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The Debate We Have to Win, Otherwise We Lose the Country
Townhall.com ^ | February 23, 2013 | Steve Deace

Posted on 02/23/2013 9:05:51 AM PST by Kaslin

Recently a discussion of this story about DC Comics being pressured by homosexual activists to fire one of its writers because he’s on the board of the National Organization of Marriage prompted vigorous debate on my Facebook wall. While perusing through the various comments, it was obvious there still exists much confusion in our country today about the term “rights.”

There are two types of rights: unalienable and contractual.

Sometimes referred to as a natural right (i.e. “the Laws of Nature and Nature’s God” reference from The Declaration of Independence), an unalienable right is a right that comes from God and thus can be accessed in your natural state without consent from another party because it existed before you were born, and will still exist in nature after you die. It’s inherent to being made in the image of God.

Should another party attempt to stop you from accessing your unalienable (or natural) rights they are guilty of a crime, oppression, tyranny, or all of the above. For example, I do not require anyone’s consent to breathe air for it is foundational to my natural state of being. However, should you attempt to stop me from breathing then you are guilty of assault, battery, manslaughter, or murder if you’re ultimately successful.

If it requires consent from another party to access it then it is not an unalienable (aka natural) right, because you have to impose upon someone else’s unalienable (aka natural) rights in the process. Taking someone else’s person or property without their consent is what we call a crime.

Nowadays some are claiming unalienable (or natural) rights that don’t exist.

For example, you do not have an unalienable (or natural) right to marry or have sex with whomever you want, because partaking of each of those activities requires consent from another party. We call people who believe they can have sex (aka “physical intimacy”) with whomever they want rapists and put them in prison whenever we can. We call people who believe they can marry whomever they want cult leaders, sultans, kings, and tyrants because they’re acquiring harems and concubines.

Likewise, you also don’t have a natural right to live where you want as I’ve heard some claim on issues like immigration. To believe that requires you to believe that private property doesn’t exist. You can’t have it both ways. If you believe I have the right to defend my own property (which our founders absolutely did), then you also have to believe that “we the people” have the right to defend our own property as well. In a “government by the consent of the governed” that property in this case are the borders and lands of these United States of America. We own them and they are our private property. Therefore, we have a right to possess and police them accordingly.

Rights that require the consent of another party are contractual rights.

A good example of contractual rights would be the U.S. Constitution, which begins with the words, “We the people of the United States in order to form a more perfect union.” Immediately the parties involved in the contract are established: the people, the states, and the federal government (or union). From there each party states in the contract the terms, jurisdictions, and liabilities each are responsible for and permitted to perform. Some of the rights in the Constitution are unalienable (natural) rights like the freedom of speech and the freedom of worship, because you don’t require consent to access them. That’s why the Constitution says “Congress shall make no law” prohibiting or establishing those things, because Congress has no power to either establish or take away that which “the Law of Nature and Nature’s God” alone bestows.

However, other rights in the Constitution are purely contractual, but where people get confused here is they fail to understand this language is intended to bind the government and not the individual. For example, the government consents to saying it has no right for “unlawful search and seizure” as other governments in human history have indulged. It is not saying you as a private person have a right to therefore store crack cocaine in your locker or illicit pictures of children on your computer. This is the government contracting with its citizens to limit its own means, not the other way around. In fact, that is the theme of the entire Bill of Rights. Just because the state promises not to exceed its authority over the individual does not give the individual the right to exceed his authority over “the Laws of Nature and Nature’s God.”

That is always the highest authority.

For example, should the U.S. Federal Court hear a civil suit between two murderous drug cartels because one failed to deliver the promised narcotics to the other and thus violated the contract? Of course not, because their very activity violates “the Laws of Nature and Nature’s God,” therefore the proper response is to arrest them as criminals instead.

Similarly, just because someone consents to having sex with you doesn’t mean that suddenly you have a contractual right to have sex with them. Is the person just a child and therefore unable to make a mature decision? Is that person mentally unstable or disabled, and thus unsure of what it is they’re really consenting to? Is that person married to someone else?

