Do Natural Rights Exist Without Government ?

[The Rabbi]

Very interesting discussion.

The debate here seems to be around the very thing I was asking about.

It calls into question the very concept of "natural rights" as a useful construct and focuses on where rights come from.

It seems very clear to me, that people need to establish where they think rights come from as it really does test your allegiances.

If you think your rights come from God, then you view government with a very jaundiced eye.

If you think they come from the government...I am not sure how you view your benefactor. After all, they created them for you.

And how do you view people who are trying to take them away ?

You know... I was glib with you earlier, but this really is very frustrating, because it's not even a real debate. It's just a confusion, a category error. The 'inalienable rights' that Jefferson references are an entirely different sort of thing than the concept most people are referring to here when they discuss 'rights'. Most people, Rabbi and the rest who insist rights are state creations, are thinking of rights as those freedoms we designate for protection - and that protection certainly isn't 'inalienable'. As soon as there isn't a government around to provide the protection, it goes away. But the freedom itself is simply a by product of free will.

The key thing about the inalienable rights is that no one needs to do anything for you to have them - all they need to do is leave you alone. That's what makes them different than nonsense like the 'right to health care' or other imagined rights that require others to serve you. Again, inalienable doesn't mean 'sacrosanct' or 'off-limits' - it just means 'innate', essentially something that is an extrapolation of the ability to think for yourself.

I understand your frustration as it seems most disagreement is generally at the level of "definitions". Your comments above have helped me to better narrow what you are referencing. I can see an extension of that thought spilling over into what many others are pointing at.

The problem is that even within the libertarian/conservative camp such differences exist.

As an example, the "right" to the pursuit of happiness is something I find difficult to envision as being inalienable.

On the one hand I think of Steven Covey's description of Victor Frankle's experience in the death camps. Frankle found he could chose to not be pulled down by his experiences. In Covey's words Frankle had more liberty while he did not have freedom. So, in a sense he had that inalienable right to pursue happiness within his circumstances.

However, that is really a stretch to me. He was still in a frigging Nazi death camp.

dblack asserts there are some kind of rights that people have, even while they are being deprived of them. That runs into what I claimed earlier: that no one can distinguish any difference between rights that are denied and rights that don't exist.

 

[emilynghiem]

Wanting to stay alive does not mean staying alive is thus a natural right.
Wanting to be happy does not mean being happy is thus a natural right.

Wanting sex does not make having sex a natural right.

But, apparently wanting contraception makes it a natural right.

From lookeing through online comments on the Hobby Lobby case,
where the conflict is coming from is "WHO is paying" for the insurance plans

People who see it as EMPLOYEES paying for these plans through federal laws
see it as THEIR FREE CHOICE to access the same drugs as required by federal laws.

They think they are paying for it as part of their labor compensation,
so it is the EMPLOYEES choice.

People who see it as the EMPLOYER paying for insurance through mandates, see it is AGAINST the company beliefs or OUTSIDE their requirement to pay to workers.

They are saying the workers should be free to pay for the plans WITHOUT
going through the companies, even indirectly.

I believe this means federal govt should not be in the business of regulating
forced terms of commerce between companies and employees, especially
where they have conflicting beliefs about health care and certain drugs.

How does this apply to natural laws?

By natural laws, nobody wants to be forced by outside authority to do things they don't agree to. Neither the employees or employers are getting their free choice because of these federal mandates trying to dictate the terms of the insurance plans between them.

If govt stayed out, the people could decide their own plans without imposing on anyone.
But going through federal govt requires the SAME plan for ALL people, and doesn't take into account that people have different beliefs and don't believe in paying for things in conflict.

so one side protests by saying the whole law is unconstitutional by unnatural imposition.
the other side faults the company and believes all people should comply with federal laws.

if they both want their way, don't agree what to pay for, but don't agree to compromise,
they should pay separately and not be forced under "one policy" by federal govt.

 

[emilynghiem]

OK do you believe you have "natural responsibilities" by conscience?

That if you have sex, you are "naturally responsible" for the consequences?

