Under the Law of the Land

A NewVistas community is a private organization living fully inside the civil order around it. It makes no civil law and exercises no police power, jurisdiction, or sovereignty; its Constitution and bylaws are private agreements, and wherever they meet the law of the land, the law of the land governs.

The law governs every conflict

Nothing in the Constitution displaces a non-waivable duty, right, remedy, lien, tax, safety requirement, court judgment, or regulatory obligation of the law of the land. Where the two conflict, external law governs, and the internal rule yields only as far as it must; any provision held invalid yields to that extent while every other provision stands. Within the community the order of authority is the Constitution, then the bylaws, then bureau standards, then contracts. Every dispute goes first to arbitration under Bureau 14 — and afterward every party keeps every right of the law, including the right to go to civil court.

Legal form and banking

The community is a nonprofit community corporation, holding its assets through the Community Asset Trust; no participant owns the community. It takes no other form — not a homeowners’ association, cooperative, or condominium — and is founded only where the law accepts it in that form. Its founding council of twelve is permanent as its board of directors, and carries every dealing with the civil institutions of its area for the life of the community. All banking is done by outside banks, in three separate relationships, one for each title repository; the community takes no deposits, makes no loans, and performs no banking function.

Taxes, paid in full

Every tax and fee is paid in full when due — never evaded, avoided, or delayed. Owner’s Draw and Business Enterprise profits are taxed as income, property as property, and sales tax falls on leases, since goods reach participants as services. The community seeks no incentive, abatement, or concession granted to it alone. Where it can show that its area bears none of the cost of a public service, such as roads, schools, or water, it may petition for a lower tax through the process open to every taxpayer — and pays the full tax until a reduction is lawfully granted. Each year it publishes the taxes it paid and the benefits its participants received.

Benefits, work, and schooling

Participants claim every benefit the law gives them in their circumstances — health coverage, social security, disability, family assistance, and the credits of general tax law — on true and complete facts. No Enterprise LLC hires anyone: everyone contracts to deliverables, and any contract that would fall short of the law on pay, age, or classification ends. Where the law permits, every household elects home schooling, paid from its own Owner’s Draw, so no child enrolls in public school and no public school money is taken; where it does not, children are schooled as the law requires. Every child sits the area’s own standard tests, and results are published in aggregate.

Police, emergencies, and assembly

Police and other civil services rent space in the community’s commercial buildings as tenants, as the civil authorities judge need, and no fee or rule ever delays an emergency response. There is no emergency power: in a crisis the relevant bureau coordinates standards, Enterprise Owners do the work, and civil government ordinarily leads, while the distributed system is never suspended. Religious, political, and other associations rent any private facility on equal terms, from a small room to the stadium; no space is public or unleased, so there are no rallies, parades, banners, or advertising.

Built to be an advantage to its area

Growth is staged and open — one local founder, a council of twelve, one building, then four — transparent to neighbors and authorities at every step, and no unproven mechanism is adopted community-wide until a published pilot succeeds. A community that cannot sustain productive Business Enterprises winds down in an orderly way: banks repossess only what they hold liens on, and anything kept passes to another nonprofit, never to private gain. These provisions limit loss; they guarantee no community against failure.

Constitution, §12.1–12.8.