By Mike Appleton, Guest Blogger
“We pledge ourselves to use all lawful means to bring about a reversal of this decision which is contrary to the Constitution and to prevent the use of force in its implementation.
-The Southern Manifesto, Cong. Rec., 84th Cong. 2d Session, Vol. 102, part 4 (March 12, 1956)
‘This was an activist court that you saw today. Anytime the Supreme Court renders something constitutional that is clearly unconstitutional, that undermines the credibility of the Supreme Court. I do believe the court’s credibility was undermined severely today.”
-Michele Bachmann (R. Minn.), June 26 2012
Most people are familiar with the opinion in Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, et al., 349 U.S. 483 (1954), in which a unanimous Supreme Court summarily outlawed public school segregation by tersely declaring, “Separate educational facilities are inherently unequal.” 349 U.S. at 495. But many people do not know that Brown involved a consolidation of cases from four states. The “et al.” in the style refers to decisions on similar facts in Delaware, South Carolina and Virginia. And the response of Virginia to the ruling in Brown provides an interesting comparison with the actions leading to the current government shutdown.
In 1951 the population of Prince Edward County, Virginia was approximately 15,000, more than half of whom were African-American. The county maintained two high schools to accommodate 386 black students and 346 white students. Robert R. Moton High School lacked adequate science facilities and offered a more restricted curriculum than the high school reserved for white students. It had no gym, showers or dressing rooms, no cafeteria and no restrooms for teachers. Students at Moton High were even required to ride in older school buses.
Suit was filed in federal district court challenging the Virginia constitutional and statutory provisions mandating segregated public schools. Although the trial court agreed that the school board had failed to provide a substantially equal education for African-American students, it declined to invalidate the Virginia laws, concluding that segregation was not based “upon prejudice, on caprice, nor upon any other measureless foundation,” but reflected “ways of life in Virginia” which “has for generations been a part of the mores of the people.” Davis v. County School Board of Prince Edward County, 103 F. Supp. 337, 339 (E.D. Va. 1952). Instead, the court ordered the school board to proceed with the completion of existing plans to upgrade the curriculum, physical plant and buses at Moton High School. When the plaintiffs took an appeal from the decision, the Democratic machine that had for many years controlled Virginia politics under the firm hand of Sen. Harry Byrd had little reason to believe that “ways of life” that had prevailed since the end of the Reconstruction era would soon be declared illegal.
When the Brown decision was announced, the reaction in Virginia was shock, disbelief and anger. Reflecting the prevailing attitudes, the Richmond News Leader railed against “the encroachment of the Federal government, through judicial legislation, upon the reserved powers of the States.” The Virginia legislature adopted a resolution of “interposition” asserting its right to “interpose” between unconstitutional federal mandates and local authorities under principles of state sovereignty. And Sen. Byrd organized a campaign of opposition that came to be known as “Massive Resistance.”
In August of 1954 a commission was appointed to formulate a plan to preserve segregated schools. Late in 1955, it presented its recommendations, including eliminating mandatory school attendance, empowering local school boards to assign students to schools and creating special tuition grants to enable white students to attend private schools. Enabling legislation was quickly adopted and “segregation academies” began forming around the state. Subsequent legislation went even further by prohibiting state funding of schools that chose to integrate.
In March of 1956, 19 senators and 77 house members from 11 southern states signed what is popularly known as “The Southern Manifesto,” in which they declared, “Even though we constitute a minority in the present Congress, we have full faith that a majority of the American people believe in the dual system of government which has enabled us to achieve our greatness and will in time demand that the reserved rights of the States and of the people be made secure against judicial usurpation.”
Throughout this period the Prince Edward County schools remained segregated, but when various court rulings invalidated Virginia’s various attempts to avoid integration, the school board took its final stand. It refused to authorize funds to operate any schools in the district, and all public schools in the county were simply closed, and remained closed from 1959 to 1964.
