Tuesday
Jul032007
by 
Bishop Hill
Bishop Hill Bill of Rights
Jul 3, 2007 Civil liberties Gordon; about the Bill of Rights you want to introduce. Don't worry yourself about it - I've done it for you.
(Comments on this thread please)
Reader Comments (54)
Perhaps add to 12 Other Rights Not Enumerated or produce a new section
13 Rights and Obligations of Natural and Artificial Persons
Section 1 Natural Persons
Natural persons enjoy all the rights and privileges and are subject to all the obligations expressed or implied in this Bill of Rights or created by valid laws enacted in accordance with this Bill of Rights.
Section 2 Artificial Persons
Artificial Persons enjoy all the rights and privileges and are subject to all the obligations specifically expressed and enumerated as applying to artificial persons created by valid laws and regulations enacted in accordance with this Bill of Rights and Constitution.
I think your Bill of Rights is brilliant. I would employ some caution, however, as to how it would be implemented. The framework from which you are working is a bit different than ours in the United States. In Federalist Paper #84, Alexander Hamilton makes what I consider to be his best argument against "bills of rights" by stating that they contain various exceptions to powers that were never granted in the first place. He also posits that future generations would make the argument that this meant the framers intended some form of implied powers, because why establish exception to powers not granted if this was not true? Hamilton called such an implied expansion in powers the "doctrine of constructive powers." Thomas Jefferson wanted an explicit statement of rights of the citizenry, and had contributed such thinking to the drafting of the Virginia Declaration of Rights only a month prior to the drafting of the Declaration of Independence. There were great benefits to this line of thinking, but as Hamilton pointed out, there are also dangers. Many modern elitist elected officials begin conversations here in the U.S. by pointing out that the subject matter of a particular bill being proposed is not covered by our Bill of Rights, therefore it must be constitiutional. Both Jefferson and Hamilton would argue otherwise. I have often used the argument that the rights of the people are infinite, but the powers of a constitutional government are finite. Divide the infinite rights of the citizen by one million still results in infinity. Multiplying the powers of government by one million is still finite. Neither of these two aforementioned conditions is optimal, but these expand to whatever extent the people will abide. A constitutional government should trust, respect and fear its citizens. When all three of these are simultaneously false, the relationship between citizen and government becomes a downward spiral of divided freedoms and multiplied government powers from which recovery is nearly impossible.
I'd just like to add an ultra-simplified law/ethics system that was in an SF story once:
(1) You mustn't annoy other people.
(2) If you are other people, you mustn't let yourself get too easily annoyed.
OK, this is for individuals, but it's worth a thought.
You don't mean this. You probably mean that no religious practice shall be permitted which contravenes the law. The advocacy of any such practices shall be incitement or conspiracy to break the law.
Do you really want to allow a religion defence for people who are (for instance) forcing marriage, administering corporal punishment in religious schools, committing honour killings.... harassing or shunning members of their community for heresy?
Didn't think so.