[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
[quote]Alpha F wrote:
No. The state does not have a right to restrict gun laws in the name of public safety.[/quote]
Hmmmm. I’m not sure the above statement is consistent with this statement:
As I read your second sentence, the state does have a right to evaluate a citizen (or group of citizens by category) and determine whether that person(s) has a “proven record of responsible and law abiding” behavior, and if they don’t, the state may restrict their right to gun ownership.
The condition to enjoyment of the right is being a “responsible and law abiding” person. So, the right is conditional. If you don’t meet the condition, the state may proscribe that right.
Am I reading you correctly so far? [/quote]
No. The condition is on the state not on the citizen.
My sentence above came after this one:
The state is placed in an appointed position of regulated authority by the good standing citizens that support that system.
The power does not rest with the state, it rests with the sovereignty of the individual.
Replace “responsible and law abiding” person with sovereignty of the person.
Persons that are able to exercise their free will aright naturally behave in a responsible and law abiding manner.
They naturally enjoy an absolute right to direct their own lives as a natural corollary of responsible good choices, not as a condition.
No human agency outside himself can take that away from him - that is the true internal state of freedom.
A criminal breaks the law because he does not honor his internal source of authority and does not honor the external source of authority ( the state ).
A free citizen breaks the law because he honors the internal source of authority ( the sovereignty of the individual ) over the external source of authority.
I believe that your analysis and conclusions make sense only if coming from the perspective that the authority/sovereignty/will of the state retains the right over the sovereignty/authority/will of the individuals.
My perspective is the complete opposite: The sovereignty of the individual retains the right over the sovereignty or authority of the state.
[quote]
If this is so, then the state does have a right to restrict gun laws in the name of public safety - contrary to your first sentence - because the entire point of restricting people who are not “responsible and law abiding” citizens (however defined) is to protect society from these irresponsible citizens and their likely dangerous misuse of guns. That is the entire point - public safety.[/quote]
The state has been given the conditional right to restrict citizens that are a threat to public safety in the name of the absolute right of the sovereignty of the individuals.
Can you see my perspective is the direct opposite of yours?
I have already agreed to disagree, a page back.
You may think that the state has power over me. I say it does not because the freedom to chose to honor their authority or mine is always at the power of my hands - guns or no guns.
Historically and in practice, the state claims more and more “rights/authority in the name of public good”.
can they do it? Yes.
Do they have a right? Only if we willingly individually surrender our right to them.
So, I say no I do not surrender and continue to hold myself accountable.
“The just social order respects the liberty of the individual as it requires him to take responsibility
for himself and to assume risks that inhere in his actions; it does not intrude on his natural freedoms, nor try to protect him from himself, nor compensate him for his own mistakes by giving him something taken from others.”
The Psychological Causes of Political Madness - Lyle H Rossiter, Jr., M.D
