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Ken M
Mountain climber
Los Angeles, Ca
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May 13, 2014 - 04:34pm PT
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Russia is a second-world country.
it is a place that has everything, but not working well. In many cities, electricity to the home is an episodic thing. Other things that we take for granted, such as the availability of a huge amount and variety of food, just doesn't exist. The restaurant experience is very limited, and not consumer oriented.
the black market is an important part of Russian society. It is not in first world economies.
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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May 13, 2014 - 04:51pm PT
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the black market is an important part of Russian society. It is not in first world economies.
Dood, maybe not in yer part of LA! Come to Azusa! ;-)
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madbolter1
Big Wall climber
Denver, CO
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May 13, 2014 - 07:37pm PT
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this position seems surprisingly, even naively, black and white. are you really arguing that a person can only believe in one or the other? that it's not possible to believe that there are both elements that should be held and managed in common [ex. air, water, raw resources, some land, etc.] and elements that should be held and managed as private property [ex. discrete elements that are the result of a single individuals work]? and even more importantly that there can be no messy grey and overlapping area between these two poles of the commonly held and the individually owned?
You certainly are at the heart of the matter, and I'm sorry for glossing over what is really at the core of the "communitarian vs. libertarian" divide.
I've said that the divide amounts to a fundamental perspective difference regarding private property. Your question presses on the role of government regarding the spectrum of "property," and so some fine-grained distinctions must be made in order to sustain my claim that the divide really IS regarding the nature of property.
First, let me acknowledge that there is indeed a difference between "property" that is "commonly held" compared to genuinely private property. And the role of government should be different regarding these two. Let's begin with "common resources."
Some of the recent posts chide me about potholes (roads), national parks, and so forth. So, let's talk about the "ownership" of such "pools" of resources, which discussion will also serve to sharpen up what is really meant by "property."
I've said repeatedly that government (and by this I mean strictly the federal government) exists primarily to secure the rights of the citizens of this nation. (Much could be said about "citizens" and even what "nation" means, but that discussion can be taken up later if necessary.)
The preamble of the Constitution states: "... in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America."
Please note the specified reasons for establishing a federal government:
1) provide a "more perfect" union
2) establish justice
3) insure domestic tranquility
4) provide for the common defense
5) promote the general welfare
6) secure the blessings of liberty
Of these fundamental purposes (and, btw, these are not just some offhanded, somewhat arbitrary list of ideals!), in our present context I would note that all of them presume a certain perspective of property rights, so I'll touch on each in that context and then develop what that notion of property rights really was.
1) provide a "more perfect" union -- The term "more perfect" stands in contrast to the articles of confederation in place at that time. It is a relative term rather than absolute. The founders realized that "perfection" was in-practice unattainable, yet striving to be "ever more perfect" must drive a nation such as ours. So the ideal is ever held before us, and here the contrast is made between the new constitution and the articles of confederation that had governed the "states" until the constitutional convention.
THE primary shortcomings that the federalists saw in the articles concerned the securing of property rights! I quote from Federalist 15: "In the course of the preceding papers I have endeavored, my fellow citizens, to place before you in a clear and convincing light the importance of Union to your political safety and happiness. I have unfolded to you a complication of dangers to which you would be exposed, should you permit that sacred knot which binds the people of America together to be severed or dissolved by ambition or by avarice, by jealousy or by misrepresentation....
"In pursuance of the plan which I have laid down for the discussion of the subject, the point next in order to be examined is the 'insufficiency of the present Confederation to the preservation of the Union.'"
Before I continue, first, please note that "the Union" is, in Hamilton's mind, an abstraction that transcends this or that set of articles or even the present Constitution. Hamilton PRESUMES that "the people" are fundamentally "in union" in terms of their rights and their desire to see them secured (Declaration of Independence). He wants to see a constitution in place that can best safeguard that "union," and he fears the forces that could threaten that "union" and turn the budding nation into an array of conflicting factions. So, "the union" is logically prior to any legal document defining a government, and, thus, any LEGITIMATE government must exist so as to preserve that "union" from the forces of dissolution.
"Do we owe debts to foreigners and to our own citizens contracted in a time of imminent peril for the preservation of our political existence? These remain without any proper or satisfactory provision for their discharge."
Here we see "common debt" acquired during the revolutionary war, debt which "the union" had taken on but that the articles, emphasizing as they did radical states' rights, did not treat as "common." Thus, "the nation" stood before the world having "reached almost the last stage of national humiliation" on the very subject of national debt, with the articles providing no possible method of discharge. Again, note how "the union" is logically prior to any particular form of governance, and Hamilton presumes that "we the people" recognize BOTH the actual existence of "the union" and the "common debt" that it has incurred in order to maintain its sovereign existence.
The point I am developing here is that this "common debt" implies both a "common good" and a "common resource" in the form of some monetary pool that must exist in order to sustain the "common good" in a NATIONAL sense... and all of these transcend this or that form of government. So, a "more perfect union" IS one that can at least provide for the "common goods" from a "common pool," and about this I am FULLY in harmony with those on this thread that would emphasize common goods, such as acceptable roadways, national parks, the common defense, and so forth.
