New Constitutional basis for re-establishing right to abortion

With the recent dismissal of the Constitutional basis for privacy and personal control of one’s body and property derived from the Fourteenth amendment (protecting “persons born or naturalized in the United States” i.e. irrelevant in protecting unborn entities), the proponents of the right to abortion need a new approach. With the decision that fetuses are a matter of controlling interest to the government (prenatal wards of the state, perhaps?), I propose that the Third Amendment now has relevance to this issue.

“No Soldier shall, in time of peace, be quartered in any house without the consent of the Owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner prescribed by law.”

The Government (Supreme Court, GOP, whoever) has apparently decided that the fetuses are not in control of the person in whose body they reside. The Supreme Court, etc, are demanding that these unborn non-citizens be involuntarily housed in nonconsensual wombs. Since the Supreme Court has chosen to conscript these “individuals” under Government control, the term “soldier” is not a far stretch to cover the relationship newly established. It is likely that the Third Amendment would also prohibit the Government (federal, state, and local) from compelling the quartering of postal workers, FBI/IRS/CIA agents, or any other governmentally controlled person. And so, the Government-”adopted” unborn wards should be properly prohibited from peacetime involuntary quartering. If the Government wants these fetuses, it must arrange alternate housing without the nonconsenting Owner of the womb. Wartime “baby factory” legislation will be required to be enacted to provide the needed “prescribed by law” condition.

Making It Real (Constitutionally)

Making It Real

We can talk of many concepts,
Debate and even write them down,
But they’re unreal if none accepts
They are rooted in the solid ground.

So it is for Democracy,
That implausible way to live.
In theory it seems near crazy,
To make our neighbors combative.

How simple to be told what’s right
By a wise and God named ruler.
Let the informed say when to fight
And not some offended dueler.

Might you trust in the guy next door
If the adequate rules were made?
To welcome some distant vote more
With careful foundation laid?

It is a challenge to be met
To change theory into nation.
We have not got it quite right yet,
But it’s not imagination.

When you can see and I agree,
The abstract gains reality.
The pure concept may never be,
But we don’t live in fantasy.

The Freedom to Vote

The Freedom to Vote

The problem with absolute Freedom is how seldom one truly gets to exercise it. To be free is to be untethered to anything and unfettered of any restraint. When does that ever happen!?

Freedom, on a more practical level, does not permit us to do everything we can, but defines a range in which we may act. Some restraints are self-imposed, based on our own sense of morality, risks, values, and logic. But many limitations are established by agreements we have with the people around us. Those choices which we allow to others are the same freedoms of which we have the expectation to possess ourselves.

Such is the freedom to vote. If my vote is to have value then so must yours under the same qualifications. In demanding my right to vote, I am conceding my inability to make the decision alone. I am buying into the agreed process for how the votes will be treated to arrive at a decision and thus implicitly agreeing to the decision as binding on me, irrespective of how I vote. Such a “freedom to vote” is costly purchased in restraints upon my other actions, especially it seems, when that vote goes against me.

True “Freedom” would be not to need to yield my actions to the opinions of others in the decision to be made. Universal Freedom would be the anarchy of everyone governed by their own decision, unable to affect or to be affected by another person’s actions. Hermits might experience such, but not those of us living amongst others.

“Free” societies are not built to strengthen Freedom, but to harness its power of desire beyond self-interest into cooperative efforts and protections. The Declaration of Independence makes this point in its “self-evident truths”:

• that all men are created equal,
• that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness
• that to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,

These are truths which are universal (equal in all people) and not statements about our differences (in health, wealth, beauty, intelligence, citizenship, etc). There is a set of naturally provided (endowed) attributes that cannot be separated from the person to be given to another (unalienable). One person’s Life (organic being), Liberty (choices) or Pursuit of Happiness (desires) cannot be removed and placed in another person. And yet, these attributes are not secure. Although they cannot be transferred to another, they may be denied without the security of society (Government) and specifically a society whose agreements (rules of governance) are based on the protection of equal and shared rights being the purpose of that society. A Society that is “destructive to these ends” must be altered or abolished, according to the Declaration of Independence, in favor of another “most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness”. There is still no certainty of these goals ensured by this fundamental document of our American society, only best efforts.