Also, do you believe there is a natural law on "reciprocity" or equal justice.
That how you treat others, you enforce for yourself. Do you believe that is natural?

I have absolutely no idea what you are jabbering about. But it is off topic for sure. We are discussing Natural Rights, i.e. rights that allegedly people have simply by virtue of their being human beings.

1. Since you don't believe in natural rights,
I am asking do you believe humans have "natural responsibilities" instead?

2. as for natural laws, do you believe there is a universal law
governing all people, often called the Golden Rule or law of "reciprocity"
where you get what you give, you reap what you sow, karma/cause and effect.
so by these laws of "natural justice" we respect others as we want to be respected,
and enforce the same principles we want enforced for us.

Do you believe we have natural responsibilities under such laws like THAT?
just by our nature as human beings.
Do you believe in any principles like that which are universal, self-existent, with or without religion or government?

 

[The Rabbi]

OK do you believe you have "natural responsibilities" by conscience?

That if you have sex, you are "naturally responsible" for the consequences?

Also, do you believe there is a natural law on "reciprocity" or equal justice.
That how you treat others, you enforce for yourself. Do you believe that is natural?

I have absolutely no idea what you are jabbering about. But it is off topic for sure. We are discussing Natural Rights, i.e. rights that allegedly people have simply by virtue of their being human beings.

1. Since you don't believe in natural rights,
I am asking do you believe humans have "natural responsibilities" instead?

2. as for natural laws, do you believe there is a universal law
governing all people, often called the Golden Rule or law of "reciprocity"
where you get what you give, you reap what you sow.

Do you believe we have natural responsibilities under such laws like THAT
which are universal, self-existent, with or without religion or government?

I have no idea what "natural responsibilities" are.
I have no idea what a "universal law" would be. There are some things that tend to recur over and over such that they tend to become laws. But that probably isn't what you mean.
Short answer: I don't have a clue what you mean. I suspect you don't either.

 

[Dr Grump]

To answer the OP: No. As Oldschool has mentioned, who decides what a natural right is?

 

[emilynghiem]

I agree with dblack and disagree with you.

There are levels of awareness, where just because you don't agree or believe something is affecting or oppressing you, it can still affect your behavior in real ways.

1. Economically and Financially
I've met many people who didn't believe they had the same rights as people running govt because they didn't believe they had equal access or ability. But once they learned they could do much of the same things, by working with teams or programs to support themselves independently, their mindset changed or started to.

Before, they were so oppressed, they didn't even know it was a choice.
Don't tell me that doesn't affect people.

Books like "Rich Dad Poor Dad" explain it makes all the difference if people
remain in a poverty/rental mentality of never owning or having control, or if people are surrounded by others who operate on a higher level of ownership and self-government.

2. in relationships
some people who suffer abuse or bullying don't have any sense they can have friend or family who don't treat them this way. so they don't see it as a choice to change or get out.
they don't stand up for their rights to be treated with equal respect, if it's not a real choice.

3. spiritual freedom and choice to change
some people have no clue they can overcome addiction or other sickness.
they don't know there is free help out there that can change their lives.

After they do, they can look back and see they were trapped, and now they are free.
But they had no concept of that before, when they were stuck in self-destruction mode.

In psychology, there are different levels of cognition and awareness.
In studies on amnesia, even if patients didn't remember learning a task before, repeat trials showed a faster and faster learning curve on the tasks,
so the brain was still retaining the memory despite no conscious perception by the subject.

Just because we are not aware of something, or don't believe it even exists, doesn't mean it can't still affect us unconsciously on other levels.

You know... I was glib with you earlier, but this really is very frustrating, because it's not even a real debate. It's just a confusion, a category error. The 'inalienable rights' that Jefferson references are an entirely different sort of thing than the concept most people are referring to here when they discuss 'rights'. Most people, Rabbi and the rest who insist rights are state creations, are thinking of rights as those freedoms we designate for protection - and that protection certainly isn't 'inalienable'. As soon as there isn't a government around to provide the protection, it goes away. But the freedom itself is simply a by product of free will.