Hamilton goes on to elucidate some of the particular functions of government that were indeed explicitly ascribed to the feds: "Have we valuable territories and important posts in the possession of a foreign power which, by express stipulations, ought long since to have been surrendered? These are still retained to the prejudice of our interests, not less than of our rights. Are we in a condition to resent or to repel the aggression? We have neither troops, nor treasury, nor government. Are we even in a condition to remonstrate with dignity?"
This is the foundation of a "national defense" coupled with a "national treasury" that can "pay the bills" of the nation as well as provide "men and funds" to secure the national defense. Again, on the subject of national defense, this is an explicitly-stated function of government, and any "pool" needed to enable this function is completely legitimate!
But "more perfect" also includes the relations BETWEEN the states: "Abandoning all views towards a confederate, this would bring us to a simple alliance offensive and defensive; and would place us in a situation to be alternate friends and enemies of each other, as our mutual jealousies and rivalships, nourished by the intrigues of foreign nations, should prescribe to us."
The abstract entity, "the Union," can only be truly maintained in a form of government that explicitly unifies the states under one head. Otherwise, "the Union" is always in danger of dissolution due to internal strife (over which there would be no adjudicating power) and due to "foreign intrigues."
Virtually the whole of Federalist 16 is devoted to the evils of internal strife and the necessity of one head over all the states to ensure that the constant bickering between the states under the articles could not escalate into all-out inter-state wars (which, between some was a real possibility).
So we see that Hamilton's great concerns regarding preservation of "the Union" come down to some fundamental points, as summarized in the beginning of Federalist 17: "Commerce, finance, negotiation, and war seem to comprehend all the objects which have charms for minds governed by that passion [ambition for radical states' rights]: and all the powers necessary to those objects out in the first instance to be lodged in the national depository." And note that these (and these only) are indeed the powers explicitly granted to the federal government by the Constitution.
"Commerce" concerns not only foreign trade but interstate commerce. "Finance" concerns national debts and the coining of money. The others are obvious. But the reason why I so often carp about the Commerce Clause being interpreted SO broadly as to mean that ANYTHING (according to justice Roberts) is now comprehended by it (and the power to tax) is that the founders themselves clarified what was contemplated by "commerce," and the anti-federalists feared the VERY usurping of power under a Constitution that we NOW see by "writing large" the Commerce Clause. This is WHY the Federalist Papers are so important and WHY an "originalist" interpretation of the Constitution is so critical; without tying terms like "commerce" back to their actual origins, we make them mean ANYTHING, literally ANYTHING; and these interpretations are not what the Constitution REALLY meant, as it emerged between the federalists and anti-federalists. Now, the anti-federalists' fears have come true.
We see in Federalists 18, 19, and 20 a series of examples intended to show the PRINCIPLES of systematization regarding "weights and measures," the value of currency, the rule of law, and justice. (Stay with me; this is all coming to a point regarding "common" and "private" property.) The point of these is to establish the absolute necessity of a "final word" in all national matters, the better to secure "the Union."
And in Federalist 21, Hamilton begins to draw things together at the fine point of "national resources" that are themselves the basis of contentions between states: "The wealth of nations depends upon an infinite variety of causes. Situation, soil, climate, the nature of the productions, the nature of the government, the genius of the citizens, the degree of information they possess, the state of commerce, of arts, of industry--these circumstances and many more, too complex, minute, or adventurous to admit of a particular speculation, occasion differences hardly conceivable in the relative opulence of riches of different countries. The consequence clearly is that there can be no common measure of national wealth, and, of course, no general or stationary rule by which the ability of a state to pay taxes can be determined. The attempt, therefore, to regulate the contributions of the members of the confederacy by any rule cannot fail to be productive of glaring inequality and extreme oppression."
The point?
Under the articles, the states tried ineffectually to "self-police" regarding their contributions to the "general welfare" in terms of men and money. Money itself varied wildly in value between the states, and there was continual contention about each "contributing its fair share" (where have we heard that before?). To whit....
"This inequality would of itself be sufficient in America to work the eventual destruction of the Union, if any mode of enforcing a compliance with its requisitions could be devised. The suffering States would not long consent to remain associated upon a principle which distributed the public burdens with so unequal a hand, and which was calculated to impoverish and oppress the citizens of some States, while those of others would scarcely be conscious of the small proportion of the weight they were required to sustain."
Wow! Is this RIGHT WHERE we are debating on this very thread?
