# How can a Libertarian be opposed to the Right to Privacy? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [November 5, 2011, 10:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-a-libertarian-be-opposed-to-the-right-to-privacy/602001 "2011-11-05T22:33:14Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![David42](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/5f9b8f/32.png) [@David42](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David42)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2011, 12:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-a-libertarian-be-opposed-to-the-right-to-privacy/602001/101 "2011-11-15T00:03:24Z")
> [@Damuri\_Ajashi](#): > > That right there is something I would have a problem with. Why single out abortion as something you dont want to fund? In theory Libertarians are against funding a whole lot of stuff so when they have an abortion line item in their platform, it tells me that libertarians have been coopted. This is anecdotal, Damuri, but it might help assure you that the LP wasn’t coopted. In the early-mid nineites I became interested in Libertarianism. I agreed with them far more than Democrats or Republicans, even though I didn’t agree with everything. Still, the LP came closer to expressing my “live and let live” attitude better than anything else offered, so I joined. In the late nineties I was the founding chair of a local LP party. At that time, our local group had huge discussions over the national party’s pro-choice plank. In my state, typically conservative, the happened to be more than half of our local group who disagredd with this pro-choice plank. One reason is that the LP was promoting itself as the “Party of Personal Responsibility.” Some of thought this was inconsistent with abortion as birth control. None of us felt a woman should have to bear a child as the result of rape or when her health was endangered. But if we’re gonna market ourselves under “Personal Responsibility,” we felt, we should say something about the irresponsibility of indiscriminate sex without birth control and then asking for someone else (taxpayers) to pay for it. Irresponsible all around. We went round and round about this and had to agree to disagree. There was one area wherein we did not disagree–we were all united in the “no taxpayer funded” abortion angle. We contacted the national party about this, networked with other state and local groups, and found that other Libertarian groups were having the same conflict with the same results. Our next convention, the national plank got changed to simply being against the funding of abortion with tax dollars. We didn’t get coopted. We simply modified our official position slightly due to increasing complaints of people who had long been Libertarians and didn’t wholly agree with the pro-choice plank. While we are a party of choice, we are also a party of responsibility, as wella s a party of protecting those who can’t protect themselves; and sometimes the things can conflict. No political ideology is perfect. ---
**Author:** ![gatorslap](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/bb73d2/32.png) [@gatorslap](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gatorslap)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2011, 12:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-a-libertarian-be-opposed-to-the-right-to-privacy/602001/102 "2011-11-15T00:05:44Z")
Where does it say in the US Constitution that Congress has the power to make laws banning the federal judiciary from hearing certain kinds of cases? ---
**Author:** ![David42](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/5f9b8f/32.png) [@David42](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David42)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2011, 12:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-a-libertarian-be-opposed-to-the-right-to-privacy/602001/103 "2011-11-15T00:09:00Z")
> [@Lord\_Feldon](#): > > He’s also against federal courts upholding peoples’ fourth amendment right to use birth control. He has introduced bills that would supposedly ban federal courts from hearing such cases, and which explicitly state that any precedent created by past court cases on that issue (and other issues) is voided. The only effect would be to re-empower states to make such laws. His issue there is bad jurisprudence, not the effect of the bad jurisprudence. He doesn’t like the court switching what the fourth amendment means for something else, even though the something else might be good too, and even though the something else is closely related. If the S. Ct. had held, “Under the ninth amendment, we find the people have a right to the use of birth control,” I doubt he’d be complaining. I wouldn’t. Like I said, it’s an issue of does the end justify the means, not any desire to impose birth control restrictions on anyone. ---
