But not all rights are “inalienable”, just life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Your “right” to vote or your “right” to choose Coke over Pepsi is not granted by God.
If the government were to follow your rationale on this point they would be in violation of the 9th Amendment to the Constitution.
WRONG. The DoI says "... they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."
Jefferson states right there that 'Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness' are not the only unalienable rights with which the Creator has endowed us.
One of the Federalists' arguments against a Bill of Rights was that it was too hard to list all the rights that people had that the US gov't shouldn't infringe, and the gov't would then think it had a green light to violate those not listed. Hence the 9th Amendment.
Uh, not quite. It says "Among these are...", NOT "just.."
and the Constitutional 'right' to vote is just that,a right given to citizens, NOT a Right endowed by the Creator.
Incidently, all my copies of the Declaration of Independance say “unalienable”, NOT “inalienable”,
You ask:
Which rights in the Constitution are unalienable and which rights are not unalienable?
All of them are unalienable. So are all of the rights not mentioned in the Constitution.
How can you tell the difference between an unalienable right and a non-unalienable (if there is such a word) right.
What the heck is a non-unalienable right? If a right is lienable then in what sense was it a "right" in the first place?
There are none, nada, zero examples in the Constitution that says that the rights enumerated there ARE God given.
That's true. The Constitution doesn't delve into the origin of our rights very much. It simply acknowledges those rights as pre-existing.
If it helps you understand things, perhaps you can come to terms with rights as being pre-existing without necessarily being "God-given". If you refuse to believe they are "God-given" I can't object.
On the other hand, that is what many if not most of the Founding Fathers seemed to believe. That fact, however, need not affect your religious views any.
The fact that the Bill of Rights was codified despite objection is further justification to believe that the founding fathers did not see those rights as God given and thus HAD to be ratified and agreed to by the states.
On the contrary. The fact that there was objection to codifying the Bill of Rights in the first place proves that your point is 180 degrees out of phase. Those who objected feared precisely the argument you make here. This point is made by other respondees, and better, so I won't belabor it.
If the God given rights go beyond life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness; what are they?
There is not enough space on any computer to list them all. Some of them are mentioned in the Bill of Rights, however. Go look at it. It's not a complete list, but it's a start.
[list taken from Bill of Rights] All of these "rights" are listed in the Bill of Rights. "Good Grief" are all of these GOD given rights?????
I believe someone else tried to explain this to you, but most of the things you listed - if not all of them - are special cases of things like your Right To Be Secure In Your Person, or your Right To Liberty.
For example, you cited the phrase "[no] Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation". Now, this isn't exactly a "right", is it? It's an instruction directed towards government. Specifically, it is something government must obey if they will try to violate one of your rights. Which right? Your Right to Be Secure In Your Person, House, etc. And that right is a God-given right. You don't think so?
Here's another example. You cited "In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed". This is another instruction to government, should they try to violate your rights. The government must do the following: give you a speedy trial, a public trial, before an appropriate jury, if they are going to try to violate one of your rights. Which right? Your Right To Liberty. And Liberty is, once again, a God-given right.
But those rights exist because they have been agreed upon through a democratic process, not because God has ordained them.
Which "agreed upon" and "democratic process" created the notion that we have the right to Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness? I'm all ears.
There may have been those that disagreed with this view at the time of the writing of the Constitution but they were overruled
Yes, they were overruled, weren't they. Especially the Brits - they too were overruled, violently.
So I'm wondering which part of that you think was "democratic" and "agreed upon". Sounds to me more like a vocal radical minority had certain ideas about things and forged a radical document enshrining their views.
An essential part of their views, of course - not to mention, the most radical - was their idea that everyone possessing unalienable God-given rights. This was their philosophy. I happen to agree with it. There is a nation built on this philosophy. It's called the United States of America.
If you really don't like this philosophy then you don't have to live in the USA. You could go to a nation built on different philosophies. To each his own.
our framework of "rights" were defined by law, not God.
Sort of. Our concept of "rights" were defined by documents written by people who believed those rights came from God and tried to enumerate some of them.
And if another right like gun ownership, becomes(God forbid) limited to particular persons and changed on various occasions - then will this right no longer be considered "natural".
No. The right to keep and bear arms is a natural right. Governments may and will infringe upon this right at various times, to varying degrees. That would not change the fact that it is a right.
Just like Hitler's Germany did not prove that Jewish people did no possess the right to life. They violated that right, but they couldn't abolish it. Right?
Otherwise, what exactly was so bad about what Hitler did? If Hitler was able to metaphysically erase the Right To Life from Jewish persons, then by killing them he did nothing wrong - they had no right to live in the first place. Is that what you believe?
It seems to me that you can't define rights by how they are abused.
No you can't. Good point. That's why no matter how many and how often governments abuse the right to keep and bear arms, it won't re-define that pre-existing right any.
The Government IS the people!
No, it isn't. The Government is the government. It is composed of certain specific people - and not all of them. It derives its powers from the consent of the governed, but that is not the same thing as saying that it "IS" the people, either.
What you describe, a government that "IS" the people, is closer to Pure Democracy (where everyone votes on every single issue and action) than to the democratic republic which is the form of government we have in this country.
And I thought we were discussing the government of the United States as it is defined by the Constitution for the United States, not the government of some imaginary Pure Democracy.