But notice that the Federalist is discussing in terms of inequalities among the STATES rather than individual people (more on that shortly); AND the subject is the "distribution of burdens" rather than the distribution of WEALTH. This leads to a critical point to which I will return again and again: The feds were supposed to govern STATES, and the states were to govern individuals. The federal responsibilities were to be primarily involved with adjudicating between STATES and were to be "course-grained" measures of trade, treaties, the value of money, and overarching justice under law. The idea of federal involvement in every, tiny DETAIL of individual lives was not even IMAGINED as POSSIBLE by the federalists; and even the debate on the part of anti-federalists was regarding STATES' rights, as the rights of INDIVIDUALS were presumed by ALL in the federalist/anti-federalist debates. This makes the point of how FAR we have come from the original design when we see the sweeping and utterly pervasive involvement of the feds in the everyday lives of INDIVIDUALS... all "justified" under (primarily) the Commerce Clause.
We've talked MUCH about taxes in this thread, so let's bring that all to a head now, in the context I've thus far laid out, with this passage from Federalist 21: "There is no method of steering clear of this inconvenience [as mentioned just above], but by authorizing the national government to raise its own revenues in its own way. Imposts, excises, and, in general, all duties upon articles of consumption, may be compared to a fluid, which will in time find its level with the means of paying them. The amount to be contributed by each citizen will in a degree be at his own option, and can be regulated by an attention to his resources. The rich may be extravagant, the poor can be frugal; and private oppression may always be avoided by a judicious selection of objects proper for such impositions. If inequalities should arise in some States from duties in particular objects, these will in all probability be counterbalanced by proportional inequalities in other States, from the duties on other objects....
"It is a signal advantage of taxes on articles of consumption that they contain in their own nature a security against excess. They prescribe their own limit, which cannot be exceeded without defeating the end proposed--that is, an extension of revenue.... If duties are too high, they lessen the consumption; the collection is eluded; and the product to the treasury is not so great as when they are confined within proper and moderate bounds. This forms a complete barrier against any material oppression of the citizens by taxes of this class, and is itself a natural limitation of the power of imposing them."
First, "in its own way" does not mean anything like, "in whatever way it pleases!" "In its own way" means "consistent with its functions and the powers granted to it."
I am honestly BLOWN AWAY that contemporary Americans are so ignorant of the principles of taxation as outlined here. Hamilton recognizes the axiom: "The power to tax involves the power to destroy!" And his perspective on taxation reveals some basic principles of federalism that have long been abandoned to the great detriment of this nation:
1) The feds establish "duties" that apply across all STATES; the relation between the feds and "the people" regarding taxation goes THROUGH the states but applies equitably across all states.
2) The idea of an income tax appears nowhere in the Constitution until the 16th amendment in the early 1900s, and by "taxes," the founders meant "duties" (or tariffs) and what we would now call "sales tax."
3) An income tax gives the feds a level of invasive power over INDIVIDUALS that was never contemplated by the founders, and manipulations of THAT tax code have been the source of the VERY inequalities we argue about in this thread.
4) The inequalities we talk about in this thread were contemplated explicitly by the founders, and Hamilton carefully explicates how "self limiting" is the power of a sales tax. The poor pay less, because they are "frugal" in their expenditures, while the wealthy pay more, because they simply consume more.
So, I have been CAREFUL to lay out how Hamilton arrives at this juncture! Hamilton is NO anti-federalist! He WANTS a strong, robust, powerful federal government (as do I); but this also must be a government that is VERY CONSTRAINED in terms of its legitimate functions and, correlatively in its need of revenues with which to perform these functions. Ultimately, the feds are granted the power to TAX, but that "tax" is of a VERY different nature, and with a VERY different object than what we see today! And MOST of the debate in this thread would go away, were we to return to federalist principles as explicated by Hamilton!
Thus, the "more perfect union" must transcend states' rights, be secured by a powerful (yet significantly constrained) federal government, and funded by duties and "sales taxes" that are a function of the feds' relations to the STATES, which KEEPS the feds out of direct power over citizens; as the primary point of the federal government was to adjudicate between and jointly protect the STATES as well as the NEGATIVE rights of "the people"!
Now, to numbers (2) and (3). These don't bear as directly on the present topic of discussion, but both "establish justice" and "ensure domestic tranquility" correlate with the principles established above. I won't lengthen this post with more quotes and commentary. However, I'll just say that, again, these points derive from the founders' desire to ensure that the federal government had the power to oversee the states in the states' establishment of laws and processes regarding citizens. Like with "common weights and measures," the principles of justice themselves were to be "interstate" in character. And the most basic object of these powers was to protect the negative rights of "the people," including their property rights. Much more on that shortly.
This is NOT to suggest that particular laws, such as abortion and gay marriage, were to be established by the feds. The principles involved here were more generic, such as the nature of lawful searches and seizures, rules of evidence, and so forth (principles, I might add, that the IRS continually violates!).
So, the point I would make in this context is that the idea that the feds must establish the "nature of personhood" or such things is misguided. The feds were to secure "justice itself" and the "rule of law itself" rather than this or that particular law. It is true that the "divide" can be fuzzy, which is why things have evolved as they have. However, the direction of that evolution could have been halted (and could even be reversed now) if a commitment had been maintained to err on the side of keeping the feds in the role of "weights and measures" instead of establishing particular rulings on such things as Roe v. Wade.
