The federal government has the power to classify information because it owns it. The primary purpose of a state is to preserve itself. The ability to control access to secrets is critical to this. It's a bit like asking "What gives the government the right to execute the laws?" Because that's what it's meant to do.

That’s not the primary purpose of government in the United States. And that’s not how government derives the right to execute laws in the United States.

We govern ourselves. The government is given the right to execute laws by the people who vote. The Bill of Rights clarified that any other rights are reserved by the people.

Additionally, most federal information is public domain and owned by the people. That’s why Freedom of Information Act requests are effective.

Freedom isn’t free and things might not always be this way if we don’t protect our freedoms.

> That’s not the primary purpose of government in the United States. And that’s not how government derives the right to execute laws in the United States.

> We govern ourselves. The government is given the right to execute laws by the people who vote. The Bill of Rights clarified that any other rights are reserved by the people.

I agree with you in principle but in practice it seems the US has drifted far from its origins.

The US government has murdered at least one her own citizens without due process. The Constitution has been contorted around trade such that nearly everything can fall under federal purview (currently being tested in the states with marijuana, remember the CA raids?).

The government for all intents and purposes, seems to be putting self-preservation and perpetuation above all else, and has been for quite some time. I suspect _that_ was what the parent poster was getting at.

The United States government classification system is established under Executive Order 13526, the latest in a long series of executive orders on the topic. Issued by President Barack Obama in 2009, Executive Order 13526 replaced earlier executive orders on the topic and modified the regulations codified to 32 C.F.R. 2001. It lays out the system of classification, declassification, and handling of national security information generated by the U.S. government and its employees and contractors, as well as information received from other governments.

Right, but what's the constitutional basis for those laws, regulations, and executive orders?

The preamble of the EO only says: by the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America