Meet the Sovereigns, a radical right group that rejects all forms of government, embraces God as the only authority, and clogs the courts with reams of nonsensical paperwork, writes Winston Ross.
His name is Craig Douglas Fleshman, though he won’t answer to that, just as he no longer carries a driver’s license or pays taxes. Pastor Paul Revere doesn’t recognize the authority of the State of Oregon, the United States of America, or anyone else that presumes to have some command over him. He answers only to God.
"We believe there’s only one sovereign,” Revere told The Daily Beast. “And it isn’t us. Jesus said to render to Caesar that which is Caesar’s and render to God that which is God’s.”
Revere and his “Embassy of Heaven” church in the foothills of Oregon’s Cascade Mountains are more seasoned examples of a growing movement of Americans who wish to wipe their hands of their government—not by secession, via those petitions filed in several states since President Obama’s reelection—but by declaring the whole system null and void.