EVERYTHING the feds engage in costs money! And that is what is germane to our discussion here. So, as the feds grow more and more invasive in the private lives of individual citizens, the money flow NECESSARILY grows larger to the feds and smaller to the states; and the relation between the feds and individual citizens necessarily grows tighter and more intimate. This trend was NOT the intention of the founders, and things have turned into exactly what the anti-federalists feared: federal involvement in EVERYTHING, with corresponding costs and invasions of individual lives.
(4) "provide for the common defense" is another principle/function that needs little discussion here. Two points I would make in this regard are: 1) "Common defense" meant not only from foreign powers but also from interstate conflicts; 2) to accomplish what the founders intended, we have NO need of a military (and corresponding budget) that exceeds that of the next 8 nations combined!
The feds were supposed to secure our borders, and this is something they have not done. The feds were supposed to protect our nation from aggressive actions by other nations, and we have instead used "national interests" to justify all manner of "police actions" and full-on invasions of other sovereign nations. I'm not advocating "isolationism" here! But how do we get ourselves into SO many situations in which the Powell Doctrine is not even thrown a bone, much less followed?
ALL of this costs MONEY, and LOTS of it! And this is money MUCH better spent on point (5): "promote the general welfare."
Wow, if there was ever a phrase more misunderstood than this one, it's hard to know what it would be! And, somehow, the liberal interpretation of this one has so taken hold that it has come to literally TRUMP number (6): "secure the blessings of liberty."
So, HERE is where our discussion becomes most pointed and focused, although, I hope you are seeing, or will see, how the foregoing context provides needed backdrop for what follows.
Even if they would not say it this baldly, most liberals have an intuition that essentially says something much like this: "See! 'General welfare' is one of the functions of the feds. Even the term 'welfare' is used! How much clearer could it get? The feds are SUPPOSED to ensure that everybody is taken care of."
And liberals thus see a TENSION, if not outright conflict, between "welfare needs" and "liberty," just as the past two administrations have in practice seen a tension, if not outright conflict, between privacy rights and "common defense."
So, bear with me as I elucidate a basic confusion regarding the nature of rights and duties that the founders fully understood but that has gotten completely lost over the centuries. I cannot state it strongly enough: failure to understand the following distinction is THE basis for the transition that has taken place in this nation, particularly over the last about 100 years, most particularly during my own lifetime.
The founders took as a "given" the well-known (at that time) distinction between negative and positive rights, deriving from negative and positive duties.
Negative rights are your rights that other people can satisfy by doing nothing. They are "negative" because they REQUIRE nothing from anybody else; hence, they derive from negative duties. And the "inalienable rights" specified in our Declaration of Independence were contemplated AS negative rights.
The right to life -- Leave me alone, and you have satisfied your negative duty toward my negative right to life. Just leave me unmolested in my person, and all is well.
The right to liberty -- As above, just leave me alone, and you have satisfied your negative duty to me regarding my negative right to liberty.
The right to the pursuit of happiness -- Again, leave me unmolested to establish my own definition of "happiness" and my pursuit thereof, and you have entirely satisfied your negative duty regarding my negative right to pursue my happiness.
Of note is that Madison STRONGLY urged that a significant part of the Declaration of Independence be included in the Constitution, particularly the brief list of negative rights, because he feared that the CONTEXT of the Constitution might be lost over time. As Madison wrote: "I believe there are more instances of the abridgement of the freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations." And, indeed, this is PRECISELY what has happened!
This page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life,_Liberty_and_the_pursuit_of_Happiness provides a concise, accessible overview of the debate regarding what political philosopher, Locke or Berkeley, most influenced Jefferson in his composition of that iconic phrase, "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." However, what is certain is that property rights were significant in Jefferson's mind as the phrase was crafted, and it was well in hand as the committee of five edited.
Both Locke and Berkeley essentially equated the right of life and the right of property, because they meant by the term "property" far more than we now take it to mean. It included intelligence, education, conscience, values, and the "fruits of one's labors." And elsewhere Madison had written: "As man is said to have a right to his property, he may be equally said to have a property in his rights."
And this echoes Locke's statement: "The great and chief end therefore, of men united into commonwealths, and putting themselves under government, is the preservation of their property."
And both Locke and Berkeley argued that the right to life is not a right at all without the means to defend it and the property to secure it. Thus, on their view, which was reflected by most of the founders, the right to life IMPLIED the right to self-defense and to the accumulation of "property."
Notice that even the Fifth Amendment conjoins these rights, denoting how fundamental they were in the minds of the founders, federalists and anti-federalists alike: "... nor shall any person... be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation."
The repeated mentions of "property," aligned with the rights of life and liberty, denote the high regard placed upon private property as basic and tied to the other rights to be explicitly protected.
But these rights were viewed as NEGATIVE rather than positive, a point that can be made well by casting them in positive terms to contrast with the negative version above:
The right to life -- We all struggle to "make it," and we all need help. So you have a duty to help me make it, just as I have a duty to help you make it.