In conclusion it comes down to this, if our rights first and foremost come from “the Laws of Nature and Nature’s God,” then anything we do to indulge or claim those rights that violates that law isn’t a right. It’s a transgression—even if the other party(s) consents to it. That simply means they’re just as guilty as you are.

You have no right to do that which God says is wrong. Never have, never will, and should an earthly authority contradict this and permit your fallen nature to manifest itself, the God the “father of the Constitution” James Madison referred to as “the Governor of the universe” will ultimately adjudicate your case in eternity.


TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; Culture/Society; Editorial; Front Page News; Government; Philosophy; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: abortion; debate; faithandfamily; founding; freedom; gaymarriage; godgivenrights; governbyconsent; homosexualagenda; immigration; liberty; limitedgovernment; naturalrights; prolife; ruleoflaw; unalienablerights
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1 posted on 02/23/2013 9:06:05 AM PST by Kaslin
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To: Kaslin

Might I add, “Just Laws” have to promote Virtue in the USA. We are ruled by Law, not man. Justice is a Virtue and it is the fundamental reason for any government or contract. Without Virtue—we can have no Justice. It is why as far back as Socrates (and made Western Civilization the best) it was known that for Freedom we had to have and promote Justice in Law. Cicero added the Universal Truths which matches God’s Truth.

To promote Vice-—like sodomy— is unconstitutional by definition. There is no Right from God to sodomize other people. It is dehumanizing—reduces man to an object-— and so is always evil because it is such a misuse of God’s Design. The very act mocks God.


2 posted on 02/23/2013 9:16:53 AM PST by savagesusie (Right Reason According to Nature = Just Law)
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To: Kaslin

Have to fight to save the country.


3 posted on 02/23/2013 9:19:13 AM PST by Biggirl ("Jesus talked to us as individuals"-Jim Vicevich/Thanks JimV!)
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To: Biggirl

Fight for the minds of our children and youths.

Political correctness has nearly destroyed us already.

Stupidly!


4 posted on 02/23/2013 9:33:36 AM PST by geologist (" If you love me, keep my commandments" John 14:15)
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To: savagesusie

Justice is a Virtue and it is the fundamental reason for any government or contract.

It’s supposed to be. Taking other people’s money is usually the reason for laws these days.


5 posted on 02/23/2013 9:47:16 AM PST by freedomfiter2 (Brutal acts of commission and yawning acts of omission both strengthen the hand of the devil.)
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To: Kaslin

Excellent article to discuss with our kids.


6 posted on 02/23/2013 10:43:03 AM PST by boxlunch
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To: Kaslin

This whole game of our Elected Officials is sickening. We are slowly being taken over by the government, soon we will not be able to defend ourselves against them. When do we stand and say Enough is Enough? When?


7 posted on 02/23/2013 10:57:16 AM PST by conservative_cyclist (I want my parents country back!)
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To: Kaslin

The country is going to collapse into ruin and horror.

It may be too late to heal the cultural rot.

So what do we do now? Council your children and try to make them aware of the dangers and the lies. Sadly, they will never get to grow up innocent. Those days are lost.


8 posted on 02/23/2013 11:18:21 AM PST by Wanderer99
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To: Kaslin

Negative rights vs. so called “positive rights”-

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gXOEkj6Jz44


9 posted on 02/23/2013 11:23:07 AM PST by ReformationFan
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To: Kaslin

VERY incorrect. The underlying relationship is a social COMPACT. In a CONTRACT one thing of value is exchanged for another. In a COMPACT, each parts with the same thing to get something of equivalent value. In the case of the United States, each individual parts with control or governance over part of his alienable rights in exchange for superior protection of his health, safety and security of his property.

