sovereign citizen

plural sovereign citizens

1. conspiracy theoriesA member of a loose movement of Americans, Canadians and Australians who consider themselves answerable only to their own particular interpretation of the common law, and not subject to any government statutes or proceedings.

   There are “homeschoolers (Christian and otherwise), sovereign citizens, weed lovers, and Hillary haters”; domestic abusers, science-deniers, conspiracy theorists, and, above all, addicts.

   2022 December 8, Judith Shulevitz, “Little House on the Prairie—With Meth”, in The Atlantic, archived from the original on 08 Dec 2022

   2 more examples

   An officer from a large metropolitan area said that “militias, neo-Nazis and sovereign citizens” are the biggest threat we face in regard to extremism. […] Last year, for example, a man who identified with the sovereign citizen movement — which claims not to recognize the authority of federal or local government — attacked a courthouse in Forsyth County, Ga., firing an assault rifle at police officers and trying to cover his approach with tear gas and smoke grenades.

   2015 June 16, Charles Kurzman, David Schanzer, “The Growing Right-Wing Terror Threat”, in The New York Times, →ISSN, archived from the original on 05 Jul 2021

   That subgroup, known as Rise of the Moors, engaged in a standoff with the police for more than nine hours, claiming that as sovereign citizens, law enforcement had no authority to stop them. No one was injured; 11 people were arrested and charged with unlawful possession of firearms and ammunition, among other offenses. Increasingly, across the country sovereign citizens have clashed with the authorities, tied up resources and frazzled lives in their insistence that laws, such as the requirement to pay taxes, obey speed limits and even obtain, say, a license for a pet dog, do not apply to them.

   2021 September 26, Sarah Maslin Nir, “She Bought Her Dream Home. Then a ‘Sovereign Citizen’ Changed the Locks.”, in The New York Times, →ISSN, archived from the original on 02 Dec 2021

   Synonyms: sovereign, SovCit, sov

2. in pluralThe body politic of a nation.

   In response, the prosecutor made the simple but valuable point that a government of representative democracy cannot function in an atmosphere of deceit – when one branch is lying to another and lying to the sovereign citizens as well.

   1989 June 28, William Greider, “What Oliver North's Trial Means to US”, in Rolling Stone, archived from the original on 11 Dec 2017

   2 more examples

   The supreme authority remains with the sovereign citizens, and the uncurbed authority of the various branches of government, local, national and federal, extends only to the specific and limited functions which have been conferred upon each by the free consent of hte citizens for their better government.

   1924, Oscar Newfang, The Road to World Peace, page 332

   These spectacles aren't calls for a Hobbesian war of all against all by some insurgent movement that, however dangerous, would have First Amendment protection. They're driven primarily by institutions that we as sovereign citizens created to serve our purposes.

   2013 January 25, Jim Sleeper, Daniel J. H. Greenwood, “To Stop Gun Violence, We Need to Remember We Can Regulate Corporate Speech and Advertising”, in The Atlantic, archived from the original on 08 Jul 2014

plural Sovereign Citizens

1. Alternative letter-case form of sovereign citizen.