**Author:** ![Linden\_Arden](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/53a042/32.png) [@Linden\_Arden](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Linden_Arden)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2011, 12:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-a-libertarian-be-opposed-to-the-right-to-privacy/602001/104 "2011-11-15T00:14:27Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > So, you declared yourself the winner! Shall we ask the mods to close this thread now that you have “won” it? Its been clearly demonstrated that the BigTime LP is opposed to the Right to Privacy and related freedom principles. Its simply THEM though - not the LP. But go ahead and defend them. Just don’t pretend the Constitution is on their side. Griswold exposed their true roots. ---
**Author:** ![Lord\_Feldon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lord_feldon/32/341_2.png) [@Lord\_Feldon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lord_Feldon)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2011, 12:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-a-libertarian-be-opposed-to-the-right-to-privacy/602001/105 "2011-11-15T00:19:16Z")
> [@David42](#): > > If the S. Ct. had held, “Under the ninth amendment, we find the people have a right to the use of birth control,” I doubt he’d be complaining. I wouldn’t. The [We the People Act](http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c112:H.R.958:) would not exempt cases decided using the 9th Amendment. It simply states that the people of the United States have no right to sue in a federal court when they are assaulted and kidnapped by state government employees for lawful actions such as having sex, using a contraceptive, or praying. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2011, 8:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-a-libertarian-be-opposed-to-the-right-to-privacy/602001/106 "2011-11-15T20:03:18Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > Just to clarify, because my wording was a bit sloppy, I should have said “the private sector”, meaning restaurants, movie theaters, etc. I would suspect that Libertaria would have its share of “Whites Only” and probably “Blacks Only” restaurants, there being a market for that sort of thing, not matter how small. In 1960’s America there was no real incentive to allow blacks at the lunch counter or anywhere else. There were more racists than blacks and the blacks couldn’t afford to spend as much as the racists. It made sense to be a white only establishment in many cases. It almost never made sense to exclude whites. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2011, 8:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-a-libertarian-be-opposed-to-the-right-to-privacy/602001/107 "2011-11-15T20:09:14Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > [Here you go.](http://www.ontheissues.org/Celeb/Libertarian_Party_Abortion.htm) That poster actually got the history backwards, but this explains the context of opposing government funding for abortions (ie, some people consider it murder): > > "Government should be kept out of the matter of abortion > > Recognizing that abortion is a sensitive issue and that people can hold good-faith views on all sides, we believe that government should be kept out of the matter, leaving the question to each person for their conscientious consideration. > Source: National platform adopted at Denver L.P. convention May 30, 2008 > Abortion is a woman’s choice and does not concern the state > > Recognizing that abortion is a sensitive issue and that libertarians can hold good-faith views on both sides, we believe the government should be kept out of the question. We condemn state-funded abortions. It is particularly harsh to force someone who believes that abortion is murder to pay for another’s abortion. > > It is the right of the woman, not the state, to decide the desirability of prenatal testing, Caesarean births, fetal surgery, and/or home births. > Source: National Platform of the Libertarian Party Jul 2, 2000" > > Emphasis added to dates for clarity. So if I think something is murder then the government shouldn’t be allowed to fund it? I don’t think that is the stance at all. I think the Libertarian party has drawn an especially bright line on the funding of abortion where they have not drawn lines elsewhere. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2011, 8:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-a-libertarian-be-opposed-to-the-right-to-privacy/602001/108 "2011-11-15T20:13:55Z")
> [@Linden\_Arden](#): > > Ron Paul famously said “The State of Texas has the right to decide for itself how to regulate social matters like sex, using its own local standards.” > > I have seen this quote many times although I have not sourced it. > > From a classical liberal perspective (Hayek) I find Ron Paul a complete crackpot. His love of the book on the Federal Reserve (Creature from Jekyll Island) from the grifter Griffin confirms it. > > Libertarianism will be much better served without the Pauls. For weal or for woe, the pauls have come to define Libertarianism. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2011, 8:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-a-libertarian-be-opposed-to-the-right-to-privacy/602001/109 "2011-11-15T20:19:33Z")
