be it enacted by the Legislature of the State of Texas."

It's not there.

Search the section on General Provisions. Nothing.
Search the section on the Department of Licensing and Regulation. Nada.
Search the section for Licensed Professional Counselors. Zilch.

So you'd logically conclude, "this is not a law".

But at the bottom of of the various sections of the Texas Occupations Code exist little paragraphs like this:

Those are the legislative acts that built the Texas Occupations Code. And they sure enough have am enactment clause right there at the beginning. That allegedly makes it law.

Now, when you read through those acts of legislation, and compare it to the actual actions of Texas BHEC, how likely do you think it is that the legislation passed as law covers all the rules and regulations imposed by Texas BHEC? How much are the legislators and the Texas BHEC Deputy Director willing to be that they crossed all the t's and dotted all their i's? We'll do a deep dive on that in another post.

But let's remember back to some earlier posts about what makes a law, a law.

The law put forth by states can't violate your rights under the Constitution of the United States of America. Marbury v. Madison makes it clear that the Constitution is the supreme law of the land.

Murdock v. Pennsylvania - No state may take a secured right under the Constitution of the United States of America, convert it to a privilege, and require you to get a license and pay a fee in order to exercise it.

AND IF THEY DO, Shuttlesworth v. City of Birmingham pass a law requiring you to pay a license and a fee for exercising your Constitutionally-secured right to free speech and right to have private meetings and private conversations with one or as many people as you want, then you can ignore it and continue exercising that Constitutionally-secured right with impunity, meaning without fear of punishment.

And if they come after you anyways and take you to court, then you throw Boyd v. United States at them which stated that the court's job is to protect against any encroachment upon Constitutionally-secured rights, and that Constitutionally-secured rights must be interpreted by the court in favor of the citizen, Bryars v. United States.

Set 'em up, knock 'em down.

In this case, even a proper enactment clause still does not give them authority under the Constitution of the United States of America to violate your rights.

The states don't have a leg to stand on in these license tax schemes.

Oh, and it is a tax, designed to generate revenue for the state. If you knew how much tax revenue was generated by the State of Texas imposing these unconstitutional licensing schemes on the public, it would make your hair stand on end. But that too is another topic for another post.

Go out there and read these cases, read your Constitution of the United States of America, and learn your rights and how to defend them. Read the cases I've shared, and read the cases cited in the cases I've shared. Educate yourself. You're living under a number of tremendous burdens in life from government encroaching on your rights. All you need is the knowledge to recognize those rights, and the tools to take them back. You can do this. You have a right to do this, to tell the government you're not going to let them encroach on your rights anymore.