Yesterday, I took Robin’s car into town for my dentist appointment. When I turned on the radio, it was set to Vermont Public Radio, and the program was about a potable water shortage in some Latin American country. They had the obligatory impact sound bit from a local citizen, which was then translated into English by the narrator. The woman was complaining about the lack of water services in her village, and how “having drinking water is our right.”
That reminded me of some of the assertions about “rights” bandied about by the HopeChange brigade for this election. Apparently, free health care is now a human right, among other things.
That, of course, is a load of nonsense. There can be no such thing as a “right” to a thing or a service. If you have the right to see the doctor for free, or to get drinking water for free, it naturally follows that someone else has the obligation to provide it to you free of charge. A right always comes with a corresponding obligation, which means that it cannot apply to free stuff and labor. It would make the obligator a slave to the person claiming the right.
If you have a “right” to bread, what happens to the baker’s right to work for a living? You may decide to obfuscate the issue by paying the baker with tax money, but all you’re doing in that case is to spread the obligation around among the tax payers.
A true and proper right always creates a negative obligation: the obligation to not mess with someone’s stuff, to not curb their speech, to not take away their guns, to not throw them into jail without due process. Look at the Bill of Rights, and you’ll understand the idea: your right to free speech only creates an obligation on the part of the government to not curb your ability. It does not create a financial obligation on your neighbor’s part. Your right to free speech is your right to speak your mind without being beaten down by riot police. The only obligation on the part of your neighbor is to leave you alone, not to pay for a bullhorn and commercial airtime so you may exercise that speech.
The Second Amendment also merely creates a negative obligation: it recognizes the right to keep and bear a gun, and the corresponding obligation of the government to keep its hands off that gun, not your right to obtain one at no cost to you. It creates an obligation on the part of the government to leave you alone, not to provide you with a rifle and a thousand rounds of ammo at taxpayer expense. You may buy a gun or acquire it in some other legal way, and the government has (at least in theory) the obligation to not infringe on that right, but you do not have the right to demand free guns from anyone on Constitutional grounds. As with all the other Amendments of the Bill of Rights, the Second Amendment only recognizes the right to be left alone.
That’s what a right is: the right to be free from government interference while doing a certain activity. There’s not a thing in the Bill of Rights that refers to a “right” to a physical thing, or a specific service, because that kind of right cannot exist. It can’t exist because it would automatically create a corresponding material obligation on someone else’s part.
That’s why “free” government stuff isn’t a right. It isn’t “free”, because there’s still a financial cost associated with it. That cost merely gets distributed, but it’s still there. A true right is something that at no point involves anyone paying for anything. It doesn’t cost the government (and by extension, your neighbors) a red cent to respect your right to speak your opinion, exercise your religion, keep and bear arms, or get a trial by jury. Water and health care, on the other hand, are not rights, because someone else would be required to provide them to you for free. If you claim the right to such a thing or service, you automatically claim the right to enslave the person who would have to give that thing or service to you. (And yes, that’s slavery–the commandeering of a person’s productive output without compensation.)
Next time you hear someone talking about their “right” to something, run it through the quick-and-easy Real Rights filter. Does the exercise of that right involve a payment–no matter how small–on the part of someone other than the claimant? Then it isn’t a right, and the person claiming it merely says, “I want free stuff.”
17 Comments
June 27, 2008 at 12:19 pm
There are positive as well as negative rights. For a history of the development of the concept see Richard Tuck’s classic, “Natural Rights Theories: Their Origin and Development”. The idea of right comes originally from Roman law (the word is ius which is where we get the word justice), and it is contrasted with dominium which is the power to do something, akin to a faculty. Rights theories didn’t always assume a right was a property right, and even Hobbes, who is the rights theorist you probably like the most would argue that you have a positive right to defend yourself and preserve your body (a form of property rights).
http://www.stuffwhitedbagslike.wordpress.com
June 27, 2008 at 12:23 pm
I reworded the whole “positive-vs.-negative rights” thing a little to make the point a bit more clear.
The right to defend oneself is a right because it only creates a negative obligation on someone else’s part, not a financial one.
June 27, 2008 at 12:27 pm
I have a right to water and health care, in that I have a right to have unfettered access to clean water and health care.
No one may legally withhold water from me, or take my water away, although no one is obligated to give me water without compensation.
Same with health care, no one is obligated to pay for my health care, but in the same vein, no one has the right to restrict my access to adequate health care as long as I have the ability to pay, which is why I oppose crap like Pharmacists not disbursing birth control.
June 27, 2008 at 12:49 pm
MadRocketScientist,
I agree with your argument all the way up until you mention you oppose Pharmacists not willing to sell birth control [for religious or moral reasons]. Are you saying all Pharmacists should be required by law to sell this? What about independent Pharmacists who own their own pharmacy? Do they as a small business owner not have the right to determine what products they sell?
-Flea#
June 27, 2008 at 1:17 pm
The only obligation on the part of your neighbor [with regards to free speech] is to leave you alone, not to pay for a bullhorn and commercial airtime so you may exercise that speech.
Senators Durban and Kerry and House Speaker Pelosi are pushing for what amounts to exactly that (see Fairness Doctrine). They want all talk radio stations to provide equal air time for hosts with opposing ideologies, even if there is less money made and advertisers aren’t interested in buying equal time.
June 27, 2008 at 3:03 pm
Health care, water, and any other necessity are merely commodities to be exchanged, bought or bartered for like any other.