The U.S. Constitution is a charter for an institution and a specific delegation of power which comes from the People who ratified the document through special conventions of individuals in each state elected specifically for that purpose. It is not a contract with the federal government which did not exist at the time and does not exist independent of the document. It is not a contract among the States as their legislatures did not ratify it. The People through special conventions did. In such a manner, the People were able to take power and authority that existed in the post-colonial State governments and re-vest it with a new national government.


10 posted on 02/23/2013 11:23:11 AM PST by marsh2
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To: freedomfiter2

Yep-—we are “Post-Constitutional” as Mark Levine states. We no longer have Just Laws-—since the 1930’s-—we threw Right Reason out the window and inserted Marxism/Socialist ideology which is irrational.

You have to destroy truth and Free Will in socialist countries. That is what the laws do now....and they steal private property-—total Marxist concept. Condition little children to be dependent on authority figures and the answer to all adversity is pills.

We really need to get back to Rule of Law (Justice) and promoting Virtue. Cicero stated back in 50 BC that Rome would collapse because there was no more “Rule of Law”-—it was Rule of Man (whoever was in power made arbitrary laws which were unjust and enriched certain groups).

The only way to “fix” this country, is to “fix” the legal system which Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. totally corrupted along with his Marxist plants in the courts and the Marxist law “professors” who twisted and warped law in most of their students.

Ted Cruz is totally correct about the Communists at Harvard Law school. But that started with “Sugar Keynes” in 1900 when the sycophants at Harvard worshipped that pederast and forced his ideology-—along with the sodomy and Satanic rituals of the Freemasons-—into their student body.

They affected all universities and curricula and publications. Forced their Socialist immorality on the culture. It was the aim of Cultural Marxists and the Fabian Socialists like John Maynard Keynes to collapse Western Civilization—by destroying Virtue. (Justice). All immorality is unjust.


11 posted on 02/23/2013 11:32:47 AM PST by savagesusie (Right Reason According to Nature = Just Law)
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To: Wanderer99
The country is going to collapse into ruin and horror.

It may be too late to heal the cultural rot.

So what do we do now?

BLOAT.

12 posted on 02/23/2013 12:08:59 PM PST by SVTCobra03 (You can never have enough friends, horsepower or ammunition.)
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To: savagesusie
Ted Cruz is totally correct about the Communists at Harvard Law school. But that started with “Sugar Keynes” in 1900 when the sycophants at Harvard worshipped that pederast and forced his ideology-—along with the sodomy and Satanic rituals of the Freemasons-—into their student body.

I agree. You might be interested in this:

http://www.thefuelproject.org/15-recent-news/recent/54-know-your-enemy-dvds-now-available.html

13 posted on 02/23/2013 12:17:35 PM PST by SVTCobra03 (You can never have enough friends, horsepower or ammunition.)
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To: Kaslin
Thank you for posting!

Another discussion on the subject:

Natural Law - The Ultimate Source of Constitutional Law

"Man ... must necessarily be subject to the laws of his Creator.. This will of his Maker is called the law of nature.... This law of nature...is of course superior to any other.... No human laws are of any validity, if contrary to this: and such of them as are valid derive all their force...from this original." - Sir William Blackstone (Eminent English Jurist)

The Founders DID NOT establish the Constitution for the purpose of granting rights. Rather, they established this government of laws (not a government of men) in order to secure each person's Creator­ endowed rights to life, liberty, and property.

Only in America, did a nation's founders recognize that rights, though endowed by the Creator as unalienable prerogatives, would not be sustained in society unless they were protected under a code of law which was itself in harmony with a higher law. They called it "natural law," or "Nature's law." Such law is the ultimate source and established limit for all of man's laws and is intended to protect each of these natural rights for all of mankind. The Declaration of Independence of 1776 established the premise that in America a people might assume the station "to which the laws of Nature and Nature's God entitle them.."

