Posted on 09/24/2001 12:49:15 PM PDT by A.J.Armitage
You are exactly correct. However they do have the right and constitutional ability to forbid you from wearing a mullet in their state/county/city. If you so choose to live there, you consent to follow by that law or suffer the penalty.
If I own the crack..
Stop righ there, you are already committing a crime, there is nothing beyond that of importance.
Natural law says that if you consent to the restrictions, your rights are not violated. By purchasing the property you consent and even sign a CONTRACT!
No they don't. That's my point. They lack all such right. I've repeatedly told you why, and merely contradicting me isn't a refutation. I doubt you could provide me with intellectual stimulation and honor of a real refutation, because you've shown no sign of understanding what I've said. You seem impervious to any criticism of your reflexive majoritarianism, as if I hadn't even typed it.
If I own the crack..
Stop righ there, you are already committing a crime, there is nothing beyond that of importance.
No I'm not. It's not a crime in the real sense of the word because owning crack doesn't hurt anyone. There are no rights violated except your fake "positive rights" to tell people what to do just because they live in the same area you do. You've provided no arguments that such rights exist, merely assertions and references to the very laws I'm attacking as illegitimate. If I thought those laws settled anything in a moral sense we wouldn't be having this discussion in the first place.
That's not the case. The assertion by defenders of the government that buying land or settling on it(settlement being the original legitimate claim to land) means the owner consents to not be the owner in no way means the owner himself makes such an agreement. The government has no right to impose conditions on private transactions, especially conditions by which the transactors are said to have given up essential rights.
No they do not. It is not a "positive right". It is the right to being secure. Endangering others is not a right.
You are obviously missing my point here. Let me clarify.
I am not saying that you are violating rights of others when you smoke crack on your property because the majority voted it to be illegal. You are violating their rights because you are endangering them.
Now this is the basic premise, threat of harm does violate the individuals whom you impose the danger upon. The trick is deciding when something becomes too harmful. This is not a subjective task, no matter how much the likes of you, Uriel, OWK, wish it to be. You have all acknowledged that sufficient danger does merit gov. interference. You simply draw the line further away form normalcy than most. But simply because you don't see the threat in your next door neighbor smoking crack, does not mean that it doesn't exist.
So the only solution can be to put it up to a vote. Otherwise everyone would define their own definition of harm, and we would have no subjective standard.
And thus every man, by consenting with others to make one body politic under one government, puts himself under an obligation to every one of that society to submit to the determination of the majority, and to be concluded by it; or else this original compact, whereby he with others incorporates into one society, would signify nothing, and be no compact if he be left free and under no other ties than he was in before in the state of Nature.
-- Locke
P.S. our gov. in this case would be our state gov.
Locke can be taken different ways. You've taken the worst from Locke, rather than the best. I went the other way, such that when I read The Law by Frederic Bastiat, I found that ageed with just about everything he wrote.
The theory behind the quote you posted, and this was pointed out by Locke's contemporary critics, leads in a straight line to anarchy, because that's what you get if people choose not to consent. Locke himself got around it by essentially saying that existing inside its territory constitutes consent to join the body politic, but this immediately comes to two objections. First, it's total nonsense. Second, it leaves people to an unlimited tyranny of the majority, such as you advocate. The most serious followers of Locke on that point are anarcho-capitalists and Rousseans.
It would be better to take Locke's point that all people, in a state of nature, have the natural right to punish criminals, understood as defined by objective violation of another's life, liberty, or property, not as defined by some arbitrary command(which couldn't exist without a government anyway). In fact, it would be better to view this as a duty, rather than a right. A moral duty, of course, rather than a legal duty which it would be a crime to neglect, such a fulfilling a contract. It should go without saying that you can't yourself commit crimes while fulfilling this duty, or you bring it against yourself. Now, humans being what they are, mistakes are inevitable, so the best you can ask for is good faith and every attempt to avoid punishing the innocent. What's really needed is a system of due process that can be trusted to acquit the innocent and punish the guilty. That's where government comes in. The duty to avoid committing crimes yourself implies a duty to use the best means availiable, the government(provided, of course, that is is in fact the best means around). The government has no rights a single individual doesn't.
