Discuss.
It is a right if on one’s own property, IIRC. For instance, a farmer could drive a pickup around his farm all day long without a license. It’s when he gets on public roads with the rest of us that he must prove he has good vision and some basic driving abilities.
What’s wrong with that?
The answer is rather simple - but for the simplicity to be, er, simple, one must remember that the privilege is not driving, but instead driving on public roads. If you own a chunk of land, you may cruise across it to your heart’s content, license or no. That is your right. It is only the use of public roads that is the privilege.
OK, back to simplicity - the government provides the roads. As provider of the roads, it may choose to regulate their use as it sees fit - so long as such regulation is non-discriminatory, etc., etc.
It’s the same principle that allows the government to close down public parks at night, or charge admission to national parks.
Sua
Or what debaser said. 
Sua
I remember being irked by this line when I first read it in the State drivers manual. I think driving (like anything else) is a right, not a privilege, though it may be regulated, as are other rights. And I also think use of public roads is a right, not a privilege (as discussed previously).
IzzyR, could you tell me exactly what you see as the distinction between a right and a privilege?
Going to Merriam-webster.com’s definition of privilege:
a right or immunity granted as a peculiar benefit, advantage, or favor.
So maybe it’s both ;o)
Can’t we call any regulated right, a privilege? That is, as soon as a right becomes sufficiently regulated, it becomes less of a right and more of a privilege.
It is a bit of a distinction without a difference, IzzyR. So long as you meet the established criteria for driving (age, visual acuity, technical skill and knowledge of traffic laws), you may not be denied the privilege/right (pright? ;)). And, with a caveat discussed below, you may not lose this pright unless you violate those traffic laws.
The caveat is that, at least in some states, persons may lose their driver’s license for underage drinking, even if no car was involved. This passes legal muster, as being “rationally related” to road safety (rationally related being the most amazingly broad concept in law), but I personally think it pretty much distorts the relationship between safety on the road and the pright to drive out of recognition.
Sua
I agree, being tested physically or whatever to drive on public roads is a necessity.
Here in Illinois, I don’t know if it’s law yet. But I hear of situations involved where guys getting caught for prostitution getting their cars taken away for a certain period of time or their drivers license suspended for some time involving prostitution.
What would prostitution have to do with driving? Yeah, the guy maybe picked up a ho in his ride, but still, there are different penalties for that.
I’m still looking for a related story, but still I’ve heard of this.
Farmer2, I’ve heard of car impoundment, but not license suspension involving prostitution arrests. License suspension would be a huge stretch, even for the “rationally related” test, so I’m not going to comment on that until I find out whether that is actually happening.
As for car impoundment, that does not actually infringe on the privilege/right to drive - you can still drive, you just have to use another car.
It is still an outrage, but the outrage in question there is the abusive use of civil forfeiture. And that is a whole 'nother debate.
Sua
As I’m using the terms, a right is something that you have a claim on - that you can demand (subject to the countervailing rights of others - a group that may include the government). A privilege is something you have at the beneficence of others.
If you’ve signed up for AAA, you have the right to have your car towed. If you’ve signed up for this MB, you are receiving the privilege of posting here.
(Some previous discussion of related matters here).
Sua, I don’t know of a direct practical difference. But I think the attitude that our natural rights are gifts from the government to us is a damaging one.
. . . and I would imagine that before there can be impoundment the authorities must demonstrate that the car being impounded was used in the solicitation of prostitution at issue, sort of like civil forfeiture of the fruits of drug dealing, etc. I also can’t imagine off-hand how license suspension could be rationally related to prostitution.
Farmer, I suspect you mean “patronizing a prostitute” – saying they got “caught for prostitution” would imply that they were hustlers selling their own bodies, to me at least.
I confess that, like Izzy, I find the distinction rather troubling – to call the ‘right’ to drive on public roads a “privilege” implies a degree of state control over individual action that is not in keeping with the philosophy of American freedom, whereas terming it a right with restrictions placed on it for the public safety carries the same weight in practical terms but slants the conceptualization much more in terms with our adherence to liberty.