Herein lay the security for men's individual rights - an immut­able code of law, sanctioned by the Creator of man's rights, and designed to promote, preserve, and protect him and his fellows in the enjoyment of their rights. They believed that such natural law, revealed to man through his reason, was capable of being understood by both the ploughman and the professor. Sir William Blackstone, whose writings trained American's lawyers for its first century, capsulized such reasoning:

"For as God, when he created matter, and endued it with a principle of mobility, established certain rules for the...direction of that motion; so, when he created man, and endued him with freewill to conduct himself in all parts of life, he laid down certain immutable laws of human nature, whereby that freewill is in some degree regulated and restrained, and gave him also the faculty of reason to discover the purport of those laws."

What are those natural laws? Blackstone continued:

"Such among others are these principles: that we should live honestly, should hurt nobody, and should render to every one his due.."

The Founders saw these as moral duties between individuals. Thomas Jefferson wrote:

"Man has been subjected by his Creator to the moral law, of which his feelings, or conscience as it is sometimes called, are the evidence with which his Creator has furnished him .... The moral duties which exist between individual and individual in a state of nature, accompany them into a state of society . their Maker not having released them from those duties on their forming themselves into a nation."

Americas leaders of 1787 had studied Cicero, Polybius, Coke, Locke, Montesquieu, and Blackstone, among others, as well as the history of the rise and fall of governments, and they recognized these underlying principles of law as those of the Decalogue, the Golden Rule, and the deepest thought of the ages.

An example of the harmony of natural law and natural rights is Blackstone's "that we should live honestly" - otherwise known as "thou shalt not steal" - whose corresponding natural right is that of individual freedom to acquire and own, through honest initiative, private property. In the Founders' view, this law and this right were inalterable and of a higher order than any written law of man. Thus, the Constitution confirmed the law and secured the right and bound both individuals and their representatives in government to a moral code which did not permit either to take the earnings of another without his consent. Under this code, individuals could not band together and do, through government's coercive power, that which was not lawful between individuals.

America's Constitution is the culmination of the best reasoning of men of all time and is based on the most profound and beneficial values mankind has been able to fathom. It is, as William E. Gladstone observed, "The Most Wonderful Work Ever Struck Off At A Given Time By he Brain And Purpose Of Man."

We should dedicate ourselves to rediscovering and preserving an understanding of our Constitution's basis in natural law for the protec­tion of natural rights - principles which have provided American citizens with more protection for individual rights, while guaranteeing more freedom, than any people on earth.

"The end of law is not to abolish or restrain, but to preserve and enlarge freedom." -John Locke


Footnote: Our Ageless Constitution, W. David Stedman & La Vaughn G. Lewis, Editors (Asheboro, NC, W. David Stedman Associates, 1987) Part III:  ISBN 0-937047-01-5
here


14 posted on 02/23/2013 12:23:27 PM PST by loveliberty2
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To: loveliberty2

Thank you for the link


15 posted on 02/23/2013 12:32:23 PM PST by Kaslin (He needed the ignorant to reelect him, and he got them. Now we all have to pay the consequenses)
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To: Kaslin
Really, it's quite simple: certain people believe in inalienable rights, but others do not. The "others" believe rights come from a document they write and force everyone else to live by via force of a gun (which they do not want you to have!), but they call "law".

These people we call liberals and the party under which they gather is called "Democrats".

16 posted on 02/23/2013 12:37:58 PM PST by jeffc (The U.S. media are our enemy)
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To: Kaslin; onyx; trisham; TheOldLady; DJ MacWoW; JoeProBono; RedMDer; musicman; Lady Jag; MEG33; ...

Outstanding post!


17 posted on 02/23/2013 12:46:12 PM PST by Jim Robinson (Resistance to tyrants is obedience to God!!)
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To: marsh2
If you have not done so, I am positive you would enjoy reading Randy Barnett's Restoring the Lost Constitution: The Presumption of Liberty.


18 posted on 02/23/2013 12:51:07 PM PST by Jacquerie ("How few were left who had seen the republic!" - Tacitus, The Annals)
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To: 2nd amendment mama

Ping!

Some good stuff here!


19 posted on 02/23/2013 12:58:12 PM PST by basil (basil, 2ASisters.org)
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Comment #20 Removed by Moderator


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