There are striking similarities between Sen. Byrd’s failed plan of Massive Resistance and Republican efforts to prevent implementation of the Affordable Care Act. There was widespread confidence among conservatives that the Supreme Court would declare the Act unconstitutional. When that did not occur, legislators such as Michele Bachmann, quoted above, attempted to deny the legitimacy of the Court’s ruling. Brent Bozell went further, denouncing Chief Justice Roberts as “a traitor to his own philosophy,” hearkening back to the days when southern roadsides were replete with billboards demanding the impeachment of Chief Justice Earl Warren.
The House of Representatives has taken over 40 votes to repeal the ACA, quixotic efforts pursued for reasons known only to John Boehner and his colleagues. And in accordance with the Virginia legislative model, the House has attempted to starve the ACA by eliminating it from funding bills. Following the failure of these efforts, Republicans have elected to pursue the path ultimately taken by the school board of Prince Edward County and have shut down the government.
Even the strategy followed by Republicans is largely a southern effort. Approximately 60% of the Tea Party Caucus is from the South. Nineteen of the 32 Republican members of the House who have been instrumental in orchestrating the shutdown are from southern states. It is hardly surprising therefore, that the current impasse is characterized by the time-honored southern belief in nullification theory as a proper antidote to disfavored decisions by a congressional majority.
In reflecting upon the experience of Virginia many years later, former Gov. Linwood Holton noted, “Massive resistance … served mostly to exacerbate emotions arrayed in a lost cause.” Republicans would do well to ponder the wisdom in that observation.
Still making the same mistake as before, eh, Skippy?
I do have a question though.
Does anyone take a grown man who goes by “Skip” seriously?
Gene H.
My name is Harry Karol Robinson – Now you know why my family and friends have always called me Skip. I started using the signature H. Skip Robinson to make fun of the convention of using an initial to start ones signature, especially by those trying to get others to believe they are intellectuals.
And Yes, I get a great deal of enjoyment out of reading people who note idiotic things like this. “Does anyone take a grown man who goes by “Skip” seriously?”. Is that how we should segregate intellectual legitimacy?
Your inability to see the forest through the trees is quite entertaining and the more you write the more I am humorously entertained.
Tony,
Yep. Rights come with corresponding duties and obligations. It’s just the nature of the beast.
Bron,
No. It was a condemnation of political pragmatism over principle (which often goes by the name politically expedient). Then again, I should have expected you to read distortion in to nuance. You don’t do nuance very well. Whether you realize it or not? What you dislike is indeed political pragmatism. However, you are a fan of more traditional pragmatism even if you don’t realize it. Or would you design a structure with materials that don’t have the proper tensile strength to make them stable? Would you apply a scientific law like F=ma if it didn’t make accurate predictions and produce tangible results? No. You wouldn’t. Either that or you’re the world’s worst engineer (which I know isn’t true from the Twin Towers debate).
This is what happens when you use words but don’t fully understand their meaning.
What you loath about pragmatism is in its political use. And I agree, political pragmatism is usually just a cover for bad actors. But as an engineering principle, it’s perfectly valid. And as I’ve told you before, one way of looking at law is indeed as politics, but another more practical (and technocratic) way of viewing law is as social engineering. Again, we see someone, this time you, with an inability to distinguish a tool used from what it is used for. Pragmatism isn’t a dirty word except in limited context and political pragmatism is problematic at best and outright evil at its worst.
Nuance.
It’s not just for breakfast anymore, but rather for all of reality.
None of which changes the above valid criticisms of binary thinking.
Skip: How can government protect your rights when it must first usurp them to be able get the money to do so?
It doesn’t usurp them, you don’t have any Rights without a matching obligation to Protect the Rights of others. That obligation is your debt to society, that is collected by Government in the form of taxation. Nobody is violating any Right they granted to you by collecting on a legal debt. Your Rights are not usurped by taxation, your obligations that you owe in order to even have Rights are met by taxation.
Gene H.
Thanks for the your perspective Tony C., I’ve always wondered how the ruling oligarchy got the African Americans to go along with slavery in the early part of our nations history. Boy your knowledge and wisdom is amazing. Nature of the beast is the correct answer Gene H. .