> [@David42](#): > > If most people in Nebraska want to outlaw abortion, let them, and let the ones who might want an abortion move to the state that allows that. You are presuming a level of individual mobility that has never existed AND you are ignoring the tyranny of the majority. > [@](#): > > In this way the Great American Experiment could be of great use to us. We could watch which state does what and see which states flourish as a result of their policies and which ones decline. We used to have this with abortions and the result wasn’t a mass migration of people from pro-choice states to pro-life states or vice versa, the result was back alley abortions. A simple majority imposed their social agenda on the minority. This is not how our democracy is supposed to work where human rights are concerned. Either the woman’s right to abortion is greater or the fetuses right to life is greater and a popular vote doesn’t answer that question. ---
**Author:** ![David42](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/5f9b8f/32.png) [@David42](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David42)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2011, 8:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-a-libertarian-be-opposed-to-the-right-to-privacy/602001/110 "2011-11-15T20:20:55Z")
> [@Linden\_Arden](#): > > Its been clearly demonstrated that the BigTime LP is opposed to the Right to Privacy and related freedom principles. > > Its simply THEM though - not the LP. But go ahead and defend them. Just don’t pretend the Constitution is on their side. Griswold exposed their true roots. You still do not understand, Linden, and that’s the only clear thing you have shown us. Now check this out: Let’s say you are a promoter of activity X and activity X becomes illegal. Someone takes it to the Supreme Court and the Supreme Court rules “Activity X is protected activity because there are little green aliens on Mars who say so,” and that is their best reasoning in law that htey provide. Now let’s say that activity X is something good and wholesome that you approve of. Let’s say, however that you believe what little green aliens on Marsthink has no business in American jurisprudence. You protest this decision, becuase you’re worried about what else the Supreme COurt might let little green Aliens from Mars decide; even though you’re happy the decision safeguards Activity X. You loudly decry the decision in the case. Next people who are in favor of Activity X criticize you for not supporting Activity X. Is this accurate or fair? ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2011, 8:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-a-libertarian-be-opposed-to-the-right-to-privacy/602001/111 "2011-11-15T20:30:43Z")
> [@David42](#): > > This is anecdotal, Damuri, but it might help assure you that the LP wasn’t coopted. > In the early-mid nineites I became interested in Libertarianism. I agreed with them far more than Democrats or Republicans, even though I didn’t agree with everything. Still, the LP came closer to expressing my “live and let live” attitude better than anything else offered, so I joined. > > In the late nineties I was the founding chair of a local LP party. At that time, our local group had huge discussions over the national party’s pro-choice plank. In my state, typically conservative, the happened to be more than half of our local group who disagredd with this pro-choice plank. One reason is that the LP was promoting itself as the “Party of Personal Responsibility.” Some of thought this was inconsistent with abortion as birth control. None of us felt a woman should have to bear a child as the result of rape or when her health was endangered. But if we’re gonna market ourselves under “Personal Responsibility,” we felt, we should say something about the irresponsibility of indiscriminate sex without birth control and then asking for someone else (taxpayers) to pay for it. Irresponsible all around. > > We went round and round about this and had to agree to disagree. There was one area wherein we did not disagree–we were all united in the “no taxpayer funded” abortion angle. We contacted the national party about this, networked with other state and local groups, and found that other Libertarian groups were having the same conflict with the same results. Our next convention, the national plank got changed to simply being against the funding of abortion with tax dollars. > > We didn’t get coopted. We simply modified our official position slightly due to increasing complaints of people who had long been Libertarians and didn’t wholly agree with the pro-choice plank. > > While we are a party of choice, we are also a party of responsibility, as wella s a party of protecting those who can’t protect themselves; and sometimes the things can conflict. No political ideology is perfect. OK, so you are saying that funding abortion is a bit different than funding say the death penalty or wars because we are not funding the result of someone else’s individual choices (as opposed to policy choices) so if you are irresponsible and you get pregnant and can’t afford an abortion then we will not pay for an abortion so that the baby ends up with an irresponsible parent that can’t even afford an abortion? I am generally against second trimenster and very much against third trimester abortion because of concerns about the rights of the fetus but I am not at all concerned about the notion that people are using abortion as a method of birth control. Perhaps if there were better documentation of women using abortion as birth control I would change my position but all the empirical evidence points the other way with nothing but anecdotal evidence that abortion as birth control is a significnt issue. I was a bit of a Libertarian in college too because the 50K foot level view looked good but when you got into the weeds you found yourself crawling around on your belly with snakes. I still support capitalisma nd free market principles but so do both of the major parties in thsi country. I was republican for most of my adult life until they jumped the shark and now I cannot see voting Republican again unless the Republican party gets off its current trajectory. ---