To secure = “to make (something) safe by guarding or protecting it”; “to make (something) certain”; “to put (something) in a place or position so that it will not move”. Particularly, this last definition describes the relationship between Security and the Freedom it secures. In order to be secure, restrictions are placed on the range of motion (action) of the object. It is “tied down for its own safety”. Security and Freedom are opposing forces and it is the “consent of the governed” which decides the balance.

And thus, as a society, we vote, a compromise in every decision made between our individual Freedom and the Security of having any Freedom.

Taking Aim at a Solution

Gun control is a controversial argument starter.  Many Americans have guns that have never misbehaved and therefore see no need to discipline those inanimate objects with great restrictions on their rights of association.  Such gun owners rightly perceive that “gun control” legislation is really “gun owner control”.

So, let’s start with both the owners and non-owners admitting to this simple truth – Gun do not need to be controlled; it is the users of guns that are the targets of our concern.

There exist many laws about what an individual is not permitted to do with a gun.  One may not assault or kill people.  One may not intimidate to rob or coerce people.  One may not damage public or other persons’ property.  But with a gun, one can do any of these activities.  The existence of these laws is to define a prohibition and the consequence (penalty) for breaching that prohibition.  The deterrent impact in knowing that some action is illegal does not always prevent the criminal act from being committed.  In our shared experience indeed, there are nearly 300,000 instances each year of guns being used in US to commit these violent forbidden acts.  There are likely more crimes than these recorded murders, assaults, and robberies, but within these reported crimes, one in thirty criminal uses of a gun apparently results in a homicide.

As numerous crime dramas have taught us, crime happens because of motive, means, and opportunity.  Laws prohibiting the various uses of guns work to counter-balance the motives of the criminal (with the perception of penalty to offset (illegal) gain) with a minor effect on the choice of means (i.e. if it was legal to poison a person but not to shoot him, some murderers might change their weapon (although perhaps not a mugger)).  “Gun owner control laws” seek to diminish the opportunity for criminals to commit their intended offenses.  The ease with which an available loaded gun may be employed to commit criminal acts (versus, say, bare knuckles as the weapon) is a great equalizer of the opportunity for more people to do so if so motivated.

Some people argue that it is the imbalance between the armed and unarmed citizens which is the real source of the problems of gun violence in our society.  That is, if all persons were armed with the easily used weapons of death and destruction, the advantage for the potential assailant would be decreased.  My early childhood education in cinematic Westerns suggests that the trained gunslinger might still outdraw the farmer (and the body-armored, semi-automatic armed bank robbers might feel sufficiently confident against a lobby of bank customers with pocket derringers).  Such gun owner rules requiring more people to carry guns do not seek to lower opportunity, but offer the prospect of increasing the counter-balance to motive in the face of ubiquitous defense and reprisal amongst the potential victims.  With the increase in mutual annihilation at the scene of crimes, we might indeed see a decrease in costly judicial proceedings (and corrections housing and supervision) against the deceased criminals not persuaded by this increased risk.

But perhaps lost in the solutions of the escalation of gun ownership as a deterrent on criminal motivation is the fact that 55% of gun deaths in the US are suicides (and another 5% are unmotivated accidents).  There are few, if any, documented instances of a suicidal assailant being deterred by his victim also being armed.  Perhaps, as a society, we believe that the suicide victim “was asking for it” and so deserves his/her fate (and that self-inflicted gunshots are a quicker and more certain means compared to more resuscitatable methods that might be used).  In the absence of guns, we might reason, those are 12,000-16,000 lost souls amongst us who would find those other means to their ends.

So, perhaps our problem is only that 3 Americans out of every 100,000 are murdered by guns each year (and 30 times that number are assaulted and/or robbed), and not the 4 Americans who die by their own action or by accident.  Motor vehicles kill over four times that many (usually accidentally), we are told, and there is no clamor to restrict their ownership.  Heart disease kills 60 times as many and yet there is no campaign to remove these killers from everyone’s chest.