The right to liberty -- This one is just ODD recast in positive terms! So, I'll leave it alone and note the fundamental oddity in casting this one in negative terms, while, supposedly, the founders thought of the other in positive terms.
The right to the pursuit of happiness -- As with life, you have a duty to help me achieve happiness on MY terms, just as I have a duty to help you achieve happiness on YOUR terms.
There are two fundamental problems with casting the inalienable rights in positive terms (over and above the inconsistency in treating liberty negatively and the others positively).
First, my right to life is NOT "inalienable" if it depends on YOU to satisfy it. It is then not tied directly and solely to ME, but we have to "work together" in some "social construct" to even define it. Same with pursuit of happiness, and even more so.
Second, as positive rights, it becomes impossible in principle for government to "secure" these rights! The problem with ALL positive rights (and their corresponding duties) is that in the real world we are constrained by limited resources of time, money, energy, etc. Thus, on a positive reading of these rights, the founders would have been very intentionally not even really throwing a bone to these rights when they used strong language like "secure!"
Cast as negative rights, government absolutely CAN (and was expected to) SECURE these rights, as there can be no conflict between negative rights, and the satisfaction of corresponding duties demands no expenditure of individual resources. ALL government has to do to SECURE negative rights is to ENSURE that people are not trampling on each other!
Immediately among my students the question emerges: "Really? There can be, in principle, no conflict between negative rights? What about when my pursuit of happiness conflicts with your life?"
This sort of question is based upon a fundamental misunderstanding. It is such a common misunderstanding, however, that it can be forgiven and pretty quickly corrected.
To start, of course conflicts can and do arise between people pursuing their own happiness in a world with limited resources! The negative rights believer readily admits this. But is the conflict between the negative RIGHTS themselves?
No, the conflict arises in the context of the ACTIVITIES one chooses in pursuit of happiness, not in the right to the pursuit of happiness itself. What is NEGATIVE about the RIGHT is that YOU have no DUTY to help me satisfy it. What makes the RIGHT negative is that its corresponding DUTY is negative! At core, your duty is to leave me unmolested is: my definition of what is happiness for me, my practical reasoning regarding what means will satisfy my ends, and the values that I hold that themselves inform my ends. YOU do not get to tell me what to value, what goals I may adopt based on those values, nor the means I believe will best serve my ends.
However, that does not give ME unconstrained rights to ACT in accordance with my practical reasoning. Remember that in my ACTIONS I must leave YOU unmolested in YOUR life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness.
So, yes, PEOPLE can come into conflict in a world of limited resources, but the rights themselves do not conflict, because the DUTIES that define the rights cannot conflict.
That is a more subtle point, so let me develop it a bit further. What is a "right" in the first place? Well, a LOT of ink has been spilled on this subject over the centuries, but a solid nutshell is this: A "right" is a moral relation between moral entities that derives from duties they have toward each other. I have no "rights" where there are no possible relations or duties. A rock has no rights because it is not a moral entity; it can have no "relations" nor impose any duties.
So, rights are defined IN TERMS of the duties they imply, which derive from the possible-in-principle relations that could exist between entities. Thus to talk about a "right to life" without defining the nature of the duties that right implies is incoherent.
In defining duties, then, we MUST define in negative or positive terms! If I have a right to a speedy trial, it is necessarily a positive right, because it is NOTHING without other people DOING a host of things to make that speedy trial happen. The right cannot exist outside the context of OTHER PEOPLE that DO things (positive expenditure of resources) to satisfy it. So, the right to a speedy trial IMPLIES positive duties on the part of other moral entities.
By myself, on a desert island, I have no right to a speedy trial. This is NOT an inalienable right; it is a derived right. It is not a right that I have just in virtue of my existence; it is a right that is inherently SOCIAL and is only coherent in that social context.
By contrast, alone on a desert island, I continually have the right to life. This is a right I have just in virtue of existing as a morally-relevant entity, and the duties it implies are ever-present. Any person that ever came to that island would find me already in full possession of that right, and it would be binding upon that person completely apart from any "social contract" or legal system. A person violating that right commits WRONG completely apart from any form of government or legislation. It is a fundamental moral right that transcends societies and agreements. And that right is not incoherent in the absence of another entity that has duties regarding it.
Why?
Because that right is NEGATIVE. Its duties are "empty" insofar as any other entities entirely satisfy their corresponding duties by doing nothing; thus even the absence of other entities continues to satisfy the duties implied by the right.
Another point is that negative rights are "perfect," while positive rights are "imperfect." This means that negative rights can always, without exception, be perfectly satisfied; positive rights, by contrast CAN only be imperfectly satisfied. Again, the issue comes down to "expenditure of resources."