So what happens when a nation state no longer meets the requirement of being lawfully constituted? Gene H., I want to see how you would answer this one.. I need another good laugh.
Gene H:
that was quite the apologetics for pragmatism.
DavidM: Of course your Rights exist, even if they are violated. Suppose we are talking about your right to give a cop the finger.
That Right means Society has agreed that if you give a cop the finger, you shall not be punished for that act, and if you ARE punished for that act, somebody has violated your Right and Society will punish THEM for committing that crime.
So, secure in your Right, you give cops the finger at every opportunity. Then one day, a cop gets pissed off and assaults you for giving him the finger, he arrests you and charges you with “disturbing the peace” or some such nonsense. In my view (and this doesn’t exactly happen in America), not only should those charges be dropped, but the cop should be charged with a misdemeanor crime and you should be compensated for your time lost and a violation of your Right. If the cop reacts that way often enough, his punishment should be escalated to suspension without pay, and eventually job loss. That is Society’s responsibility, and therefore the Government’s job to implement.
There is no way to guarantee your Rights will not be violated or the government will be perfect. That is why the Right is not just a Right to insult the cop, the Right includes Protection of the Right by punishment of those that violate it. It isn’t just a Right to Life, it includes prosecution of murder. It isn’t just a Right to property, it includes the search for and prosecution of thieves.
I call that “protection” of the Right; there must be a steep cost to criminals for violation of a person’s Right. That promise of exacting a steep cost for violations, once criminals see it isn’t an empty promise, is what Protects the Right and minimizes violations.
I am not being inconsistent here in the least. People as a collective grant rights, and promise to protect them (in the above sense). Your Rights from God or Nature are meaningless if people can violate them at will without suffering any punishment that will change (or prohibit) their behavior. Rights without Protection are pointless, believing you have a Right to speak truth to power isn’t any good (and in fact is a dangerous belief) if actually exercising that Right gets you summarily killed in full view of the People without your murderer suffering any ill consequence whatsoever. Your murderer will show no restraint, knowing he won’t be punished.
To be any good, a Right needs the commitment of Society to support and protect it.
Skip: How would we as a society determine the difference in needs between an autistic child, Nikoli Tesla and Tony C.? Do you think that you can articulate in detail, without using binary thinking, one answer to just one question?
I cannot tell you with any precision what these individuals need or needed (including myself), what I can tell you is I would trust Society to make that decision and set a standard periodically; like every five or ten years.
My primary ideal is to eliminate existential coercion, AKA the exploitation of desperation, regardless of its effect on prices, the economy, or efficiency. I regard the exploitation of desperation as a form of crime for profit. I firmly believe that crime pays, and pays well, and we outlaw it because we don’t want people to profit that way.
My secondary ideal is that I believe all people do better when individuals have the resources they need to reach their born potential; particularly nutrition, shelter, safety, security, education and health care. What is an autistic child’s potential? I don’t know, but some have become extremely wealthy, some have become world class musicians and artists and mathematicians, so who knows? Deny them the resources to find out, and nobody ever knows what life potential we wasted because of greed.
Could I design programs that deliver on this stuff? Sure. If I had to do it tomorrow, I’d copy Norway’s programs wholesale. If I have longer than a day and the resources to implement more thoughtfully, I’d conduct a component analysis of the ten happiest countries on Earth to find the commonalities and implement a coherent system within the constraints of Democracy, using what I already know to be one such commonality of the successful formula, a very strong “Modern Socialism” safety net beneath what is primarily Capitalism constrained to compete on product-related characteristics alone.
Thank you Tony C.. That is a well thought out responsive answer and one that I will soon try to do the same for you.
DavidM: None of those contradict me. It DOES take a government to supply your Rights; as I said delegation is a necessity. The government is the servant of the people. The people decide the Rights of all and the concomitant Responsibilities of all, and the government is tasked with the job of implementation.