The key thing about the inalienable rights is that no one needs to do anything for you to have them - all they need to do is leave you alone. That's what makes them different than nonsense like the 'right to health care' or other imagined rights that require others to serve you. Again, inalienable doesn't mean 'sacrosanct' or 'off-limits' - it just means 'innate', essentially something that is an extrapolation of the ability to think for yourself.

I understand your frustration as it seems most disagreement is generally at the level of "definitions". Your comments above have helped me to better narrow what you are referencing. I can see an extension of that thought spilling over into what many others are pointing at.

The problem is that even within the libertarian/conservative camp such differences exist.

As an example, the "right" to the pursuit of happiness is something I find difficult to envision as being inalienable.

On the one hand I think of Steven Covey's description of Victor Frankle's experience in the death camps. Frankle found he could chose to not be pulled down by his experiences. In Covey's words Frankle had more liberty while he did not have freedom. So, in a sense he had that inalienable right to pursue happiness within his circumstances.

However, that is really a stretch to me. He was still in a frigging Nazi death camp.

dblack asserts there are some kind of rights that people have, even while they are being deprived of them. That runs into what I claimed earlier: that no one can distinguish any difference between rights that are denied and rights that don't exist.

maybe not while they are in denial. But once you break out of that situation, of course you can see where you didn't have access to choices that were treated as nonexistent.

 

[emilynghiem]

I have no idea what "natural responsibilities" are.
I have no idea what a "universal law" would be. There are some things that tend to recur over and over such that they tend to become laws. But that probably isn't what you mean.
Short answer: I don't have a clue what you mean. I suspect you don't either.

1. here is a list of versions of this "Golden Rule of Reciprocity"
in major world religions
The Golden Rule: A list of two dozen versions
do any of these look like they are general wisdom or truth that applies to "all people" by our nature as human beings?

my question is do you believe there is a universal law (ie applies to ALL humanity by nature of being human) that exists independent of all these religions expressing the same law?

do you believe this law exists "on its own," as part of human nature man did not create,
or do you believe it is only in our world because of the religions made by man?

2. since you don't call it natural rights or natural responsibilities,
do you believe there are any laws that govern the human CONSCIENCE
which are not made up or caused by man, but naturally exist by how
the human conscience operates?

3. do you believe in "laws of psychology" or "social science" that are not made up by
man, but naturally exist, and merely discovered or studied and put into words by man?

 

[Asclepias]

While I believe in God, I have struggled with the idea that Thomas Jefferson put forth:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

Unalienable means (from the net): incapable of being repudiated or transferred to another.

Now, if China chooses to be communist....and forbids your rights, what difference does it make if they can't "repudiate" them (refuse to accept that they exist) ? You still don't get to exercise them....and, in effect, they have been removed.

While recently reading Ezra Taft Benson's talk on the proper role of goverment, he states that the most important function of government is to secure the rights and freedoms of individuals.

Can someone explain to me how we don't have secure rights without government ?

I just don't see it.

You cant secure any rights you think you should have unless there is a form of government. You make up what rights you want and band together with like minded people to protect those rights. The only real right you have is to fight for your life. No one can take that from you but you.

 

[emilynghiem]

To answer the OP: No. As Oldschool has mentioned, who decides what a natural right is?

People would have to figure it out, to make sure we are talking about the same principles:
Comparing what concept each person means by rights, freedoms, and laws;
and what "terms" they use since this can vary. We can believe in similar concepts,
but use different terms or systems. Whatever principles we agree are naturally occurring among all humans, we may agree to identify those with "natural rights or laws."

Most of the interactions I find online are people stumbling or bumbling around in this process -- some people more aware of it, and some not at all. but in the process of sharing and comparing, we are essentially figuring out what are universal values and what are not.

 

[Quantum Windbag]

No. I maintain they don't exist, offer challenges for those who do, and conclude from the unsatisfactory answers and lack of proof that I am correct and others are wrong.
If they exist it should be easy to prove.
It would be easy to explain where they came from
It would be easy to explain what they consist of.
It would be easy to explain what their parameters are.
But since no one has done any of those things in a satsifactory manner--or any manner--then I can only conclude they do not exist at all.

