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List:       cypherpunks
Subject:    Rights (was RE: )
From:       Matthew James Gering <mgering () ecosystems ! net>
Date:       1998-08-31 21:42:02
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Albert P. Franco, II wrote:
> I chuckled reading this exchange... In Spain, one of my constitutional
> rights, along with free expression, is the right to work! In Spain you

> ARE entitled to a workplace, a pay-check, etc.
>
> Different points of view!

Work is a verb, an action, not a object. You have the right to work, not
the right to a job. I don't doubt though they proclaim and enforce your
right to a job, the concept of individual rights is still quite alien to
Europe (and becoming forgotten in America).

	Matt


"The most profoundly revolutionary achievement of the United States of
America was the subordination of society to moral law.

The principle of man's individual rights represented the extension of
morality into the social system--as a limitation of on the power of the
state, as man's protection against the brute force of the collective, as
the subordination of might to right. The United States was the first
moral society in history.

All previous systems had regarded man as a sacrificial means to the ends
of others, and society as an end in itself. The United States regarded
man as an end in himself, and society as a means to the peaceful,
orderly, voluntary coexistence of individuals. All previous systems had
held that man's life belongs to society, that society can dispose of him
in any way it pleases, and that any freedom he enjoys is his only by
favor, by the permission of society, which may be revoked at any time.
The United States held that man's life is his by right (which means: by
moral principle and by his nature), that a right is the property of an
individual, that society as such has no rights, and that the only moral
purpose of a government is the protection of individual rights.

A "right" is a moral principle defining and sanctioning a man's freedom
of action in a social context. There is only one fundamental right (all
others are its consequences or corollaries): a man's right to his own
life. Life is a process of self-sustaining and self-generated action;
the right to life means the right to engage in self-sustaining and
self-generated action--which means: the freedom to take all the actions
required by the nature of a rational being for the support, the
furtherance, the fulfillment and the enjoyment of his own life. (Such is
the meaning of the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of
happiness.)

The concept of a "right" pertains only to action--specifically, to
freedom of action. It means freedom from physical compulsion, coercion
or interference by other men.

Thus, for every individual, a right is the moral sanction of a
positive--of his freedom to act on his own judgement, for his own goals,
by his own voluntary, uncoerced choice. As to his neighbors, his rights
impose no obligations on them except of a negative kind: to abstain from
violating his rights.

The right to life is the source of all rights--and the right to property
is their only implementation. Without property rights, no other rights
are possible. Since man has to sustain his life by his own effort, the
man who was no right to the product of his effort has no means to
sustain his life. The man who produces while others dispose of his
product, is a slave.
...

Just as in the material realm the plundering of a country's wealth is
accomplished by inflating the currency--so today one may witness the
process of inflation of being applied to the realm of rights. The
process entails such a growth of newly promulgated "rights" that people
do not notice the fact that the meaning of the concept is being
reversed. Just as bad money drives out good money, so these
"printing-press rights" negate authentic rights.

Consider the curious fact that never has there been such as
proliferation, all over the world, of two contradictory phenomena: of
alleged new "rights" and of slave-labor camps.

The "gimmick" was the switch of the concept of rights from the political
to the economic realm.

The Democratic Party platform of 1960 summarizes the switch boldly and
explicitly. It declares that a Democratic Administration "will reaffirm
the economic bill of rights which Franklin Roosevelt wrote into our
national conscience sixteen years ago."

Bear clearly in mind the meaning of the concept of "rights" when you
read the list which that platform offers:

"1. The right to a useful and remunerative job in the industries or
shops or farms or mines of the nation."

"2. The right to earn enough to provide adequate food and clothing and
recreation."

"3. The right of every farmer to raise and sell his products at a return
which will give him and his family a decent living."

"4. The right of every businessman, large and small, to trade in an
atmosphere of freedom from unfair competition and domination by
monopolies at home and abroad."

"5. The right of every family to a decent home."

"6. The right to adequate medical care and the opportunity to achieve
and enjoy good health."

"7. The right to adequate protection from the economic fears of old age,
sickness, accidents and unemployment."

"8. The right to a good education."

A single question added to each of the above eight clauses would make
the issue clearer: At whose expense?

Jobs, food, clothing, recreation (!), homes, medical care, education,
etc. do not grow in nature. These are man-made values--goods and
services produced by men. Who is to produce them?

If some men are entitled by right to the products of the work of others,
it means that those others are deprived of rights and condemned to slave
labor.

No man can have a right to impose an unchosen obligation, an unrewarded
duty or an involuntary servitude on another man. There can be no such
thing as "the right to enslave."

A right does not include the material implementation of that right by
other men; it includes only the freedom to earn that implementation by
one's own effort.

Observe, in this context, the intellectual precision of the Founding
Fathers: they spoke of the right to the pursuit of happiness--not of the
right to happiness. It means that a man has the right to take the
actions he deems necessary to achieve his happiness; it does not mean
that others must make him happy.

The right to life means that a man has the right to support his life by
his own work (on any economic level, as high as his ability will carry
him); it does not mean that others must provide him with the necessities
of life.

The right to property means that a man has a right to the economic
actions necessary to earn property, to use it and to dispose of it; it
does not mean that others must provide him with property.

The right of free speech means that a man has the right to express his
ideas without danger of suppression, interference or punitive actions by
the government. It does not mean that others must provide him with a
lecture hall, a radio station or a printing press through which to
express his ideas.

Any undertaking that involves more than one man, requires the voluntary
consent of every participant. Every one of them has the right to make
his own decision, but none has the right to force his decision on the
others.

There is no such thing as "a right to a job"--there is only the right of
free trade, that is: a man's right to take a job if another man chooses
to hire him. ... "

   -- Ayn Rand, excerpt from "Appendix: Man's Rights" in _Capitalism:
The Unknown Ideal_

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