The remainder of the statements, interpreted in that light, are consistent: The members of a Society determine the Rules of the Society, and without surrendering that sovereignty over themselves, delegate the use of force and implementation to a Servant Government, to ensure equitable, consistent, uniform implementation, protection, and when necessary, investigation and punishment.
Tony C wrote: “None of those contradict me.”
In your most recent statement, you claim that rights exist even if government or criminals (part of society) violate those rights.
In your previous statements, you argued that rights do NOT exist or are meaningless without government or society supplying them and protecting them.
David2527 – I’ve read the contradictions as well.
Tony C. How can government protect your rights when it must first usurp them to be able get the money to do so? If I pay for my rights to be protected by voluntary means, government is taken out of the equation. I don’t always need government to protect my rights. I can, despite your misconceptions, rely on my fellow human being, to assist me in protecting my rights without having to hold a gun to their heads and they will help me to hold a gun to the head of a criminal when required. It will not always be perfect but most criminals will get their just do and the majority of people will have the liberty to fund the things they think necessary and important to fund a civil society without having guns held to their heads or being threatens with fines and imprisonment.
At what point are you no longer willing to accept the tyranny of fascism. As they come to your house to take you to an internment camp? When you must wait in lines for food and supplies?
Bron,
In one way or another, I’ve been studying the brain my entire life.
And what Tony said.
Binary thinking is a limiting construct. The universe is analog. Also, binary thinking and creativity are different forms of intelligence. You can be a creative binary thinker. Frank Miller is a binary thinker and an incredibly creative comics artist, writer and film maker. However, if you think Aristotle was a binary thinker, you either don’t grasp Aristotle or you haven’t read enough of him.
“You dont like Binary thinking because it doesnt allow for pragmatism, which is really lousy and destructive thinking.”
No. I don’t like binary thinking because it’s wrong. It is, as Tony points out, one giant exercise in the fallacy of over simplification. Einstein said, “Make everything as simple as possible, but not simpler.” That whole “but not simpler” is a very important qualifier. I’m all for prime principle driven critical analytical thought which includes forms of reduction. That does not change that some systems are inherently complex and not conducive to reduction without incurring considerable error. First and foremost I’m an empiricist and the heart of empiricism (and the scientific method and the resulting technocratic approach to legalism) is pragmatism. However you are confusing pragmatism with political pragmatism. They are not the same thing. If you can’t tell that I’m an idealist politically by now, then shame on you, but that is the polar opposite of a political pragmatist. Political pragmatism is based primarily on practical considerations, rather than ideological notions, and results in such amoral thinking as “If the President does it, it isn’t illegal.” Political pragmatism is wrong and is often an excuse used when correcting a political/social/economic wrong is either difficult or the pragmatist has a vested interest in either the status quo or in excusing the bad acts of another because they themselves might be implicated. Pragmatism as it relates to soft rule utilitarianism isn’t a bad thing at all. It’s the same kind of pragmatism that makes pure science into applied science. Does it work toward a productive or beneficial end and how? That is the driver of the kind of philosophical pragmatism I practice.
When I apply that to political pragmatism, I have to include a second tier of reasoning based upon: 1) Is it ethical and 2) is it worth any associated negative costs? If a solution violates either one of those questions, it violates ideals I think are too important to sacrifice, for example egalitarianism or equal protection or the common good. Take Nixon for example. Putting the President in prison would have been difficult, true, but it would have been the right thing in the long run for a variety of reason not the least of which is equal protection and application of the law. It would not have been impossible as a political pragmatist would have asserted.
Pragmatism isn’t the same thing as political pragmatism. One is useful tool, the other is an amoral cop out for not doing the right thing. These kinds of distinctions are important. Many of the suggestions I make would be politically difficult and therefor not politically pragmatic. They are, however, pragmatic for other reasons and better for society in the long run and the benefits far outweigh any one individual or groups ego being massaged or their asses covered for doing things against the interest of society for their personal gain.