But, before we rush to arm our toddlers, perhaps we should consider what the other options are to gun owner control: (2) lower the availability of guns, or (3) do nothing (i.e. learn to live with the problem at its current “minor” effects amongst the myriad of other risks we survive (or not) each day).  While the latter option is the most likely outcome of the prolonged debates which will be occurring, let’s examine the reduction of availability strategy.

How may guns be made less available (or useful)?  To whom should guns be less available?

Underlying those questions is the fundamental assumption that “guns should be available (if limited perhaps).”  While it may not be unique in its legal policies around gun (weapon) ownership, the Constitution of the United States of America defines an undeniable right of its citizens to keep and bear arms.  The one explicitly stated purpose for citizens to be armed is “the security of a free state.”  While the amendment suggests that a well-regulated militia is necessary to achieve this purpose, it is understood that the manning of a militia (in the framework of the society of the Founders) was from the individual private citizen drawn into service as needed.  Such a citizen would return to his business when the need passed.

As a matter of history, the original version proposed for the Second Amendment contained a phrase suggesting it was the expectation that every citizen would be armed and ready to serve in the militia unless a “religiously scrupulous” person objected to rendering “military service in person.”  That clause was stricken from the draft submitted for ratification, leaving the restriction upon the Government not to be allowed to infringe (reduce) the rights to arms.  The Government was not prevented from raising the requirement of gun ownership (as the NRA and others may today be proposing).  Indeed, only a few months after the ratification of the 2^nd Amendment, the US Congress enacted a law that required every white male between 18 and 45 to enroll in the militia and bring his own musket, flintlock, or rifle and ammunition.

Thus, growing out of a culture of self-reliance, parochial organization, and even a bit of sanctioned rebellion, we have been placed in our current position by the thinking of our 18^th century Founders.  They allowed the possibility that the nation and society may change and thus need new structure and rules.  One method was in the forceful resistance of its citizens to the tyranny of its government.  But the other was in the peaceful and deliberative process of enacting and amending these rules.

Ask yourself – if the Second Amendment was proposed today, would it be ratified?

If you believe the answer is No, then the clear action required is to Repeal the Second Amendment.  Or amend it to 21^st century standards of technology, society, and culture.

What does the necessity of a militia to maintain security mean in our day?  We now do have fulltime professional armies and police forces doing the duties 24/7 that the old militias were called upon in such emergencies to perform.  The standing forces maintain sufficient arms in their controlled arsenals to equip any volunteer or draftee called into auxiliary service.  The citizen does not need to park a tank (or jet fighter) in his driveway to assist in the national defense.  He does not need a semi-automatic to help direct traffic at a rock concert.  The militias (and their private arms) that might be required are those to oppose government, not to assist it.  Do we as a nation still believe in the rights of private militias like the KKK, Hell’s Angels, and deep-woods survivalists to prepare to fight locally against oppression by our enacted laws?  The Constitution/2^nd Amendment, as is, seemingly states that such “gun clubs” are a necessity for our freedom – does the vast majority of us believe that now?

Or should the 2^nd Amendment be amended to state the more restricted and modern purpose for keeping household weapons?  Recreation – sports, hunting, and collector’s hobbies.  Law enforcement and military defense is no longer the province of the private citizen – those are the regulated and controlled business of governments, local, state, and national.  Perhaps, under the revised 2^nd Amendment, anyone may own a gun, but it may only be carried outside the home (or designated shooting and hunting establishments/locales) when unloaded and/or disabled from use without special government license and permission.  Carrying a concealed weapon (without regulated permission) is always an offense as is carrying a loaded or enabled firearm.  Those with criminal intent may be no less motivated than before, but their opportunity to get weapons to the scene of their crimes will be limited by the vigilance of those around them.  We do not need to wait to see if the person carrying an AK-47 actually shoots before the police can intervene to ensure there is no ability to fire the weapon.

But, if you believe the answer is Yes, the 2^nd Amendment would be ratified today, then let’s give it an in-depth reading to understand what the 21^st century voter has approved.

“A well-regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.”

