From: starr@genie.slhs.udel.edu (Tim Starr)
Subject: Re: New Libertarian Gun Control Book
Organization: UDel, School of Life & Health Sciences
Date: Tue, 22 Dec 1992 22:42:10 GMT

In article <1992Dec21.051734.2077@cbnews.cb.att.com> lvc@cbnews.cb.att.com (Larry Cipriani) writes:
}In article <1992Dec19.094447.11115@genie.slhs.udel.edu> starr@genie.slhs.udel.edu (Tim Starr) writes:
}>In article <1992Dec18.183244.10725@cbnews.cb.att.com> lvc@cbnews.cb.att.com (Larry Cipriani) writes:
}>> I've read the constitution, and it makes me cringe.  About the only
}>> good part, IMO, is the Bill of Rights.  What's all this rubbish about
}>>"states" and "states rights", etc.  Ugh.
}>
}>States aren't accorded rights as I recall, but powers.
}
}It still deserves an "Ugh!".

Not to a Constitutionalist.  Since the Federal government isn't delegated any
powers to regulate guns, such power is reserved either to the States or to
the people.  State policy could very well be laissez-faire.

}>>>He works from common law principles of restitution for takings, ...
}>>
}>>What's common law got to do with libertarianism ?  Why just that
}>>concept from common law ?  Why not all of common law ?
}>
}>Common law embodies centuries of dispute-resolution which has much
}>value to offer libertarian jurisprudes.
}
}Yes, but it breaks down dramatically in certain situations, such
}as broadcasting and other modern types of property rights.

I don't agree with this.  Broadcasting would have been done by homestead
of Roosevelt II hadn't nationalized the airwaves.

}>Philosophically, restitution is the most libertarian paradigm
}>of justice, as opposed to retribution, for example.
}
}I view restitution as compensation for an accident which results in
}a loss of property or life.   Gov't "taking" of property is in no
}way an "accident", it's quite deliberate, and not much better than
}a thief walking away with my belongings or worse.

I see no reason to restrict restitution to accidents only.

}Do you think retribution is non-libertarian ?  I don't see why
}this is a problem for libertarianism.

Not exactly unlibertarian, but subordinate to restitution.  Suppose I destroy
$100 worth of your property on purpose.  Should I pay for it plus damages
plus collection costs, or should you merely get to destroy $100 worth of
my property?  I'd go for the former, restitution.

}If someone willfully takes the life of another person they should
}pay for it with their own life.

I'd let the victim's heirs sue for whatever penalty they wanted.  There's no
guarantee that a jury would award it to them, but it should be their choice.

}>Let's assume that there's a fatal disease that everyone will get unless they
}>all get inoculated against it.  In that case, taking private property to
}>pay for the inoculations would be justified, because being saved from death
}>is compensation for the taking.
}
}Perhaps, but what would a Christian Scientist say ?  Maybe he or she
}would rather rely on prayer than be innoculated.  I'll bet money on
}their prayers not being answered, but that's their business [as long
}as they don't transmit it to anyone else].

Right, as long as they don't communicate it.  If there's a risk that they
will, then prior restraint is justifiable to force them to be immunized.

}Also, in the real world the tradeoffs aren't so clear.  There are human
}costs to, say, the polio vaccine.  There is a tiny fraction of the
}population for whom a polio vaccine causes serious illness and possibly
}death.  In this case,  the "compensation" of being taxed for the vaccine
}is "death."  Maybe someone would rather take the chance of not catching
}polio than suffering with the cure.

Absolutely true, which is why this sort of thing is at the margins only,
and not a matter of general policy.

}Just who decides what is the correct form of compensation ?  In
}practice it's the goverment, not some "libertarian oracle" which
}gives us the answer.  And given that a baised party is doing this
}deciding we should not rely on "restitution" from the gov't as the
}gov't will just maximize it's takings and minimize it's "restitution".

Juries are supposed to award compensation.  This is an excercise of the
power of eminent domain, after all.  There may be imperfections in our
jury system, but it's the best procedure I've ever heard of.

Tim Starr - Renaissance Now! - Think Universally, Act Selfishly
starr@genie.slhs.udel.edu

"True greatness consists in the use of a powerful understanding to enlighten
oneself and others." - Francois Marie Arouet Voltaire
Newsgroups: talk.politics.guns