If rights do not exist without government how do you explain the fact that they are still used even when there is no government?

They aren't. It is an unproven assertion on your part.
Recall Hobbes' formulation of man's existence in a state of nature.

When there is no government people suddenly lose the ability to live? How does that work, exactly, because all of our rights exist because, despite the claims of totalitarian governments, everyone is born without direct intervention of the government. Then we have the ability to think, from which our freedom of speech and religion come from. I have seen absolutely no evidence that would even begin to support the claim that, without government, no one can think.

 

[M.D. Rawlings]

No. I maintain they don't exist, offer challenges for those who do, and conclude from the unsatisfactory answers and lack of proof that I am correct and others are wrong. If they exist it should be easy to prove.

[1] It would be easy to explain where they came from
[2] It would be easy to explain what they consist of.
[3] It would be easy to explain what their parameters are.

But since no one has done any of those things in a satsifactory manner--or any manner--then I can only conclude they do not exist at all.

Everyone of these issues has been addressed, certainly by me. You simply refuse to directly acknowledge and engage the ontological and historical arguments that I, especially, given my obvious learning on the matter, have put forward, and I note that you ignore the deconstructions of your historical errors and logical fallacies.

As for the matter of the existence of innate rights being self-evident, once again:

They are self-evident because any given instance of their violation provokes the bonds of peace and justice, and at one level or another, a state of war between the respective parties necessarily ensues. Ultimately, they are the stuff of self-preservation and core aspirations.

Every sane person of normal intelligence on this board knows when their fundamental rights are being threatened or violated as the injustice of it and the consequences of it are very tangible, rationally apprehended and viscerally felt in the most immediate sense there is, for one is indisputably compelled to fight, flee or submit against what one would normally will for oneself.

All the claims to the contrary are baby talk, indeed, theoretical rubbish, sophomoric philosophizing, the womanish stuff of "To be or not to be."

The following are the fundamental, innate rights of man. They have been identified and established for centuries, indeed, long before the iteration of them in terms of natural law proper during the Enlightenment. It is readily self-evident that the innate rights of man would be of such a nature that the transgression of them would pose an immediate existential threat to one's physical survival or mental well-being.

They are not the civil/political rights afforded by government!

1. The right to be secure in one's life, fundamental liberties (3, 4, 5) and property.

2. The right to use deadly force to defend one's life, fundamental liberties and property.

3. Freedom of religion/ideology.

4. Freedom of expression.

5. Freedom of movement.
______________________________________________

And by the way, your claim that Christianity holds that the killing of a human being by another necessarily constitutes murder is false, another fallacious claim out of nowhere, just like your irrational claim that the mutual obligations of morality are not pertinent to understanding the essence of innate rights, particularly as they are carried over from the state of nature and expressed in the state of civil government. Obviously, the understanding of this goes to their parameters, number 3 on your list! And that is self-evident too, given the necessities of the government's regulatory and judicial authority regarding the legitimate extent of civil liberties in the face of conflicting interests.

How about you stop wasting our time with your obviously ill-considered and fallacious claims as you think to preemptively negate the manifestly essential premises of innate rights. As for their origin and their precise parameters . . . I've covered those in other posts. How about you for once give us a response that is as direct and definitive as this rejoinder regarding your second, supposedly unanswerable challenge.

Refute that.

 

[Quantum Windbag]

Very interesting discussion.

The debate here seems to be around the very thing I was asking about.

It calls into question the very concept of "natural rights" as a useful construct and focuses on where rights come from.

It seems very clear to me, that people need to establish where they think rights come from as it really does test your allegiances.

If you think your rights come from God, then you view government with a very jaundiced eye.

If you think they come from the government...I am not sure how you view your benefactor. After all, they created them for you.

And how do you view people who are trying to take them away ?