The devil is in the details, so they say, but so are the angels of our better nature.
Creation is no simple place.
And while the truth may often be complicated and ugly, it has the benefit of being true and not constrained by the artificiality of binary thinking. I don’t embrace complexity because I innately love it. I embrace complexity because it is simply the way of things. Complex systems are lovely in their own way and often just as ordered as simple systems depending upon the scale at which you examine them. I love simple . . . when it’s possible and when it works. But I don’t think sacrificing ideals or inducing error by over simplification is a good thing to do because complexity is more difficult to deal with than simple.
The universe has no “easy” setting.
Bron: Except the world isn’t binary at all. Height, weight, income, beauty, and value all exist on a spectrum. A donut does not have a fixed value, fixed caloric content, or fixed value to consumers from day to day, the value of a donut depends on so many factors that it exists on a spectrum. As does virtually everything; like shelter. Shelter is less necessary in fine clear weather than it is in inclement weather, or mid-winter.
Likewise, abilities and needs exist on a spectrum. The autistic child in my family needs much more attention and care than the neuro-typical children in my family of the same age. My mother suffers from a form of dementia, she needs more attention and care than other adults without it.
The amount of care people need varies so much, that “necessary care” exists on a spectrum, and treating everybody as if they deserve precisely the same amount of protection and care is fundamentally inequitable.
Binary thinkers are just wrong, that thinking does not reflect and cannot capture a fraction of the reality of the human condition. It produces models that are so over-simplified that they produce answers the vast majority of people reject as just wrong, and the problem is not with the vast majority of people, the problem is with the over-simplification.
Tony C. How would we as a society determine the difference in needs between an autistic child, Nikoli Tesla and Tony C.? Do you think that you can articulate in detail, without using binary thinking, one answer to just one question?
Gene H. You don’t think Bron already understands the various types of thought processes and that binary thinking and over simplification is not always a good thing? That the universe is complex? This is the information you want to articulate, that you don’t think anybody else in the whole world understands? I can honestly remember discussing ideas like this in junior high school.
“Creation is no simple place.” – What in the hell does that even mean or is it really just one of your complex thoughts you admire?
By the way, you should surely be able to simplify that last post.
You, by the way lied, about my calling my last piece of writing my masterpiece. I actually said it was a first daft, that wasn’t even finished and that I posted it to get others to assist me and to counter one of your dubious points.
Should we next discuss pragmatism, expedience and principles? Or how about, if the means justifies the end and collateral damage? That’s always a fun one.
Gene H:
Are you studying the brain now, or did you just read that one article on the acc?
Binary thinking is black and white. I try to think that way, but I do understand poison is in the dose in most cases, I think ricin is an exception.
Women and men are not the same, day and night is not the same. There is no third way between day and night, that is twilight and I dont know about you but I like both night and day.
You dont like Binary thinking because it doesnt allow for pragmatism, which is really lousy and destructive thinking. What about the caste system in India? That is certainly not Binary thinking, why would anyone want so many tiers in which to place human beings at various levels of worth?
As a Binary thinker, I think all humans have the same worth as every other human, I have no room to think about some people being worth more than others. I guess you do, no mater how much egalitarianism you preach.
There is nothing wrong with Binary thinking, we have come as far as we have based on the binary thinking of Aristotle and others. By trying to destroy binary thinking or diminishing it, you are trying to undermine western civilization. You want whatever you want, you are like a child who refuses to accept the limits put upon you by your parents but who refuses to learn why your parents place those limits on your actions.
You want the world to be what it isnt and if you destroy binary thinking, then you can make the world whatever you want it to be. Instead of following Francis Bacon’s admonition to obey nature to conquer her, you will just make it up as you go along. Why bother to conquer nature when you can just say it is this way.
I am guessing the Nazis and the communists were not binary thinkers. Otherwise they would have understood that there is good and evil; wrong and right in the world.
Binary thinking doesnt mean you arent creative. But it does mean you believe in absolutes like gravity. Please dont give me some science fiction bullsh*t about gravity on other planets.