We acknowledge and uphold the right to arms in the context of “well-regulated militia being necessary”.  In the 21^st century, we do not understand “regulated” to mean “drilled to march in regular columns.”  To us, regulations are rules and laws and a well-regulated industry has such guidelines and restrictions on operations from top to bottom.  The Constitution, Article I Section 8 ascribed the regulation of militia to State authorities within the disciplines provided by Congress.  A modern vote to ratify this amendment means the individual private citizen has the non-infringeable right to arms if he/she operates within the regulations of the State militia.  There is not a restriction on the Government to control gun ownership outside of the citizen’s participation and adherence to the regulation of the State militia.  There is no granted power to form, recruit, and train private militias in the Constitution, no matter how well-regulated.  If you think that there should be – Amend the Second Amendment.   Drop the introductory phrase to allow citizens to have any weapons they want for any purpose.  Or add language changing Article I to permit extra-governmental militia to be formed.  But, until the Amendment is modified, acknowledge the responsibility of the State governments to impose regulations (within the context of militia membership rules) on who may own (and register) what and how they may keep, carry, and use firearms.  Enroll in your local State militia and pledge to abide by their regulations.

So, let’s put it to a good, old-fashioned American vote.  Let’s propose two amendments – one to reaffirm the Second Amendment as written by our Founders and another to repeal it (and perhaps replace it with a more modern understanding of what American society wants in its nation and neighborhoods).  Either outcome might give us the ammunition to solve this problem.

Million Gun March

Gun owners, arise!

Cast off your complacent nature.

Come out of your fortified homes.

You are been vilified by the actions of only a few (thousand). You are being labeled as purveyors of violence, corruptors of civilization, destroyers of peace, and perpetuators of outdated American myths.

The time has come to step out of the shadows cast by criminals and show your neighbors who you are. Time to come out of your gun closets and display your pride.

It is time to march. To march to Washington, D.C. And awake the nation to the glory, freedom, and power of guns for good!

What is the true power of guns? Show them. Show that you can assemble one million people with one million guns on the National Mall and have hardly any murders, suicides, and armed robberies. Show them the effect on the crime rate in the District when a million visitors, armed against aggression, are added to its population for a weekend.

When should you march? April 19, 2013, the 238^th anniversary of the finest display of the value of the armed citizen in our nation's history. Remind all Americans who answers the call when our country needs you. Who is there the minute trouble starts? The citizen. Who is there when there is not time to wait for police or the army? The citizen. Enshrined in the Constitution defining our nation is the recognition of the necessity of the armed citizen to preserve our security. Remember that and march to remind everyone else!

There is no right in the Constitution to be a criminal, no right to be a lunatic. But guns do not make criminals and lunatics – they only enable them. March to the National Mall with your heads and your guns held high to demonstrate your sanity and allegiance to the founding principles of this great nation.

Assemble, gun owners! March!

[Unfortunately, I do not own a gun, so you will not be seeing me in your patriotic crowd. But have a good time – April is lovely in DC. Oh, and remember if somebody yells “Duck”, it might not mean an opportunity to hunt waterfowl.]

Sandwiched In Between

[Sandwiched In Between]

I think it was the mismatch of the long grey beard and ponytail with the three piece business suit that caught my attention first. I usually am as disinterested as anyone else on the sidewalk passing a sandwich board clad prophet. But this one got a second glance and then a stop out of me.

There was a single word on his breastplate and a different one riding on his back. LIBERTY declared the front and DUTY replied its partner (or maybe its opponent).

“Well, you caught me,” I said to the gent. “You have certainly simplified your message, but I do not think I know what it is.”

“Two sides, same middleman,” he explained. “Or maybe four sides if you count both internal and external.” He revealed the side facing his chest (on the reverse of LIBERTY) said DUTY and, facing his back, LIBERTY was on the reverse of DUTY.

“Uh, maybe, I still need another hint?” I asked, perplexed.

“Well, sir, we talk of our rights as those freedoms or liberties we possess as citizens. But you cannot have a liberty without it invoking a duty. You can speak as freely as your body and mind will produce, but you don't have the protection of free speech unless the rest of us acknowledge and fulfill our duty to tolerate your speaking and what you say. We got no duty to listen or to agree, but we got to allow you to say it.”

“So, my personal Liberties are backed by everyone's Duties to respect them,” I restated to him.