You know... I was glib with you earlier, but this really is very frustrating, because it's not even a real debate. It's just a confusion, a category error. The 'inalienable rights' that Jefferson references are an entirely different sort of thing than the concept most people are referring to here when they discuss 'rights'. Most people, Rabbi and the rest who insist rights are state creations, are thinking of rights as those freedoms we designate for protection - and that protection certainly isn't 'inalienable'. As soon as there isn't a government around to provide the protection, it goes away. But the freedom itself is simply a by product of free will.

The key thing about the inalienable rights is that no one needs to do anything for you to have them - all they need to do is leave you alone. That's what makes them different than nonsense like the 'right to health care' or other imagined rights that require others to serve you. Again, inalienable doesn't mean 'sacrosanct' or 'off-limits' - it just means 'innate', essentially something that is an extrapolation of the ability to think for yourself.

I understand your frustration as it seems most disagreement is generally at the level of "definitions". Your comments above have helped me to better narrow what you are referencing. I can see an extension of that thought spilling over into what many others are pointing at.

The problem is that even within the libertarian/conservative camp such differences exist.

As an example, the "right" to the pursuit of happiness is something I find difficult to envision as being inalienable.

On the one hand I think of Steven Covey's description of Victor Frankle's experience in the death camps. Frankle found he could chose to not be pulled down by his experiences. In Covey's words Frankle had more liberty while he did not have freedom. So, in a sense he had that inalienable right to pursue happiness within his circumstances.

However, that is really a stretch to me. He was still in a frigging Nazi death camp.

You are confusing the pursuit of happiness with actual happiness. The pursuit of happiness is the one thing that even the most cynical person has to admit is impossible to actually take away from an individual. No matter how hard you make it to actually get to happiness, nothing can stop you from pursuing it.

 

[Quantum Windbag]

You know... I was glib with you earlier, but this really is very frustrating, because it's not even a real debate. It's just a confusion, a category error. The 'inalienable rights' that Jefferson references are an entirely different sort of thing than the concept most people are referring to here when they discuss 'rights'. Most people, Rabbi and the rest who insist rights are state creations, are thinking of rights as those freedoms we designate for protection - and that protection certainly isn't 'inalienable'. As soon as there isn't a government around to provide the protection, it goes away. But the freedom itself is simply a by product of free will.

The key thing about the inalienable rights is that no one needs to do anything for you to have them - all they need to do is leave you alone. That's what makes them different than nonsense like the 'right to health care' or other imagined rights that require others to serve you. Again, inalienable doesn't mean 'sacrosanct' or 'off-limits' - it just means 'innate', essentially something that is an extrapolation of the ability to think for yourself.

I understand your frustration as it seems most disagreement is generally at the level of "definitions". Your comments above have helped me to better narrow what you are referencing. I can see an extension of that thought spilling over into what many others are pointing at.

The problem is that even within the libertarian/conservative camp such differences exist.

As an example, the "right" to the pursuit of happiness is something I find difficult to envision as being inalienable.

On the one hand I think of Steven Covey's description of Victor Frankle's experience in the death camps. Frankle found he could chose to not be pulled down by his experiences. In Covey's words Frankle had more liberty while he did not have freedom. So, in a sense he had that inalienable right to pursue happiness within his circumstances.

However, that is really a stretch to me. He was still in a frigging Nazi death camp.

dblack asserts there are some kind of rights that people have, even while they are being deprived of them. That runs into what I claimed earlier: that no one can distinguish any difference between rights that are denied and rights that don't exist.

No, he is saying we have those rights even when they are being infringed upon. Your problem is that you see infringing as denial.

 

[emilynghiem]

They aren't. It is an unproven assertion on your part.
Recall Hobbes' formulation of man's existence in a state of nature.

Dear Rabbi: I'm not sure you can prove that these laws exist or operate independently of govt structures, since we are submerged in society embedded with them.

I think I see what you are saying.

You are talking about PROVEN things, in order to say they exist or not.

Most people I know approach natural law principles as assumed or given, since it cannot be proven where it came from.

Since you seem to have no concept of these things,
that's why I was trying to find out what frame of reference you DO use for
the laws or psychology of human relations.