Analogize it to the use of land in an area with zoning in place. You have permitted rights to use your land for the purposes for which it is zoned – they are your rights, running with the land, not a privilege granted by the almighty metropolis, but they are restricted for the purpose of enabling your neighbors and passersby to have equal opportunity to their own quiet enjoyment of their rights. For example, you may be required not to open a boiler factory next to the nursing home, or a porn shop next to the elementary school; you may be required to build your house at least ten feet away from the property line; you may be required to put in sidewalks so pedestrians can walk safely past your home without having to walk in the street; you may be prohibited from putting in columnar cedar trees to hedge in your corner-lot property and block the view of motorists of oncoming traffic on the intersecting street. But those restrictions to one side, it is your right to do what you will, within broad limits aimed at protecting everyone’s standard of life, with your property.
Likewise, you cannot be denied a driver’s license because you are too old, gay, a Democrat, a Jew, an atheist, too fat, too ugly, or whatever other prejudices the licensing agent might have – you can only be denied one when you are physically, mentally, or attitudinally incapable of operating a motor vehicle safely on the highways and such denial is subject to stringent rules protecting your right so to do against arbitrary abuse.
Polycarp, real estate can be rezoned. The “almighty metropolis” can change what you are permitted to do with your land (and in the process greatly change the value of your land).
Sua
Yet teh examples you gave refer to rights issuing from AAA or the owners of the SDMB. I confess, that I think of the first example as a matter of contractual obligation, not rights. the second example I see very much as a privilege, though the scope of that privilege is also delineated in formal agreement between parties.
Poly
I think that I generally view “rights” as concerned very much with the natural capacites of human beings, not with teh specific technological devices which may amplify or extend those capacities. Thus, we have the right to speak freely, but we do not individually have a right to operate radio transmitters. Use of the public airways is a privilege. We have a right to move about freely, but it is a privilege to operate a motor vehicle on public roadways.
As others have noted, the practical distinction is subtle. In fact, given IzzyR’s examples the distinction may be nonexistent. For myself, I think the distinction lies in the justifications which can be used to deny an individual the ability to exercise the right/privilege. I am perfectly happy with the government saing that someone has driven irresponsibly too many times in the past and will not be allowed to drive in the present. To me, driving is a privilege. I would object very strongly to the same reasoning being applied to the right to vote.
I disagree with that definition of “privilege” and I would consider driving a right regardless of what you were told in high school. A privilege is something granted or denied without justification and without creating rights upon other third parties.
Rights can be suspended for cause. Voting is a right which can be suspended for cause.
I do not think a person can be denied a driver’s license for no reason and I therefore consider it a right.
I would find it equally appalling to see people denied for possession of recreational drugs. I don’t know if it’s a federal or local Mass state law but you can lose a drivers license for a year due to drug laws. And this is for people who don’t have to be anywhere near a car at the time of the arrest. Outragous.
I suspect you would find that most state appellate courts have held (if the issue has come up) that operating a motor vehicle on public roads is a privilege, not a right. Setting aside the semantic discussion above, this issue has come up quite often in terms of double jeopardy challenges to administrative license revocation/suspension laws. For example, state legislatures have provided that your drivers license can be revoked/suspended for DUI, in a civil/administrative proceeding that is separate and distinct from the criminal DUI action. Defendants in such actions have often tried to argue that taking away their license in a separate action from the one in which they are criminally punished amounts to double jeopardy. AFAIK courts have universally rejected this claim, holding that driving is a privilege, not a right, and that the government can take that privilege away as a matter of protecting the public, without any double jeopardy problems.
I don’t see much of a distinction between right and privilege… All rights are regulated to one degree or another, as are privileges. I don’t recall ever before hearing that privileges are regulated without cause, and rights are only regulated for cause, but I guess that might work… or maybe privileges are more heavily regulated than rights? I don’t believe the distinction is clear, but if someone says they want to do something, it’s called a right. If you don’t want someone else to do something, you call it a privilege.
Personally, I’m in favor of regulating access to roads/driving to a greater degree. I think dangerous drivers should be taken off the road, and I think vehicles that pollute heavily should have their access to roads limited. So I guess I should call driving a privilege, right? I’m biased, of course-- I have a clean driving record, and asthma.