Because negative duties "cost nothing," they CAN, in principle, be perfectly satisfied; nothing about the contingencies of this universe with its limited resources keeps me from perfectly satisfying my duty to leave you unmolested in your negative rights. By contrast, positive duties "cost something," and they CANNOT, in principle, be perfectly satisfied. Your right to a speedy trial comes up against real resources-constraints that might force society, despite its best and good-faith efforts, to push your trial out weeks or months, calling into question what "speedy" even means!
Thus, it is impossible in principle for a society found on INALIENABLE rights that government is supposed to SECURE to think of those rights in positive terms. And our founders were not so confused as to conflate negative and positive rights.
Thus, everywhere you read terms like "secure," you can substitute the term "unmolested." Such as "secure in their persons," meaning "unmolested in their persons." (Obviously, ensure grammatical correctness when switching between parts of speech.)
I could provide a pile of quoted passages at this point, but I'll hold those for any questions that might emerge from the foregoing discussion.
At this point, finally, we have the backdrop needed to talk about "ownership" or "property" as the founders saw it, along with why the current liberal perspective is SO FAR from the design of this nation. I am not leaving the Rebumblecons out of this discussion, which is why I have repeatedly said that Demoncrats and Rebumblecons are EQUALLY off the mark, just from opposite sides of the same coin. And the "liberal vs. conservative" debate fails to explicate where it matters most!
I prefer to use the term "property" rather than "ownership" for two reasons. First, the core political and moral philosophy upon which "property " is based does not neatly map onto what we typically think of when we talk about "owning" something. Second, "ownership" has legal implications that "property" does not. This is to say that an understanding of "property" is logically prior to a proper understanding of "ownership," and "ownership" is properly a subset of discussions surrounding "property."
A quick example: philosophically speaking, as noted above, "property" concerns a spectrum of attributes of a person that go far beyond what the person "owns." It is barely, if at all, coherent to talk about a person "owning" their body. But surely a person's body is their "property" if ANYTHING is! Also, a person's intelligence, values, and conscience are technically their "property" in a philosophical sense, but it is really incoherent to talk about a person "owning" their intelligence, conscience, or values!
Now, from above, remember that the right to life is negative and implies the right to accumulate property, which is itself a negative right. Also remember that a large part of why a legitimate government exists is to SECURE these rights. So, government's primary role as regards life and property is to keep YOU from molesting MINE, while keeping ME from molesting YOURS. Thus, laws, including OWNERSHIP definitions and laws emerge with an eye to securing these rights. And the essence of legitimate laws is to say, "Leave it alone!" And, "Don't trample on others as you pursue...."
Thus, the notion of "private" property is implied in "property." It is a mistake to talk about "common goods" and "common resources" as "property," because: 1) such talk conflates ownership with property; 2) the "possession" and "maintenance" of such resources cannot be cast in negative, inalienable terms!
There is NO sense in which I (qua individual) can "possess" a national park! The very definition of a "national park" implies a social agreement, and the "park" does not even EXIST apart from the abstraction that is the agreement. So, it can be coherently said that "we collectively own" a national park, but it cannot be coherently said that "I possess a national park as part of my property." The very term "property" has philosophical implications that our founders well understood and built into their legal verbiage, and that understanding does NOT map neatly onto the "ownership" that emerges as derivative of social agreements.
Correlatively, I cannot "own" an "interstate highway." I cannot "own" those "free potholes" that people here are making so much about. LOL In NO sense can these BE my "property" because of the nature of the emergence of their "ownership."
Now, bringing ALL of this together in answer to the original question, which was: "What distinguishes between air, water, raw resources, some land on the one hand and private property on the other?" the answer can now be explicated....
I said that you are either communitarian or libertarian in your understanding of private property, that you either see property as a "pool of resources" that government is tasked with "managing;" or you see property as essentially individual, the possession of which government is tasked with "securing." I also said that these positions are a hard dichotomy: there is no middle ground, and the positions are incommensurable. Finally, I have something close (oh, God, I hope!) to enough backdrop to defend those claims.
So, lets contrast things like air, water, raw resources, some land, against things that we would naturally think of as "private property," such as a house or car.
None of the former can in principle be "individually owned," while obviously the latter can be.
None of the former can be "possessed" by an individual as "property," nor "managed" or "used" (in toto) by an individual. You do not "possess" THE AIR that you breathe. It is not "yours" in any sense. Even collectively, we cannot "own" it. At MOST we can "manage" it in a collective sense insofar as we can AGREE together to not pollute it, and so forth. But even such AGREEMENTS presuppose at least three features that preclude air from being PROPERTY:
1) Such agreements logically presuppose society, so any "rights" construed by such agreements are not inalienable; thus they are not property rights.
2) Such agreements by definition require the expenditure of resources, which means that they imply positive rather than negative duties.
3) There is no sense in which any entity can demand of air: "Just leave it alone." It is impossible for me to "use" any air and "return it to the pool" untouched and untainted. This implies that any duties I might have as regards air MUST be imperfect, hence positive, duties. Thus, NONE of us can have any "property" in air!
Air is a "pool" that we can at most "collectively manage" but that cannot be construed as "property."
