No. The topics are the same. You have an objection to your perception of what libertarians might think, (regardless what they actually do think), and you are trying to make your point over and over in separate threads.
So far, you have failed to demonstrate that anyone that you accuse of being a libertarian actually holds the views that you attribute to them, so you are failing to make a case for your claim.
Well, if you attempt to say it with multiple threads on the same topic, you are going to begin having those threads shut down.
Make your case that I should not merge the threads. So far you have posted nothing that actually explains why I should not.
Y’know, if you are unfamiliar with the concept of Common Law, particularly English Common Law from which the Law of the U.S. has developed, then you probably have no business discussing Law in any context until you get some more education.
I agree we have a generalized right to privacy. I don’t agree we should construe the federal constitution as though it had an amendment reading, “The United States, or any state, shall not infringe on the privacy of the people.”
It would help if you identified which version of the right to privacy you mean.
Sheesh Linden, do you understand what “common law” is? its a legal system. it’s a jurisdiction. It’s the system of law the english built before our constitution, which defines our constitution. It started with Henry II who wanted a set of statutes “common” to all of England, though it grew beyond that simple idea to include the basic fundamental ideas that English Courts governed under.
You could say “State of the English law prior to 1789” but that’s a mouthful and not entirely correct, though that;s the gist of it.
It’s not some “lesser” or “inferior” or “law of the common people” or something that resides in the ether. (BTW we did away with the notion of ether in astronomy a hundred years ago)
Common law is our law today unless 1) a statute abolished it while it was unprotected in the constitution or 2) the constitution abolished it.
It’s the framework our legal system is built upon.
I really really think you’re starting debates that are over your head, Linden, but if you want to have patience and learn something, rather than prove your ideological and false points about libertarianism, I don’t mind helping you understand.
But to those of us who know what we are talking about, a discussion of the constitution is almost impossible in many circumstances, because you have to consider the common law when deciding what the constitution means, nearly always.
Perhaps Linden is busy educating him/herself, we can hope.
However TomNDebb, I have to concede this thread has a slightly different flavor than the other. I’d agree with you however, if there were twenty-two other threads also very similar Linden has started. I’d vote for letting this one go on.
The irony is that Linden Arden inadvertently made a good point. Many Constitutional scholars of a conservative or libertarian bent (with multiple theoretical approaches in there) don’t believe in a Right to Privacy, and I agree; that’s not in the Constitution. Perhaps it should be, but it isn’t and any discussion of it is silly, because you can create anything you wantto fill that space.
The “Right to Self-Defense” is the same. It’s not a Constitutional rightm and that’s fine because the Constitution does not limit what rights we have or can have. It could become one, though I don’t see the need; it seems perfectly suited to adjudication by the states.
My quick reading of DC v. Heller indicates that the Constitution does protect a right of self defense. While there may also be a common law right, I do think it is also protected by the Constitution.
Getting back to the original question about self-defense, I’m going to assume that the OP is asking about an individual’s right of self-defense against the government, since by and large the purpose of constitutional rights is to constrain the actions of the Government. And the answer is that the Constitution deos not provide the individual with a general right of self-defense. What it provides, in the Fifth Amendment, is that the individual’s rights to life, liberty, and property shall not be constrained without due process of law. This is why it’s generally lawful for the Government to imprison someone, with a proper warrant to do so, and why it’s generally unlawful for an individual to use force to resist arrest.
How do you read Heller? It seems to me that if the Constitution protects your right to bear arms in self defense, then the Constitution protects a right to self defense. Unless, of course, the Constitution only allows you to use arms in self defense, which I think is kinda a tough reading to make.
Does not an originalist try to determine the original intent of the Constitution, rather than its literal meaning?
Because, if so, I am surprised no one has mentioned the second amendment. An originalist* would look at the reason for said amendment, and note that there was an idea that a citizen might have to defend himself against a tyrannical government.
As for the more mundane version, all you would need is the government’s inability to deprive you of life or liberty without due process of law. Law at that time would have been understood to be (or at least take pointers from) common law. A very common originalist* claim is that the Constitution was written in the legal language of the day and is not ambiguous. The word “law” would mean the law they were familiar with, British common law, except with those modifications made by the Constitution.
It would seem the OP is going more for a textualist view, however. But that’s wholly uninteresting: all you have is that the federal government is not empowered to regulate such, and thus it obviously goes to the states. The same exact argument used for privacy, and a whole lot more.
I know you weren’t speaking to me, but I would probably say that it empowers you to own arms which may be used in legitimate cases of self-defense as avowed under local or state law. Of course, self-defense is always a somewhat murky issue, so that limits must be imposed by the government in some form.
Then why did Scalia’s opinion contain 32 references to “self defense”, including statements like:
"Tucker elaborated on the Second Amendment: “This may be considered as the true palladium of liberty . . . . The right to self-defence is the first law of nature: in most governments it has been the study of rulers to confine the right within the narrowest limits possible. Wherever standing armies are kept up, and the right of the people to keep and bear arms is, under any colour or pretext whatsoever, prohibited, liberty, if not already annihilated, is on the brink of destruction.”
and
"Joel Tiffany, for example, citing Blackstone’s description of the right, wrote that “the right to keep and bear arms, also implies the right to use them if necessary in self defence; without this right to use the guaranty would have hardly been worth the paper it consumed."
and
“As the quotations earlier in this opinion demonstrate, the inherent right of self-defense has been central to the Second Amendment right.”
Scalia wrote, at great length, about the right to bear arms being tied to the right of self-defense without limiting the language to only that under state or local law. Throughout the opinion, there are multiple references to State Constitutions that have specific language protecting the right of self defense, yet the opinion doesn’t limit it’s application to only those states or municipalities that have such language.
