Where did we get these rights? The Constitution? Government? by Right Rev. Rowland
(conservative)
Thursday, March 12, 2009
The Constitution of the United States guarantees protection for our individual rights, while at the same time establishing due process for a civil society to govern those rights.
As a nation, we have held the rights of the individual to be sacred above all other governments in history. While our track record is not flawless, we have come closer to the perfect form of government for mankind than any other experiment in history.
The Revolutionary War was sparked by a repeated violation of what the colonies viewed as their inherent rights. They determined that no form of government had the right to take those rights without showing justification that made moral and legal sense.
How have we survived for over 200 years as a nation that preserves individual liberty, only to see the last few decades erode our freedoms more than the last two centuries?
Because our government has forgotten where our rights come from. The governing system of the United States has been operating on autopilot for so long, it has lost touch with where the Constitution was birthed. Many even subscribe to the notion of a 'living' document that will morph into whatever the current polysci fad of the day is.
The Constitution was written to express what the authors held to be true even before it was writtten: That God, the Creator of Mankind, had given His creation rights that could never be removed or usurped by any governing system.
Human rights can be suppressed by governments, or attacked by individuals, but they do not cease to exist. Just because I am blocked from my rights by a thug, doesn't mean they aren't still my rights, and I am within my rights to fight for what is mine.
The Constitution put into practical formulae for governance what the Founders had already put forth as truth in the Declaration of Independence: That our rights are inalienable, because they come from our Maker, and that no individual or government could simply remove them without just cause.
The more we reject the notion of a Creator, the further removed we are from the immutability of our rights. The more we look to Government as the source of our rights, the more freely Government suppresses our liberty.
Without God, we are at the mercy of man-made institutions. The more these institutions become full of their own wisdom, the more the individual suffers. We have a full-scale attack in our nation against the concept of God, and promoting the removal of any acknowledgement of God from the public square.
So, when the idea of God is completely gone, what is left of my rights? The Government will say they hold the keys to my liberty, as the 'defenders' of the Constitution. What we need to maintain is the truth that my rights are still my rights, with or without government, with or without a Constitution, because they came from God and not man.
So, let me ask you to ponder this question..... Does the current generation even realize what has been stolen from them, or where their individual rights come from?
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Posted By: Jahfre Fire Eater
Date: 2009-03-12 17:15:26
Hi Right Rev. Rowland,
You and I share a similar concern but I disagree with most of how you view the situation.
I believe that rights only exist if they are exercised. So, I think an individual's rights do cease to exist when they are oppressed such that they cannot exercise them. Individual rights exist when:
There is only one individual...or...
Individuals can mutually agree what rights exist and which must be oppressed
Government was invented to help groups of individuals enforce their mutually agreed rights by supressing oppressive actions aimed at those rights. Once any right, from the individual's right to life to the divine rights of Kings is no longer mutually agreed upon, no longer mutually defended from oppression, those rights cease to exist.
I disagree that "as a nation" we have done anything close to holding individual rights above all others. I see this attitude as part of the problem that has led to the erosion of our mutual defense of individual rights. As a nation, we don't exist. We exist as individuals. Losing sight of that simple fact and accepting the group-think mentality is a necessary step in the erosion of our ability to defend liberty.
I'd challenge your assertion that our government is anywhere close to perfect and also that it is closer to perfect than many ancient systems that lasted far longer and led to less oppression than our current system.
I agree that many of our founding fathers did hold that God granted (some) of his creations rights and to (some) God granted consciencless dominion over other creations. That doesn't mean they were correct. I absolutely disagree with the notion that God gave humans rights and I disagree on several aspects of it.
First, I've never bought into the God-as-welfare model. I don't see evidence that God gives anything away. If anything, God defined the potential any creature starts with but the individual use of that potential isn't a detail a God would busy itself with. So, I don't believe God gave me any rights but the potential to exercise and defend them or to oppress and eliminate them. I can change my mind which way I'll use my potential at any time.
Which leads to my second objection to the notion of God-given rights. If God thought it was so important for all of his dominant human creations to have rights the I don't think it would be possible for Thor the Club to deny me of them any more than Thor could change that babies usually have the same number of eyes, ears, arms, and fingers or that the air is free. See, God wanted all of his creatures to have air and he made it so no one could keep them from it.
I think religions constrain God for their own convenience. With or without God we are at the mercy of man-made institutions.
The idea that rights are gifts from God diminishs the need to defend them. The idea that sins are absolved diminishs the incentive to avoid sinful behavior. The mind rot caused by institutionalized belief systems based on the largesse of benevolent super beings or benevolent government to protect individual rights is at the center of the current situation of rule by imbeciles and apathy by the masses.
I disagree that the way for mankind to learn how to better defend liberty is to reinforce the belief that God bestowed those rights upon them and that a piece of paper can prevent government from oppressing them.
There are only two actions necessary. Fortunately these things can easily be performed by nearly every single one of Gods human creations. No divine knowledge or super human creators are necessary. (and no need to sign up for a specially labeled herd of online libertarians)
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