Can I ask you more questions to figure out how you talk about human nature:

A. Do you believe in psychology as a science, universally applying to all people?

B. Do you believe all people have the same basic levels of experience
* physical/individual
* mental or psychological in relations or perceptions of others
* spiritual or collective relations as society or humanity

If not, do you have different terms you use for the levels of human experience?
how do you describe the PATTERNS or FACTORS in human nature or behavior?

these might be the closest substitute for "natural laws" or "universal laws"
affecting all human nature, behavior or relationships. What terms do you use?

 

[Quantum Windbag]

To answer the OP: No. As Oldschool has mentioned, who decides what a natural right is?

No one decides what they are any more than they decide what natural laws are.

 

[Quantum Windbag]

While I believe in God, I have struggled with the idea that Thomas Jefferson put forth:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

Unalienable means (from the net): incapable of being repudiated or transferred to another.

Now, if China chooses to be communist....and forbids your rights, what difference does it make if they can't "repudiate" them (refuse to accept that they exist) ? You still don't get to exercise them....and, in effect, they have been removed.

While recently reading Ezra Taft Benson's talk on the proper role of goverment, he states that the most important function of government is to secure the rights and freedoms of individuals.

Can someone explain to me how we don't have secure rights without government ?

I just don't see it.

You cant secure any rights you think you should have unless there is a form of government. You make up what rights you want and band together with like minded people to protect those rights. The only real right you have is to fight for your life. No one can take that from you but you.

Speak for yourself, I can secure my rights without the government. I do not need the government to tell when to think.

 

[Dr Grump]

To answer the OP: No. As Oldschool has mentioned, who decides what a natural right is?

People would have to figure it out, to make sure we are talking about the same principles:
Comparing what concept each person means by rights, freedoms, and laws;
and what "terms" they use since this can vary. We can believe in similar concepts,
but use different terms or systems. Whatever principles we agree are naturally occurring among all humans, we may agree to identify those with "natural rights or laws."

Most of the interactions I find online are people stumbling or bumbling around in this process -- some people more aware of it, and some not at all. but in the process of sharing and comparing, we are essentially figuring out what are universal values and what are not.

My main sticking point in this debate though, is not about whether they exist outside of govt, it's whether they exist at all. I say, no.

 

[M.D. Rawlings]

No. I maintain they don't exist, offer challenges for those who do, and conclude from the unsatisfactory answers and lack of proof that I am correct and others are wrong.
If they exist it should be easy to prove.
It would be easy to explain where they came from
It would be easy to explain what they consist of.
It would be easy to explain what their parameters are.
But since no one has done any of those things in a satsifactory manner--or any manner--then I can only conclude they do not exist at all.

If rights do not exist without government how do you explain the fact that they are still used even when there is no government?

They aren't. It is an unproven assertion on your part.
Recall Hobbes' formulation of man's existence in a state of nature.

But unlike Locke and scripture, by the way, Hobbes never provides an ontologically sound reason for why the life of man in the state of nature "is solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short."

 

[M.D. Rawlings]

I understand your frustration as it seems most disagreement is generally at the level of "definitions". Your comments above have helped me to better narrow what you are referencing. I can see an extension of that thought spilling over into what many others are pointing at.

The problem is that even within the libertarian/conservative camp such differences exist.

As an example, the "right" to the pursuit of happiness is something I find difficult to envision as being inalienable.

On the one hand I think of Steven Covey's description of Victor Frankle's experience in the death camps. Frankle found he could chose to not be pulled down by his experiences. In Covey's words Frankle had more liberty while he did not have freedom. So, in a sense he had that inalienable right to pursue happiness within his circumstances.

However, that is really a stretch to me. He was still in a frigging Nazi death camp.

dblack asserts there are some kind of rights that people have, even while they are being deprived of them. That runs into what I claimed earlier: that no one can distinguish any difference between rights that are denied and rights that don't exist.

No, he is saying we have those rights even when they are being infringed upon. Your problem is that you see infringing as denial.