P.S., Skip, I find that very encouraging. Since we clearly survived 1973 intact as a nation, your figures suggest we could easily raise the minimum wage to about $70 per hour and although it might be a struggle at first, we would all survive just fine. 🙂
Skip says: The 97.31% decline in the value of the $USD was from 1973,
Riiight. 40 years. which says the dollar is worth 2.7% of what it was in 1973, or that in today’s dollars, $1 in 1973 is like $37.17 dollars today! Which means when I was working my way through high school on minimum wage, I was actually earning the equivalent of a job today paying over $70 per hour!
Except, the purchasing power of my gross pay, relative to today, with basic goods, was around $8.50 per hour, which works out to …. 3.8% annual inflation in 40 years. And you are correct, although I think that is about 0.8% too high, it would not bother me at all.
The actual reduction in the value of a dollar since 1973 would be about 77%, making the current dollar worth over eight times your claim. I consider that a significant exaggeration of the facts; historical pricing of survival commodities (food and shelter) tracked independently of the government let us compute inflation, and your numbers are just wrong, or perhaps produced by misleading computation with assumptions and exclusions not mentioned in stating the results. In either event, you are repeating a falsehood.
Skipper,
I’m sorry, but you’ve mistaken me for someone who takes you seriously.
If you had an opinion worth respecting, I’d respect it. There are quite a few posters here who have respectable opinions – many I agree with and some I don’t. However, I respect your right to have an opinion and to express it, true, but your actual opinions proper? Not in the slightest.
You forget.
I’ve read that pile of gibberish essay you consider your masterpiece. And like others here who bothered? I was not impressed. In any way.
Bron,
It’s not my fault you are limited by binary thinking, crippled critical thought skills and a propensity to both over simplify, cater to your confirmation biases and view the world through a lens of fear.
I actually feel bad for you. But that’s only because I know you mean well. You can’t help having an underdeveloped anterior cingulate cortex and an over active amygdala.
DavidM:
Speaking of the OED, the word of the day today is mountebank, what do you call that? Serendipity maybe?
Thanks for the help, Gene.
Gene H:
You are so smart Gene H, please tell us some more about how smart you are and how much you read and understand that we poor rubes dont. Oh the rarefied air you breathe would give the rest of us hypoxia.
I feel a case of the vapors coming on just thinking about how much you read and understand.
Gene, if you are reading, can you check if my reply to David (a few minutes ago) got snagged?
DavidM: But what you argued before was that society agrees to a right that a person has, but then government abrogates that right anyway, then the person’s right really does not exist. You are arguing from pragmatism.
No I am not. If society agrees to a right, and government abrogates it, government has acted as a criminal servant of society. Society and Government are not identical, just as an employer and his employee are not identical.
Suppose I own a trucking company. Some diesel tractors pulling a heavy load get about 5 mpg. I know my driver is going to have to refill his tank, so I give him a gas card, charged up with the fuel he will need for the trip, plus about 10% to cover any reduced gas mileage random occurrences (like stop-and-go traffic jams, inclement weather, detours around construction or price fluctuations). Now suppose my driver is dishonest and has his own diesel pickup truck. He fills his tanks, but at the nearest truck stop, he meets his wife and siphons off about 5% of the fuel to his pickup. If I do not notice that 5% of missing fuel, or chalk it up to legitimate overage, and my dishonest driver gets away with that theft — It remains a theft, discovered or not. It is not a Right I have agreed upon.
Here is another example. If as an employer you give an employee signature authority to, say, sign off on invoices for materials, and the employee is secretly taking a 1% kickback on the materials with certain suppliers that are over-charging you 5%, you have not magically “authorized” that kickback or “agreed” to it. Your failure to catch or punish the employee secretly abusing their authority does not mean you have agreed to LET them abuse their authority.