However, it tends to turn abusive, and turns against the people, leading to the kind of thing I describe in the column that started this whole thing. The solution is to tie the government to the people, not through crude majoritarianism, but through the kind of republic our Founders established.
If you were quick(which you're not), you'd see that my whole theory rests on vigilanteeism(and possibly use it as an objection). It's not a bad thing. "Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed." There's nothing inherently wrong with vigilanteeism, just the way it's often carried out, requiring a system of due process to correct. The government itself is the ultimate vigilantee, unless you see it as being in a separate metaphysical category. It's not. You might notice that this opens the government itself to have vigilantee justice exercised against it. This is also not a bad thing. "When a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security."
Now this is the basic premise, threat of harm does violate the individuals whom you impose the danger upon. The trick is deciding when something becomes too harmful. This is not a subjective task, no matter how much the likes of you, Uriel, OWK, wish it to be. You have all acknowledged that sufficient danger does merit gov. interference. You simply draw the line further away form normalcy than most. But simply because you don't see the threat in your next door neighbor smoking crack, does not mean that it doesn't exist.
The word you're looking for is objective.
And yes, it is objective. Immediate threat of bodily harm counts. Hypothetical future threats don't.
It's rare to find a soulmate. Go for it.
Your passion to legitimize and legalize hard drugs is quite sickening.
Suppose it's 4:20 and Dope Smokin' Joe fires up the old bong and inhales the wicked fumes. Who has Dope Smokin' Joe killed?
And since you think he's violating all the comandments, how has he had a god before the LORD thy God, who brought thee out of Egypt? In which way is he engraving an image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth, and bowing himself before it? How is he using the Lord's name in vain, or failing to keep the Sabbath? How is he dishonoring his father or mother? In what way is he committing adultery? Who is he stealing from? Which neighbor is he bearing false witness against, and what does this witness consist of? How does toking imply envy of his neighbor's house, wife, manservant, mainservant, ox, ass, or anything that is his neighbor's?
I don't understand Libertarians who want to use drugs. Isn't their claim to fame, "Liberty?" How can one be at liberty or free, if they are dependent on drugs? Or, alcohol, and cigarettes, for that matter?
It isn't about wanting to use drugs. It's about wanting to be free, by which we mean free of coercion. I don't do drugs, but I want drugs to be legal. I don't smoke, but I want cigarettes to be legal. I do drink, and I want alcohol to be legal. It may be that an addict or an alcoholic is made unfree by his addiction, but a person under coercion is just as unfree.
Smoking a cigarette doesn't 'harm/endanger' them, does it? ----- Your ignorant fanaticism on this subject is getting bizarre.
You have no right to purposefully take away your ability to act responsibly, and to reason.
Weird, -- here we are, discussing the reasoning behind the freedoms protected by the constitution, and you insist that the government has a power to make us 'act responsibly'. Shows a lack of reasoning on your part, imo.
Otherwise I should rightfully be able to own a nuclear warhead in my home.
More weirdness. -- Nuclear materials are inherently very dangerous, & restrictions can be placed on their storage.
Your passion to legitimize and legalize hard drugs is quite sickening.
You are the sick one, tex. --- They are legal, as per the constitution. There are many unconstitutional laws restricting their possession & use. I have a passion to repeal these laws, not for ANY drugs.
-- [well, I do favor a good beer now & then]
Yup, and coke, heroin, crack, ect are quite harmless. Your ignorance STILL astounds me.
More weirdness. -- Nuclear materials are inherently very dangerous, & restrictions can be placed on their storage.
Your passion to legitimize and legalize hard drugs is quite sickening.
You are the sick one, tex. --- They are legal, as per the constitution. There are many unconstitutional laws restricting their possession & use. I have a passion to repeal these laws, not for ANY drugs. -- [well, I do favor a good beer now & then] -217-
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Yup, and coke, heroin, crack, ect are quite harmless. Your ignorance STILL astounds me.
ALL mind altering substances are, to a degree, harmful to their users. That is why we give govenment the power to regulate them. --- Just as they have the power to regulate nukes.
Really my boy, you should go back to a good school. Texas A&M failed you, -- or you it.
Sho you right! We all know that not a single soul out there has been harmed who has not touched drugs.........
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