The Constitution states the powers and limitations of the government.
For example, the government can wage war.
Likewise, there is a ban on the government passing laws regarding the establishment of a state religion.
There is no ban on a government passing laws concerning people dancing naked and having drinks. As such, no such inherent right exists and local governments can ban it.
Likewise with prohibition. Just because the 18th ammendment was repealed, that is not an impediment against any state or locality passing dry laws. They are free to do so.
In short – not everything you want to do is a legal “right.” Legal “rights” are only those that are granted to you by the Constituion.
So you say. And to force such a standard on others is, by your own definition, immoral.
The bottom line is that we are a nation of laws. The types of laws that can be drafted and adopted are governed by the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of the state in which you happen to reside. Since the COTUS and the NYS Constitution make no ban on passing laws banning red lollipops, NYS is free to adopt such a law. It does not infringe on my “right” to own a red lollipop because I have no such right to begin with. It may be a silly law, deserving of ridicule and the outster of the lawmakers who pass it; but it violates no rights.
Lastly, grendel72, please show me where it states one has a right to do “whatever the hell you want” so long as you don’t harm anyone. Last I checked, there are things that one can do that don’t harm anyone that aren’t a “right.”
Never let it be said I’m not an equal-opportunity nit-picker.
This isn’t strictly correct, Zev. The Constitution says explicitly that other rights exist, and the rights enumerated in it should not be considered an exhaustive list. Further, the Constitution does not “grant” rights, but rather prohibits the government from infringing upon rights you already have, from some other source. What other source? That’s unclear. God, if you believe in that sort of thing (". . . that we are endowed by our Creator with certain inalienable rights . . ."); social consensus or the nebulous idea of “inherency,” if you don’t. But the Constitution itself neither grants nor invents rights.
Because communities (whether they be local or state) can insist on standards within the community. That’s what democracy is all about. If the community deems half-naked dancing to be outside those standards, they are free to decide in such a manner. As long as they don’t overstep the bounds that the Constitution sets for such laws, then they are binding. Don’t like them? You have two options:
Move to a location where such activity is tolerated
Start a campaign, boot out the yahoos who pass such laws and repeal them.
We have the same laws here. You can’t watch a naked person dance, and drink your beer at the same time. Except in Lawrence: there’s a place where you can bring your own beer and watch naked people dance, you just can’t buy it there. Or you can’t buy alcohol, at all, on Sundays (except in a restaurant).
I don’t understand how these laws make any sort of sense except to give conservative sourpusses a way to make our pursuit of hedonism a little more difficult.
As I’m sure Jodi will agree, it depends on whether we’re talking about law or ethics. Lawfully speaking, only government has rights. Ethically speaking, only individuals do.
People are fond of offering me hypotheticals. I would like to offer you one. If a community democratically made gang rape legal, would you still hold the people there to your two choices?
No. One doubts that gang rape falls in the domains of “domestic tranquility”, and would likely fall short of most, if not all state constitutions as well.
I’m not passing judgement on the merit of the law banning naked dancing and drinking itself. The law itself may or may not be a bad or silly law, as is the hypothetical law banning red lollipops. I am simply taking issue with the assertion that the OP has the legal “right” to observe naked dancing and drinking.
Actually, I’ve never been in a strip bar myself, and I have a vague feeling that it is wrong in a way. I still think that it is far worse to impose my morality on others.
Taking away the option of others to do something because I disagree with it is just wrong, I can’t really express it any better than that. If you feel something is wrong, don’t do it- that is the limit of your options without infringing on the freedom of others.
Either I’ve misunderstood this or, if I haven’t, I wonder why you think I would agree that individuals have no rights at law. As should be obvious, I do not agree with that and, to the contrary, would argue that “government” has no rights as such, at law or otherwise. All rights IMO derive from the people, either individually or collectively, and the government can only claim such rights as would belong to the people collectively – such as self-defense – but has no independent claim to any rights whatsoever.