Essentially. But Rabbi's allusion to Hobbes tells me that what he fails to see--and believe me, no one in their right mind would want to be under the political sway of Hobbes' Leviathan--is the deadly mayhem of self-preservation seething just under the seemingly tranquil surface of the oppressed's demeanor toward his self-anointed master.

 

[beagle9]

While I believe in God, I have struggled with the idea that Thomas Jefferson put forth:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

Unalienable means (from the net): incapable of being repudiated or transferred to another.

Now, if China chooses to be communist....and forbids your rights, what difference does it make if they can't "repudiate" them (refuse to accept that they exist) ? You still don't get to exercise them....and, in effect, they have been removed.

While recently reading Ezra Taft Benson's talk on the proper role of goverment, he states that the most important function of government is to secure the rights and freedoms of individuals.

Can someone explain to me how we don't have secure rights without government ?

I just don't see it.

Foundation.

Thomas Jefferson didn't originally put the notion of divinely endowed, inalienable rights forward. The inspired authors of the Bible did, and the Anglo-American tradition of natural law as a formal philosophical construct harks back to Augustine. It was extrapolated from the sociopolitical ramifications of Judeo-Christianity's ethical system of thought and comes down to us from Augustine through the likes of Aquinas, Luther, Calvin, Montesquieu, Sidney and the Father of Classical Liberalism John Locke. The canon of Burke's oratorical exegeses on this school of political thought is profound as well.

With regard to the founding ethos of our nation, in my opinion, the four most important works are (1) the Bible; (2) Montesquieu's The Spirit of the Laws, in which he propounds the construct of the separation of powers; (3) Sidney's Discourses Concerning Government, in which he deconstructs the despotism of monarchy and propounds the necessities of Judeo-Christian morality and the principles of republicanism; and (4) Locke's Two Treatises of Civil Government, in which he propounds, most importantly, (a) the essence of the state of nature, (b) the essence of a legitimate state of civil government, (c) the right of revolt and (d) the inalienable rights of man. As in the case of all of the aforementioned thinkers, Locke's ontological justification for his political theory are the sociopolitical imperatives of divine law as derived from biblical scripture.

In fact, Jefferson's rhetorical flourish "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness" is merely a paraphrase of Locke's well-known triadic formula for natural law and the divinely endowed, inalienable rights thereof: life-liberty-private property. Pursuit of happiness was a common term of art at the time universally understood to entail the constituents and prerogatives of private property: one's own person, one's immediate family, one's material assets and one's aspirations. Further, the underlying first principles of private property are the sanctity of human life and the integrity of the biological family of nature, backed by an armed citizenry, the ultimate check against criminal elements and tyrannical political factions within the land under the terms of the social contract and against invaders from without the land of the same.

Now as for those who pooh-pooh the inherent constitution of things woven into the fabric of reality, including the fact of inalienable rights and the people's moral responsibilities thereof: make no mistake about it, societies reap what they sow. See Edmund Burke's sociopolitical extrapolation of that biblical principal in my signature below. All of the great thinkers mentioned in the above made the very same observation from scripture in sociopolitical terms, backed by the incontrovertible examples of historical experience, but Burke's is arguably the most eloquently succinct.

You see the problem with those who pooh-pooh the actuality of these principles mistakenly believe that the common substance of the material realm of being trump the imperatives that are self-evident from experience and the rational forms and logical categories of human consciousness and moral decision, and are ultimately embedded in the Being of God Himself on Whom the material realm is contingent. Hence, they fail to recognize the translation of these principles in terms of the tangible consequences of adhering to them or violating them in the material realm of being: prosperity and liberty, or poverty and tyranny, respectively.

(Actually, the few conservatives on this thread who pooh-pooh the notion that there be anything tangible about these principles routinely talk about the societal problems that arise due to leftist claptrap in their refutations of the latter. They just haven't adequately thought things through or connected the dots between the concrete reality beyond and the subordinate reality below. Or perhaps they've been dissuaded by some pseudo-intellectual blather of pure theory, for example, dblack's remark: "It's an important distinction, not because it designates some rights as sacrosanct or some similar nonsense [LOL!]. But because it puts government in the proper perspective as a tool to protect our freedom, rather than the source of that freedom."