Such distinctions can neatly separate "common goods" from "property," and the negative duties vs. positive duties that emerge from the very definitions of our relations to entities and resources will serve to make these "pool vs. property" distinctions clear. I am NOT saying that there are no "edge cases" that we struggle with (such as general fetal rights vs. the life and property rights of the individual woman to be "secure in her person"). What I AM saying is that ALL such edge cases must be discussed in terms of the CORRECT principles; we rarely even get that far!
When I contrast communitarianism with libertarianism, I am in a nutshell saying this: The former radically conflates ALL of "property" with "common goods," while the latter radically separates "common goods" or "resource pools" from "property."
In summary, our founders were philosophical libertarians; they had a negative-rights view of rights and duties; they designed a government that existed to SECURE negative rights; and the present conflation or even reversal of negative and positive rights has DISALLOWED our present distortion of a government from doing the VERY thing it was originally designed to DO: secure us in our persons and property!
So, when we debate about how to "tax the rich" or "help the poor" or "provide for the rights of the people" such as health care, we invariable engage in that debate from entirely fallacious and incorrect principles! IF people have a "right" to health care, it is CERTAINLY at most a positive right! And THAT is the basis of what I mean when I say that such a thing is NOWHERE contemplated by the Constitution in its assignment of powers to the federal government.
That fact is also why I decry all forms of income taxes (however you cast or "rate" them) to support such expenditures at the FEDERAL level, because the FORM of taxation, coupled with the slate of expenditures, DEFINES the very nature of the relation between the federal government and individual citizens that FORMED the government in the first place to SECURE their negative rights in their persons and property! My advocating a flat tax is designed to PRESS on this very issue.
So, here is a legitimate government axiom: When government uses positive duties to infringe upon negative rights, you can be sure that something has gone wildly astray! And that, my dear friends (and I mean that), is where we presently live.
So, when you debate "republican vs. democrat," and you decide cycle after cycle to emphasize one party over another, and you do so without regard to the fact that BOTH parties are utterly and completely self-serving and confused about the very nature of legitimate government (they actually do NOT at present serve your most fundamental interests), you ARE choosing to extend this ridiculousness for yet another election cycle.
I'll say this in closing: Rand Paul is NO Ron Paul. Ron Paul garnered widespread respect, but was "unelectable." And we really should be asking ourselves in PRESSING fashion why we keep doing the same thing again and again while expecting different results! "Change?" Well, we really DON'T get it while we keep voting based upon PARTIES, and BOTH parties are equally confused about why the federal government even SHOULD exist in the first place.
"The Union" to which I referred at the beginning of this post has never ceased to exist. Not everybody in this "nation" is part of that "union," as factions HAVE succeeded in dividing this nation in (at least) two (and NOT down party lines, believe me!). But "the Union" to which the founders referred IS that body of "the people" that continue to look to government to SECURE their negative rights.
"The most common and durable source of factions has been the various and unequal distribution of property" (Federalist 10). And remember now that what "property" means includes the innate faculties of people: intelligence, conscience, even education, and so forth. Thus, this "unequal distribution" is NOT taken to be a bad thing, even though it motivates factions. Only MAJORITY faction is an actual threat to "the Union," so, in fact: that "unequal distribution" is Madison's ANSWER to the threat of MAJORITY faction:
"The diversity in the faculties of men, from which the rights of property originate, is not less an insuperable obstacle to a uniformity of interests [widespread uniformity of interests being the basis of majority faction]. The protection of these faculties is the first object of government" (Federalist 10, emphasis supplied).
We have come FAR from "unequal distribution of property" (properly understood) being a GOOD thing, and we have come FAR from the protection of these "unequally distributed" faculties being the FIRST OBJECT of government.
Philosophical libertarians want the protection of "unequal distribution" of property and, thus, the securing of negative rights. What do you want?
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wilbeer
Mountain climber
honeoye falls,ny.greeneck alleghenys
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May 13, 2014 - 07:49pm PT
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"What do I want"
Less long winded explanations or justifications for ones selfishness.
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Bob D'A
Trad climber
Taos, NM
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Topic Author's Reply - May 13, 2014 - 07:57pm PT
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Get to the point...please!!!
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madbolter1
Big Wall climber
Denver, CO
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May 13, 2014 - 08:03pm PT
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Just the brief time you took to respond reveals why you remain so misinformed. If you can't be bothered to read my position, at least don't presume to know what it is.
Principles and nuances right out the window!
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wilbeer
Mountain climber
honeoye falls,ny.greeneck alleghenys
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May 13, 2014 - 08:06pm PT
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I read your position.
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TGT
Social climber
So Cal
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May 13, 2014 - 08:07pm PT
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It was primarily Madison's,
just restated.
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Bob D'A
Trad climber
Taos, NM
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Topic Author's Reply - May 13, 2014 - 08:13pm PT
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I did read it, I don't agree with all that you posted. You still haven't answer my questions on giving solutions to today's issues.
