From: kurt@eskimo.celestial.com (Kurt Cockrum)
Subject: Re: Government grants privileges? (was: Re: DWI)
Summary: Yes, indeed
Organization: >>> Eskimo North (206)-FOR-EVER <<<
Date: Sun, 26 Jul 1992 19:24:40 GMT

In article <1992Jul25.162431.1706@kopachuk.uucp> dcb@kopachuk.uucp (David Breneman) writes:

[...]

>                 Our country is supposed to be founded of the principle
>that the *people* grant the *government* the *privilege* of power over
>us in exchange for certain protections the government gives in return;
>such as providing police to protect our natural rights from those who
>would defraud or endanger us, defense from foreign and domestic forces
>which would seek to oppress us, a court system for arbitrating
>disputes, a currency to facilitate trade, etc.

In practice, the government regards the handing over of power to be
a *single* *act*, and an *irrevocable* *transaction*.  Sedition is the name
for acts (they call them "crimes") that try to reverse the transaction.
Trouble is, the government also gets to adjudicate sedition.

Who shall guard the guardians?  The "agreement" that David
mentions above fails to handle the self-referential case, which is where most
of the problems arise.

[...]
>       However, nowhere in the writings of our founders, and nowhere
>in any legal treatises at any time prior to the 20th century is there
>any credible notion in American political thought that the government
>can or should have any powers derived from Divine Right (that is, powers
>above those which it is the will of the people governed to grant it), or
>that is should be able to dispense or withhold these munificencies
>through the work of non-elected officials.  This whole notion of
>governemnt having a Greater Power which is *not* derived from the people
>is the gist of what our founders fought against in the revolutionary
>war.  

But it would appear that a whole subculture of the people has sprung up
whose writings and sayings indeed *do* advocate a government with powers
derived from "divine right" (I refuse to dignify that odious phrase with
caps), *after* the Revolution.  I refer, of course, to the christian right.
They, after all, are responsible for the motto "in god we trust" appearing
on our paper currency.  George Bush himself has allowed as how atheists do
not deserve full citizenship.  It's a lot further along than you think;
they, naming themselves "OCA", are waging a war in Oregon for theocratic
control of that state.

These writings aren't necessarily of a legal nature, but if the notion
of "by/from/of the people" is to have any substance, that should not matter.

>I do not recognize the governemnt's right to grant privileges to
>any one for any purpose.

But isn't this just what patents and copyrights are?
My dictionary defines privelege [from Latin _privus_ (separate or peculiar)
and _lex_, _legis_ (law)] as:
1 a right, immunity, benefit or advantage granted to some person, group of
  persons or class, not enjoyed by others and sometimes detrimental to them.
2 a basic civil right, guaranteed by a government; as the _privelege_ of
  equality of all.
[ I was taken aback by the phrasing of 2; implicit in the notion of privelege,
it seems to me, is that it is a relation between superiors and subordinates,
controlled by the superiors, that typically increases the options of the
subordinates; an immediate corollary is that the superiors can make it go
away.  Granting/withdrawal of priveleges is a control methodology.  What are
our dictionaries coming to these days? :) :( ]

I am *not* arguing *for* or in favor of the subject, BTW.  You all know me
better than that :) .  I'm just trying to get some thoughts cleared up.

>                          It is antithetical to our whole system
>of legal and moral values. 

I can't accept the validity of this argument, inasmuch as it is also used to
justify oppression or denial of rights to various minorities and/or deviant
groups.  It is a stock phrase of fundy christians.  It's also self-serving
to the extent that it ignores inconsistencies and contradictions among the
"whole system of legal and moral values".  It also assumes that said values
are absolutes, not relative, which I reject a priori.

>I pay taxes to support the building and maintenance of roads.  
>Therefore I have a right to drive on them. [...]
[...]

Oops...taxes are compulsory payments or tribute paid from subordinate
entities (usually individuals) to superior entities (usually governments,
gangs, or other collective grouping.  When the superior entity is an
individual the act is called robbery, mugging, fraud, etc.).  No rights
necessarily follow from such payments, especially those of recovery or
compensation, except through the largesse or laxity of the superior entity.
Neither can be counted on.

>In light of these comments, I pose two talking points:
>
>1) If cars had been around in the 18th century, our right to own
>   them would be guaranteed by the Constitution.

Hmmm...wouldn't the common law have covered this, as it does the concept
of "ownership" in general?  Why do you think the Constitution would mention
cars specifically (Is what you meant?  or did you mean something more
abstract, such as "the right of personal transportation", or the "right to
travel")?  After all, the Constitution failed to mention horse-drawn
transportation, which surely had an impact at least equal to that of the
automobile.  Do you think that the right would have been spelled out
explicitly ("the people shall have the right to own cars") or would it have
been obfuscated (in the same way as, say, the 2nd. amendment, which waffles
on about "well-regulated militia" and similar jargon)?

>2) If cars had not appeared until after world war II, their private
>   ownership would be illegal.

Double hmmm...why aren't personal computers illegal?  Perhaps because the
government failed to anticipate their potential?  Indeed, what with recent
attempts by the spooks to control encryption technology, and the FBI's
telecomms monitoring proposal, it might well become illegal to possess
computing devices capable of certain one-way data transformations.  Many
people are starting to use the PGP cryptosystem (note recent proliferation
of .sigs on the net containing PGP public keys of the sender), and the
"RSAref" RSA-style public key cryptosystem reference implementation is
readily available [ the Feds *really* fucked themselves when they allowed this
:) !  I am sure that they will bitterly regret it.  Yay! ].  The willingness
of the federal government to clamp down in recent years on activities they
consider threatening, combined with the presence of those activities, and
widespread dissatisfaction with things as they are, makes me speculate that
we may be seeing civil war before the decade's out, as the Feds attempt to
assert and regain control over grassroots efforts to be "free", and people's
disillusionment with the existing system increases.  [ Sorry about changing
the subject :) ]

>Well?
[...]

Another thought-provoker:  I have heard some women say that if men could
menstruate, it would be a sacrament, and that pregnancy and abortion would
be merely two distinct outcomes, both equally acceptable, of the same sacred
rite.
-- 
kurt@grogatch.celestial.com (Kurt Cockrum)
Newsgroups: seattle.general