217 years old and holding...barely...

December 15th is the 217th anniversary of the ratification of the Bill of Rights. That's the first ten amendments to our Constitution, set in place to protect our already existing rights from government usurpation. There is a wide range of views on how effective they have been in accomplishing that goal.

Certainly people of the libertarian persuasion can cite many examples where they believe government has ignored our protections, especially those afforded by the first, second, fourth, fifth, ninth and tenth amendments. Other groups place varying amounts of importance on some of the amendments, while placing none at all on others.

I'm a big believer in individual rights, and a big fan of anything that serves to keep the government in check. Which is why I believe the Bill of Rights needs to be rigidly interpreted, and why people need to understand they still have the same rights even when it isn't.

I wrote this opinion back in 2005 to express some of my thoughts on rights. I still believe it's right....


The recent uproar over certain pharmacists’ refusal to provide “morning-after” birth control pills due to moral objections showcases the misconception of rights that many people have. Does a pharmacist have the right to refuse to sell a product he or she finds morally objectionable, or does a woman have the right to purchase a drug that the FDA has approved for sale? The answer to both questions is yes.

Oddly enough, many of our elected officials seem unable to grasp the concept of rights. In California, legislators are drafting legislation that would require pharmacists to provide any lawful drug, regardless of their moral or religious beliefs. Apparently they believe they can give someone the right to force someone else to do something that person finds objectionable. At the same time, legislators in Washington are drafting legislation that would require employers to make allowances for their employee’s religious beliefs. Apparently they believe they can give an employee ( perhaps a pharmacist), the right to refuse their employer’s orders, (perhaps an order to sell birth control pills), without a fear of repercussion, so long as the refusal is made on religious grounds. So what happens next? Does the pharmacist go to jail for not providing the drug, or does the pharmacy owner go to jail for forcing him to make the sale or firing him for not making the sale?

Maybe the solution lies in the realization that government cannot grant rights, that every person in the world is born with the same natural rights, regardless of the type of government they live under.

Every person has the right to purchase what someone else wishes to sell. If your pharmacist decides he will sell Bayer Aspirin but not Tylenol, you have the right to get mad, you have the right to walk out the door and find a pharmacist that sells Tylenol. You don’t have the right to force the offending pharmacist to sell Tylenol.

When an employee goes to work for an employer, they come to an agreement. The employee agrees to perform a service in return for benefits. The employer agrees to provide benefits in return for services provided. When they can no longer agree on services and benefits, they have the right to part ways in search of other employers and employees. This is our system of free enterprise and contract law. It works well with minimum government intrusion. Government has no reason to step in until someone tries to forcibly prevent you from going to another pharmacy, or until an employer defrauds an employee, or until an employee defrauds an employer.

Your rights cannot conflict with someone else’s rights. If something you decide to do requires or leads to the initiation of force against another person, then it isn’t a right.

Yes, you have the right to join with any number of people and pool your resources for your retirement. No, you don’t have the right to force someone to join your group.

Yes, you have the right defend yourself against violence. No, you don’t have the right to initiate violence.

Yes, you have the right to donate to any cause or charity you choose. No, you don’t have the right to force anybody else to donate.

Yes, you have the right to seek an education. No, you don’t have the right to take someone’s home if they decide they don’t want to pay for your education.

Yes, you have the right to own and control your property. No you don’t have the right to control someone else’s property.

Yes, you have the right to prevent people from smoking on your property. No, you don’t have the right to prevent people from smoking on their property.

Rights belong to individuals. While every person in a group has rights, belonging to a group does not give you more rights than a single person.

This group of people that is our government needs to realize they cannot grant or take away our rights. They can only protect those rights, or prevent us from practicing them. I’d prefer a government that protects them.

Death by a thousand cuts...

Well, they're at it again. Or still. The president and the congress are again thumbing their collective noses at the 4th amendment guarantees of protection against unreasonable searches. If that disgusts you like it does Libertarians, you might want to consider voting against it this fall.



Here's the press release from the Barr for President campaign:

"June 19, 2008 6:33 pm EST

Atlanta, GA -- “In asserting his power to conduct warrantless searches of Americans, President George W. Bush has expressed his clear contempt for the Fourth Amendment. So has Sen. John McCain, despite his reputation as a supposed maverick,” says Bob Barr, the Libertarian Party candidate for president. Now the Democratic-led Congress is preparing to approve a so-called compromise that gives the Bush administration almost everything it wants in order to expand dramatically the power of the federal government to surveil American citizens without court orders. “America desperately needs leaders who will stand up for the Bill of Rights,” observes Barr, “not those who flaunt its vital and time-honored protections.”

The president already has the power to conduct surveillance of foreign terrorists. The 30-year old Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act provides for court oversight, along with the requirement that the government get a warrant. “The court has virtually never rejected a request,” notes Barr. “Changes in technology require updating the law, not gutting it.”

However, the bill being advanced by the Democratic leadership “would allow the government to listen to millions of phone calls by Americans with neither an individualized warrant nor an assessment of probable cause,” he adds. Although the law would offer some protection when a particular American was expressly targeted, even then “the proposed rules fall short of what the Fourth Amendment mandates.”

Moreover, the bill would immunize telephone companies from wrong-doing, protecting them against law suits even when the firms violated the law by helping the government conduct warrantless searches. Past cases would simply be dismissed. “Conservatives once said, ‘you do the crime, you do the time,’ but no longer,” observes Barr. Now virtually the entire Republican Party is prepared to sacrifice the Fourth Amendment rights of Americans in favor of federal government power.

And the Democratic leadership is ready to do the same. Congressional Democrats privately say that they don’t want to take the political risk of opposing the president. “But the individual liberty of Americans is not a political football, something to be tossed about when an election looms,” insists Barr. “It is the constitutional duty of lawmakers of both parties to defend the Constitution, even when they believe doing so might be politically inconvenient.”

Advocates of abandoning the Constitution warn us that we live in dangerous times. But Americans have long lived in dangerous times. “That didn’t stop the nation’s founders from creating a Constitution that secured individual liberty and limited government,” notes Barr. “It shouldn’t stop us from following the Constitution today.”

Barr represented the 7th District of Georgia in the U. S. House of Representatives from 1995 to 2003, where he served as a senior member of the Judiciary Committee, as Vice-Chairman of the Government Reform Committee, and as a member of the Committee on Financial Services. Prior to his congressional career, Barr was appointed by President Reagan to serve as the United States Attorney for the Northern District of Georgia, and also served as an official with the CIA.

Since leaving Congress, Barr has been practicing law and has teamed up with groups ranging from the American Civil Liberties Union to the American Conservative Union to actively advocate every American citizens’ right to privacy and other civil liberties guaranteed in the Bill of Rights. Along with this, Bob is committed to helping elect leaders who will strive for smaller government, lower taxes and abundant individual freedom."