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labrat
Trad climber
Auburn, CA
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May 13, 2014 - 08:25pm PT
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"You still haven't answer my questions on giving solutions to today's issues."
No one responded on my fears of China's quest for world domination either......
It won't matter much when they take over :-(
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HermitMaster
Social climber
my abode
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May 13, 2014 - 08:46pm PT
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Look at China's history.
It has never had the expansionist mindset possessed by the West.
I bet the people of Tibet feel real good about China's version of the "expansionist mindset"
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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May 13, 2014 - 08:51pm PT
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Randisi, what do you call their actions in the South 'China' Sea?
Never mind, I'll ask the Vietnamese and Filipinos.
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Bob D'A
Trad climber
Taos, NM
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Topic Author's Reply - May 13, 2014 - 08:53pm PT
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I agree with Randisi on China...they have major issues with their environment and production of food.
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philo
Trad climber
Is that light the end of the tunnel or a train?
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May 13, 2014 - 09:20pm PT
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I remember when the fear was that Japan was buying up America and was going to own US.
Guess what it never happened. After the crash those same properties got repurchased by the same rich fuks that tanked the world economy back then. And for pennies on the Yen..
Believe it or not the same rich fuks who screwed us this time by sending all the manufacturing jobs over there will end up owning the place.
At least until the Chinese throw them out again.
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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May 13, 2014 - 09:22pm PT
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Ideas are fine but ramming another country's naval vessels is a bit much
especially when those actions occur far beyond what any possible interpretation
of international maritime law would consider China's territorial waters.
They're being real azzholes.
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okie
Trad climber
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May 13, 2014 - 09:30pm PT
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Give Randisi a break. He's behind the Bamboo Curtain. He's always one click away from being...um... disappeared from this forum.
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philo
Trad climber
Is that light the end of the tunnel or a train?
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May 13, 2014 - 09:32pm PT
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Okie dokie.
That same thought had crossed my mind.
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HighTraverse
Trad climber
Bay Area
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May 13, 2014 - 09:42pm PT
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Randisi
you know Big Brother is watching you!
Tibet was naked aggression and is now human rights violations. South China Sea/Vietnam/Phillippines is bypassing legal norms.
Not that the US has set a good example. We have behaved like a third world country (illegal force of arms) in a dozen countries since China became Communist.
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TGT
Social climber
So Cal
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May 15, 2014 - 02:23pm PT
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For the first time since Ulysses S. Grant was president more businesses were destroyed last year than created.
Entrepreneurial spirit is seen as evil by progressives and this president and his minions have done all they can to stomp out any spark to the benefit of his crony corporatist buddies.
Why we are on our way down hill was clear to Madison
Ironically it is from a federalist paper argument for the formation of the senate.
To trace the mischievous effects of a mutable government would fill a volume. I will hint a few only, each of which will be perceived to be a source of innumerable others.
The internal effects of a mutable policy are…calamitous. It poisons the blessing of liberty itself. It will be of little avail to the people, that the laws are made by men of their own choice, if the laws be so voluminous that they cannot be read, or so incoherent that they cannot be understood; if they be repealed or revised before they are promulgated, or undergo such incessant changes that no man, who knows what the law is to-day, can guess what it will be to-morrow. Law is defined to be a rule of action; but how can that be a rule, which is little known, and less fixed?
Another effect of public instability is the unreasonable advantage it gives to the sagacious, the enterprising, and the moneyed few over the industrious and uniformed mass of the people. Every new regulation concerning commerce or revenue, or in any way affecting the value of the different species of property, presents a new harvest to those who watch the change, and can trace its consequences; a harvest, reared not by themselves, but by the toils and cares of the great body of their fellow-citizens. This is a state of things in which it may be said with some truth that laws are made for the few, not for the many.
In another point of view, great injury results from an unstable government. The want of confidence in the public councils damps every useful undertaking, the success and profit of which may depend on a continuance of existing arrangements. What prudent merchant will hazard his fortunes in any new branch of commerce when he knows not but that his plans may be rendered unlawful before they can be executed? What farmer or manufacturer will lay himself out for the encouragement given to any particular cultivation or establishment, when he can have no assurance that his preparatory labors and advances will not render him a victim to an inconstant government? In a word, no great improvement or laudable enterprise can go forward which requires the auspices of a steady system of national policy.
But the most deplorable effect of all is that diminution of attachment and reverence which steals into the hearts of the people, towards a political system which betrays so many marks of infirmity, and disappoints so many of their flattering hopes. No government, any more than an individual, will long be respected without being truly respectable; nor be truly respectable, without possessing a certain portion of order and stability.
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JEleazarian
Trad climber
Fresno CA
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May 15, 2014 - 02:43pm PT
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You don't know shiht. You have no idea how many of those businesses were tax shelters, who created them, why they exist, and who in effect held them.
Quite a statement. Insulting and irrelevant at the same time. One thing seems certain, though -- no one is dissolving tax shelters in the face of an administration and Senate Majority Leader that never met a tax on business they disliked.
John
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