Well, at least he got the second part right.)

God is not mocked, and He laughs at the myopic, materialistic gibberish of those who eschew that which is self-evident: the Creator, not the state, is the Source and Guarantor of human rights and dignities; hence, the latter are inalienable and, therefore, sacrosanct in every sense of the word.
___________________________


Now you're wondering how human rights can be inalienable if they are secured by government or can be suppressed by the same.

But as I've just shown, and, again, more graphically in my response below this one to Delta4Embassy's post, the essence of your query is an illusion.

First, stating that the only legitimate purpose of government is to secure the rights of man is not the same thing as stating that the government is the Source and Guarantor of the rights of man.

So that no one make the mistake of conflating these two distinct ideas, Jefferson, like Locke and Sidney before him, points out in that very same document so revered that when a government ceases to serve its only legitimate purpose: it is the inalienable right of the people, indeed, it is their duty, to rise up in revolt and put down that government. In other words, the people willingly surrender a certain portion of freedom, for the sake of brotherly love and for the sake of their mutual interests, in order to secure their inalienable rights against the constant threats posed by renegades in the state of nature.

The portion of freedom that the people willingly surrender for the sake of the collective good is not our inalienable rights as such, as the bootlicking statist Clayton Jones stupidly suggests. They are inalienable. Period. They are absolute. Period. They are sacrosanct. Period. The ramifications of the inalienable right to keep and bear arms and the inalienable right to revolt are clear.

Instead, what we give up under the rule of law, as opposed to the rule of the jungle, is the freedom to directly enforce the integrity of our inalienable rights in the face of relatively light and transient transgressions. We yield to a collective system of due process. A peaceful resolution. Note that I write relatively light and transient transgressions. The people retain the prerogative to put down egregious transgressions by the use of deadly force if necessary, and rightly so.

Lefty routinely wets his panties over that idea.

In other words, the people, not the state, bear the ultimate responsibility to secure their rights, as they retain the means to assert the ultimate check against criminal or governmental transgressions of the same. The meaning of the term secure in the political theory of natural law is promote and protect.

Second, in the real world, any given group of people systematically lose liberties in direct proportion to the rate at which its members throw off their individual responsibilities to provide for themselves and, consequently, to hold the government to its legitimate limits of power.

Bootlicking statists like Clayton Jones, for example, routinely hide their desire to oppress and steal from those with whom they disagree behind some legalistic jingoism. They lack self-control. They like being victims. That's their justification for what they know to be in their heart of hearts a violation of other people's rights and property. They are cowards and bullies. They are womanish little pricks. Oxymoron?

Clayton Jones' favorite target of oppression are orthodox Jews and Christians; his favorite legalistic weapon is a bastardized iteration of the principle of public accommodation, whereby the former are obliged to surrender their inalienable rights of free-association and private property to accommodate the illegitimate demands of others . . . inevitably backed by government under the banner of civil rights.

In fact, the depravity of hatred and envy are at the root of every tyranny, and every tyranny begets more and more dependency on the government.

Now consider this: by what means does God put down human rebellion against His inalienable rights and authority?

Once again, see my signature below.

In other words, the dynamics of natural law are tangible in terms of the realities of human interaction and the outcomes thereof. Every act of immorality or irresponsibility is another link in the chain of tyranny. Our nation is teetering on the brink of fascism because too many prefer the security of government over the responsibilities of liberty and are willing to enslave us all to pay for it.

After all, what is government security, but the amelioration of the consequences of the immorality and sloth of some hoisted onto the backs of others in the name of social justice.

Governments limitations are to secure our rights only as we so choose for it to do so, and therefore it is not intended to go beyond that point, but it can't help itself to now be empowered in a great way, and this because we empowered it to do a job for us, and therefore it now takes advantage of that empowerment way and far beyond what we expected out of it or demanded of it to do for us. It has become sick with power, and now may God have mercy upon us all.