PINE TREE FLAG UPDATE: This article isn’t new, but it’s relevant: Appeal to Heaven: On the Religious Origins of the Constitutional Right of Revolution.

And as a sidebar, though I regard the January 6 “insurrection” talk as BS — it wasn’t an insurrection at all, and if Trump had wanted one, it would have been easy to have a real one, and he didn’t — it’s also true that the right of revolution is built into our system and was revered by the Framers.

Note the first two sections of the Tennessee Constitution, which dates to 1796 and which Thomas Jefferson praised at the time:

Section 1. That all power is inherent in the people, and all free governments are founded on their authority, and instituted for their peace, safety, and happiness; for the advancement of those ends they have at all times, an unalienable and indefeasible right to alter, reform, or abolish the government in such manner as they may think proper.

Section 2. That government being instituted for the common benefit, the doctrine of nonresistance against arbitrary power and oppression is absurd, slavish, and destructive of the good and happiness of mankind.

This was unremarkable at the time of the Framers, when badges of office did not possess a talismanic power.