**Author:** ![David42](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/5f9b8f/32.png) [@David42](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David42)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2011, 8:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-a-libertarian-be-opposed-to-the-right-to-privacy/602001/112 "2011-11-15T20:36:12Z")
> [@Lord\_Feldon](#): > > The [We the People Act](http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c112:H.R.958:) would not exempt cases decided using the 9th Amendment. It simply states that the people of the United States have no right to sue in a federal court when they are assaulted and kidnapped by state government employees for lawful actions such as having sex, using a contraceptive, or praying. Well, I do not see how this legislation would stop someone from filing a 42 USC 1983 claim, for instance, for kidnapping by a state actor. It would stop an appeal from a state supreme court in the case the person was originally “kidnapped” in. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2011, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-a-libertarian-be-opposed-to-the-right-to-privacy/602001/113 "2011-11-15T20:43:45Z")
> [@Damuri\_Ajashi](#): > > So if I think something is murder then the government shouldn’t be allowed to fund it? I don’t think that is the stance at all. I think the Libertarian party has drawn an especially bright line on the funding of abortion where they have not drawn lines elsewhere. What current government policy funds a citizen’s action that some people construe as murder, other than abortion? Of course, in Libertaria, the government wouldn’t fund anyone’s medical care, so it’s really a non-issue. > [@](#): > > For weal or for woe, the pauls have come to define Libertarianism. Only for a small segment of our society. > [@](#): > > A simple majority imposed their social agenda on the minority. This is not how our democracy is supposed to work where human rights are concerned. Either the woman’s right to abortion is greater or the fetuses right to life is greater and a popular vote doesn’t answer that question. The “vote”, popular or otherwise, answers every question in a democracy. It’s a polite fiction that certain things are above the vote, but nothing is in a democracy. ---
**Author:** ![David42](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/5f9b8f/32.png) [@David42](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David42)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2011, 8:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-a-libertarian-be-opposed-to-the-right-to-privacy/602001/114 "2011-11-15T20:46:41Z")
> [@Damuri\_Ajashi](#): > > OK, so you are saying that funding abortion is a bit different than funding say the death penalty or wars because we are not funding the result of someone else’s individual choices (as opposed to policy choices) so if you are irresponsible and you get pregnant and can’t afford an abortion then we will not pay for an abortion so that the baby ends up with an irresponsible parent that can’t even afford an abortion? No. I was illustrating how that plank came about. The reason for the plank wasn’t that we wanted to single out abortion. The reason for the plank is that the LP was facing not just minor disagreement over a platform plank, but experiencing a major division over the issue of abortion. Non-taxpayer funding of abortion was the only thing all of us could agree on about abortion. As far as the responsibility issues you complain of, I’d say that such an irresponsible person needs some help. But there’s a big difference in recognizing that and demanding that people who think abortion is murder in all cases contribute to that by paying for it. > [@Damuri\_Ajashi](#): > > I am generally against second trimenster and very much against third trimester abortion because of concerns about the rights of the fetus but I am not at all concerned about the notion that people are using abortion as a method of birth control. Perhaps if there were better documentation of women using abortion as birth control I would change my position but all the empirical evidence points the other way with nothing but anecdotal evidence that abortion as birth control is a significnt issue. Cite. If the documentation is poor on the reasons women get abortions (as I’d expect in an issue involving private medical records) I don’t see where you’re getting your “empirical evidence” from. Nor was I aware that you have to state a reason for getting an abortion, seem I have believed that you could get an abortion on demand. I am against the concept. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-a-libertarian-be-opposed-to-the-right-to-privacy/602001.md?page=5)