Assuming the people in question wish to continue to live within the rule of law, ZEV’s choices are, in fact, the only reasonable choices: (1) Move to where you are not bound by the repellent law; or (2) change the law. The only other possible choices are to refuse to follow the law (civil disobedience), which is not an option when something is de-criminalized, since it is impossible to break a law that doesn’t exist, or to revolt, which takes one outside the rule of law.
GRENDEL –
But, you see, that’s what we as a society do when we say that it is wrong to murder, or to steal, or to have sex with someone not of the age of consent. In our country and in this day and age, much of the law is regulatory – designed to promote the safer or more orderly running of society. But at a fundamental level, without regard to time or place, much of the law (and the idea of “law”) is based on collective morality. I think as a general proposition it is fine to say that “Taking away the option of others to do something because I disagree with it is just wrong,” but I hope you would see that this is in fact exactly what a lot of our laws do – take away the option of others to do something becasue we, collectively, disagree with it.
Sure, but as I have said, where the rubber hits the road on these issues is when, and what, constitutes “observably harmful”?
What if the rationale for the regulation in question was not that peeler joints are immoral, but some perceived problem with property values/transient populations/exploitation of women/whatever? Would you then have a problem with the law, or would it pass muster with you so long as the underlying purpose is not the imposition of morality but rather the prevention of the “observably harmful”?
Beats the shit outta me, Lib. Good question. YOu hafta pose it to the Kennesaw city council, or whatever it is they have down there that functions as such.
And a great answer! It’s good to hear a cut-to-the-chase response.
Zev wrote:
Okay, I’m glad you cleared that up. Of course, ethically, all rights accrue to ownership of property; therefore, if rights come from the chief magistrate, then he owns the law.
Jodi wrote:
For that to be true, and for me to be in agreement with you, we need only clarify “the people” to mean “the people with the greatest political clout”. In a democratic system, it is they who own the law.
Let us assume that there are 1,000 citizens, and only 100 of them are being raped. How, in a democracy where they are outnumbered 10 to 1, do they go about changing the law?
I think the point is clearly not to ensure that every home has a firearm in it. When a law isn’t meant to or can’t do what it is written to do, then that usually implies that there was some political motive behind passing it.
First of all, this is a ridiculous hypothetical. Realistically speaking, no American governmental body at any level would support such a thing. Ever.
Second, rape laws, like most criminal laws, are made at the state level. You’d have to convince a lot more than 1,000 people that doing this is a good idea.
Third, women make up about half the population, so about half of the population would be at-risk of gang rape. They’d never support it. And I suspect a sizeable portion of the other half would be none too happy with the notion of their wives, daughters, sisters and mothers being made legal targets for rapists.
Fourth, if you can still somehow wrap your mind around this through-the-looking-glass scenario, the women have another option: pack up and leave. And they’d be wise to do so – would you really want to live in a community that would tolerate legal gang rape? Hell, I’m a man and I’d be so offended, I’d leave. A community that would do that is beyond redemption, IMO.
Put simply, the ordinary democratic process and/or voting with one’s feet would handle this extraordinarily farfetched scenario.
Tell me more about this city ordinance in Kennesaw Ga. From what I read here the city fathers have enacted a city ordinance that requires that there be a firearm of some sort in every household (with some exemptions). Is there a sanction if a household is unarmed? If my neighbor, acting under some local crime stoppers program, reports to the town constable that my house is devoid of firearms, or that I have pawned the family shoot’ in iron, does anything happen? Is my house searched? If the search just reveals an aluminum base ball bat or a boarding pike but no smoke pole am I liable for a fine or time in the lock-up? Or is it like an ordinance that requires me to mow my lawn—if I don’t have a gun does the town buy one for me and ad the price of the gun to my real estate taxes? Is my name published in the city father’s minutes as a house that is ripe for a burglar? What the Hell is this madness?