And yes, of course people want free stuff but they want to call it something else so they don’t have to face the fact that they are basically freeloaders. I can’t count how many times my fellow stubfarts here in the retirement village will ask for a ’senior’s discount’ on everything from a cup of coffee to a package of golf balls. It’s embarassing to be around! Pay your own way you stupid old fart, the same way the kids pay theirs. Cripes, they got their hands full just trying to pay for their own little ones, never mind their idiot parents!But these people feel that because they are old they are entitled to such things and they get miffed when they don’t get it. Alot of these types are right on side with Obama too, which should tell you something.
You have a right to what you can pay for (and protect) and that is it.
June 27, 2008 at 4:54 pm
“It doesn’t cost the government (and by extension, your neighbors) a red cent to respect your right to….a trial by jury.”
Using your tests above, I have to disagree with you over this part (the rest, as usual, is spot on and being rapidly committed to memory for smacking idiots later). The trial by jury does actually cost the government (and us), and creates an obligation that is not along the lines of “leave me alone.”
The jury must be selected. There needs to be a judge. Lawyers are more or less (and I can’t believe I’m typing this) a good idea. The jurists undoubtedly have things they would prefer to do, so depriving them of their time and compelling them to come watch the trial and render judgement rather than earning their normal living is an obligation created by a right to a trial by jury. To redress this, jurists are of course paid but a) not very well, and b) out of the government’s pocket which as you said just distributes the cost to us all. Judges obviously can’t earn a living without a government paycheck on grounds of conflict of interest. Given modern bureaucracy I’m not even gonna *touch* the cost of making all this “speedy.”
So while I agree that a fair and speedy trial by a jury of peers is certainly a good idea, by your definitions above I can’t agree that it’s a right.
June 27, 2008 at 5:05 pm
Stingray,
thanks for pointing out that particular flaw in my argument. The fact that we pay the players ina trial out of the public kitty does throw a wrench into my test. However, one could argue that it only costs us money because we choose to pick up the tab in the interest of maximum impartiality, and that nothing in the Bill of Rights or the rest of the COTUS *requires* the use of government-paid judges and defenders to meet the constitutional requirement for a jury trial.
In fact, there’s absolutely no compelling reason why you *need* a government-paid judge and jury, or is there?
June 27, 2008 at 5:53 pm
On the public paying for the right to trial by jury: see a scene in “The Moon is a Harsh Mistress”
June 27, 2008 at 9:26 pm
The misuse of the word right is why I’ve stopped utilizing it, and stopped recognizing it – I now take a generalized approach in argument, referring instead to a generalized form of the human right – the two modes of interaction, Force and Reason. Negative rights are all subsets of the Reason mode of interaction, and positive rights are all subsets of the Force mode of interaction.
When you abandon the language of “rights” it becomes a lot harder for opponents to fake a firm moral standing by stealing the connotations of words which were never theirs.
June 28, 2008 at 8:43 am
That make sense. So that is why government can regulate our rights.
June 28, 2008 at 9:06 am
Like needs and wants, rights and privileges have been debated for quite some time, like licenses to drive automobiles, for example. I would suggest it is time to perceive public education as a privilege, rather than a right. The potential, challenges, and obstacles currently littering the public education landscape are discussed in the novel, The Twilight’s Last Gleaming On Public Education. A portion of this intriguing, socially relevant, and enlightening story, which possesses may of the elements commonly found in school systems throughout the United States, may be viewed online by contacting the publisher at http://www.Xlibris.com, clicking on their Bookstore link, then Searching by title. Check it out for yourself. See if the perspectives presented influence your perception of rights, inalienable or otherwise.
June 28, 2008 at 10:54 am
First time I’ve been to your blog… excellent analysis, and my thoughts exactly. What many on the Left don’t understand is that rights can’t be granted; only restricted. I’ll be very interested to read more on this site.
MONIQUETH3INTERN: The government can regulate our rights only insofar as we allow them to. Consent of the governed: we elect our officials, and we allow them to restrict our rights whenever we fail to call them on it.
June 28, 2008 at 11:10 am
Mr. Bucket is proof that most talk about rights is motivated by the desire to game the system. It works both ways: those without claim rights to the things they need, and those with claim the right to say no. Mr. Bucket will change his tune when it’s too expensive to drive his car. Then he’ll claim a “right” to compel the government to drill for more oil (rather than let the market do its work and force his broke ass to ride the bus). This is what happens when ignorance and selfishness try to pass themselves off as independence and manly, self-reliant virtue.
What is a right? If you believe in God it’s something we’re born with. If you believe in The Market (man-made, not divinely made) it’s another dodge to get something for free.
June 28, 2008 at 5:59 pm
Here is what San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom said after yesterday’s lawsuit to allow handguns in the city’s housing projects: “We will absolutely defend the RIGHTS of the housing authority”. Since when have housing authorities had rights and the citizen’s that live there do not?
June 28, 2008 at 9:56 pm
Marko,
You may be one of the smartest essayists that I have ever had the pleasure of reading.
Logic and clear thinking all around; I hate to say it (rather not sound cynical) but it’s a shame most folks don’t get it, as it is crystal clear, as put forth in your finely – tuned missives.
Please keep it up, sir.
Mike
June 29, 2008 at 2:41 pm
Jared,
That’s a natural byproduct of thinking anything could be a “Collective Right” in the first place – it bestows rights on collectives, and leaves the door gaping wide for an immoral act becoming moral because a group does it, not an individual. It’s a variant of the same wooly thinking that things banning items can control human behaviour.