“Yup. And the same thing happens the other way around. The Liberties of everyone around you depend on you accepting your personal Duty to support them.” He grinned widely at my apparent comprehension. “When it comes to Rights, what you do within affects what others outside receive and what they do outside decides what you actually possess within.”

“And if I do not accept your right to something?”

“Then, sir, the system breaks down. You cannot expect to have your rights honored (by me or others) if you do not uphold your side of the bargain.”

“But I thought my rights were unalienable, given to me by my Creator.”

“He isn't exactly hanging around to defend them for you, except as how He is part of every consenting member of society by whatever name or concept that represents Him to folks. Without the agreement to agree as a society (even when the particulars may displease us), nobody has any assurance of receiving de facto the protections of his or her rights.”

“But people do not all tolerate other people exercising their rights. Somebody will blow up the building where I work, because another crackpot working three floors up posted a hateful blog.”

“And we agree as a society that the bomber is a criminal (who will lose his liberties when caught) and the crackpot is merely stupid (and wrong perhaps). But the crackpot's rights did not protect him or you from somebody who sees his duty wrong or too unimportant to fulfill. Liberties are made of the air in the words of speeches, but it is Duties that are the sinew that assure the reality of Rights. It is what we do, not what we say, that defines and defends the society we build together. Patrick Henry's quote of 'give me liberty or give me death' sums it up; we can choose our actions, but we are given the consequences. Sometimes we must risk dire returns to achieve desired results.”

“Well, thanks for the explanation. I appreciate you seeing it as your duty to enlighten us.” I extended my hand, curiosity satisfied.

He shook my hand and said, “Oh, they are paying me $8.25 an hour to stand here. Have a good day, sir.”

The Declaration of Interdependence

The Declaration of Interdependence

When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one person to accomplish more through social and political bands with others than those individual persons can achieve alone, a decent respect for the tribulations as well as the benefits of such a cooperation requires that they should examine and declare the causes and boundaries for their union.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all persons by virtue of birth are endowed equally in Rights to their Life, their Liberty, and their Pursuit of Happiness, that they are not inherently endowed with Rights to others' Life, Liberty, and Pursuit of Happiness, and that, alone, a person's achievement in these goals is limited by his own innate abilities and resources, but, in society, the means and actions for one's needs or desires may depend, compete, or conflict with another's. Thus, to secure and resolve these collective Rights, Agreements are instituted amongst People, deriving their just power from the consent and the concession of those agreed. To enforce the common protections of these Agreements, Societies and Governments enact and establish rules and structures to serve all the People. To support the collective Rights, the People assume Duties that place boundaries and require restrictions upon the full freedom in the exercise of their individual Rights for the interest of the common protections of everyone's Rights.

The conflict of Rights and Duties of an individual is an inevitable consequence of the social contract as Duties are extrinsic, mandatory, and subtractive from the inherent Rights we may voluntarily choose to exercise or not. When tradition and governance make apparent and fair the balance of benefits from the assistance and support of others with the losses of opportunity and choice for the individual, the obligation of Duty can be easily justified and borne. But sometimes we must draw our assurance from systematic faith in the justice of these same rules and structure when the diminishments of Duties seem to overweigh the personal benefits derived from others' contribution and support, such as when the fortunate with little challenge to their comfort, health, and pleasure are called upon to assist those with greater challenges or when a Duty seems to fall selectively or more heavily upon only some of the People.

Prudence dictates that Society and Government long established should not be changed for light and transient causes, but that forbearance be coupled with efforts to redress complaints within those systems. The strength of governance draws from its ability to earn compliance with its rules, but such obeisance as is compelled by inflexible force may more likely be confronted by inflexible and destructive resistance. Consent and concession are not granted only once to empower Agreement, but must be an eternal compromise, open for examination, interpretation, and negotiation peacefully to reinforce our bond. People must commit in consensus to community if the value and combined might of their union is to be preserved. Rules and structures may change, but the personal acceptance of both obligation and prerogative as constituents of an individual's role in an interdependent society is essential.

{My gratitude to Thomas Jefferson for providing the start to several of these sentences and thoughts. I accept the blame for how they may have wandered from his message by the time they reached their ends.}