The government is NOT Society. Ideally, government accurately reflects what the majority of society believes and wants. But of necessity, Society cannot be involved in every frikkin’ decision and transaction, just as a CEO of a company serving millions of people cannot be involved in every frikkin’ decision and transaction of their company. American Society as “CEO” must serve 310 million “customers” (which is themselves), that plausibly have transactions with about 90% of the world population, which the majority think should be treated equitably. Delegation of authority is a necessity of scale.
That would not be true on a micro scale, in a small group everybody can indeed be aware of and provide collective oversight of everything. In sociological studies of groups, the size of such groups can be roughly one to two hundred adults before delegation becomes a necessity due to the “overhead” of remaining sufficiently informed by gossip and more formal reporting. It just won’t work on groups of thousands, much less hundreds of millions or billions of people. Delegation, informational distillation and formal organization becomes an absolute necessity to avoid anarchy (which is near zero protection from the most brutal predators).
Government does not determine Rights, Society does. When government takes an action that society did not authorize or agree upon (or refuses to take an action we DID agree upon), then Government has abused the power we delegated to it, and may have acted criminally. That does not confer a new Right upon the persons that benefited from that abuse of power or criminal act, any more than getting away with Theft makes Theft their Right.
If government violates your Right to life, it is no different than if a mugger violated your Right to life. Your Rights conferred by being a member of Society exist even if violated by criminals. A component of your Right is the responsibility of Society to punish such violations, and for that punishment to be effected the society must have two things: A mechanism by which to bring the criminal to justice, and the realization they have the responsibility to use that mechanism.
This, however, is one of the logical flaws in your view of Rights. By claiming Rights are granted free by God or Nature, many citizens are misled into thinking they have no inherent responsibility for these Rights; your formulation severs the natural link between the payoff (Rights) and the costs (enforcing the Rights of others). Your view creates mis-perceptions that undermine freedom: For example, if Rights are free and entail zero responsibility, then taxes become Theft and those paid by taxes are parasitic thieves, instead of the servants protecting your Rights.
I think the “inherent” view warps the transactional basis that forms a society (or as it is often called, the social compact). Here is an analogy. On an income statement for a company, we see Revenue and Cost of Goods Sold, often 80% or more of Revenue in a retail setting. Your view is analogous to claiming all the Revenue is yours and given to you by God, and your suppliers are parasites on your business to be reviled, they are violating your God-given Right to your Revenue by demanding 80% of it, and threatening to collect that in court and ultimately even at gunpoint (through the police seizing your assets) if necessary. Obviously that view is flawed, you would have no revenue without anything to sell, and by analogy you would have no Rights (and no infrastructure) without paying your fair share to enforce Rights and build and maintain infrastructure.
Society grants Rights; not God or Nature or the government. Society delegates the power to collect taxes and enforce Rights with the proceeds to a Government, and ideally that government is a faithful employee that executes the will of Society with fidelity. But if it doesn’t, then Government abuses its power and acts criminally when it violates the Constitution and Laws and restrictions Society has placed upon it. That abuse does not constitute a new Right, it just constitutes a criminal act; and a Government is flawed in concept if Society has no mechanism to investigate and prosecute such criminal acts, or fails to understand it even has a responsibility to investigate and prosecute such criminal acts.
In my opinion, that latter condition is something the “inherent” view of Rights promotes to the detriment of society.
Tony C wrote: “If government violates your Right to life, it is no different than if a mugger violated your Right to life. Your Rights conferred by being a member of Society exist even if violated by criminals.”
Your logic trail in this thread has led you into contradicting your earlier comments which were based upon different premises, just as I predicted.
Tony C wrote previously:
“It takes a government to supply your “Rights,” however they are formulated.”
“I have (effectively) no right to life (or property) if nobody is obligated to protect that right.”
“…my own “right” to defend my life or property is meaningless if I can be punished or killed for doing that…”
“…my murderer must be found and punished to the best of my society’s ability. If that is a choice they make on a case-by-case basis, I effectively have no Rights…”
“… you would have no Rights (and no infrastructure) without paying your fair share to enforce Rights and build and maintain infrastructure…”