If "Our Creator" endowed us with rights...

Discussion in 'Religion & Philosophy' started by dadoalex, May 10, 2020.

  1. WillReadmore

    WillReadmore Well-Known Member

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    Oops!
     
    Last edited: May 22, 2020
  2. WillReadmore

    WillReadmore Well-Known Member

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    When our federal documents identify the people they use "the people". If they want to identify citizens they use "citizens". And "state" means governmnet. When issues are specified to be issues of the several states, it doesn't mean that each individual gets to choose - it means that the several states each get to choose. So, each statee (except for handfull of oddballs) have their own constitutions that handle those issues deferred by the federal government.

    And, your idea that our founders considered it so important to ensure armed insurrection that they wrote it into the constitution as an absolute right is just weird.
     
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  3. Polydectes

    Polydectes Well-Known Member

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    Who is the government in a republic of the people?
    Except they can't interfere with the federal Constitution.
    That's because you aren't thinking. With an assumed populace there won't ever be a need for insurrection. The power is with the people.
     
  4. WillReadmore

    WillReadmore Well-Known Member

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    Consent of the governed is a reference to democracy.

    What you are talking about is denying democracy.

    The issue today is one of a reduced ability to work together as required by our constitution - NOT a problem of not having enough weapons to shoot elected officials.
     
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  5. Polydectes

    Polydectes Well-Known Member

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    Democracy isn't the consent of the governed is the consent of the majority, or mob rule. We are governed by the Constitution not whatever dictator we elect.

    So no it's not a reference to tyranny.
    democracy is two wolves and a sheep voting on what to have for dinner.

    I much prefer a constitutional republic to a democratic tyranny. Democracy didn't recognize rights of people to marry a different race or someone of the same sex. In fact democracy said no to those rights.
    Right, we have the right to have fire arms so that's not a problem. It's almost like people knew what they were doing when they made it.
     
  6. WillReadmore

    WillReadmore Well-Known Member

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    I agree it's a larger issue, as there are various safeguards, etc. But, that was a post - not a civics lass on democracy.

    We are a democratic nation. The fact that we are divided into states in a republic does't change that. You still get to vote for your representation.


    The people said yes to slaves, no to African Americans being considered full humans, no to women voting, no to African Americans voting, and to all sorts of other stuff that we have today.

    The constitution, the rules of our legislature, our checks and balances, and other factors include specific protections for minority views.

    Using guns is against everything America stands for.

    In fact, we have a word for it - terrorism.
     
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  7. Polydectes

    Polydectes Well-Known Member

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    no we aren't. We are a constitutional republic. We have rights endowed upon us by our creator not by the government not by majority rule.

    The division is you don't get that. The fact that you don't get that means you posed a danger to our liberty.

    that argues my point that were not democratic. Democracy is mob rule.
    Our Constitution or the majority?


    Emotional pleading.
    I carry a gun every day, I have a license to do so. So it's licensed terrorism every day?
     
  8. WillReadmore

    WillReadmore Well-Known Member

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    It is if you're threatening violence in a way intended to affect political decisions.
     
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  9. WillReadmore

    WillReadmore Well-Known Member

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    We are a democracy - selecting leadership and making law based on the votes of the people and their elected representatives.

    We are also constrained by our constitution - which can itself be modified only by the people and their elected representatives.

    The fact that our government is divided into a federal level, to state government (as in a republic) and local governmnet doesn't mean we aren't democratic. Those levels are all democratic.
     
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  10. Polydectes

    Polydectes Well-Known Member

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    It's as if you've lost the point, and now you're just posturing.
     
  11. Polydectes

    Polydectes Well-Known Member

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    No we are not. We're a constitutional republic.

    We don't make law based on mob rule. Think about the last decision that judiciary made they didn't put out and vote they just decided based on the Constitution not the mob.

    We elect our leaders through an electorate Democratic process. That doesn't make us a democracy.

    You are the source of the division you want to shape the country into something that it's not.
    so when the Supreme Court decided that it's unconstitutional to ban same-sex marriage, what elected officials were polled?
    yeah the constitution in the judiciary mean we're not democratic those people are appointed.

    This is why George Orwell considered democracy a meaningless word. You're using it to describe the whole country based on how we pick our leadership.

    we are a constitutional republic no matter how many times you insist that will be the truth.
     
  12. WillReadmore

    WillReadmore Well-Known Member

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    I didn't say we aren't a republic. That's just a way we have of dividing government so there is more local decision making. We still make our decisions through representative democracy.
     
  13. Kokomojojo

    Kokomojojo Well-Known Member

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    Oh?
    So whats the last referendum your representative or senator publicaly circulated for the 'people' you talk about to vote on? You must have one helluva full mail box.

    Democracy ends after election day.
     
  14. Polydectes

    Polydectes Well-Known Member

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    So when the Supreme Court rules on something that's Democratic? Explain.
     
  15. Resistance101

    Resistance101 Banned

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    It did not take a civil war to give black people any Rights. As pointed out, the War of Northern Aggression was used to dismantle the Bill of Rights. The slavery issue was merely a pretext for undermining the presuppositional principle that man is born with unalienable Rights. And, again, if slavery were not a concern you would not have brought it up and after it was addressed, you would drop it. I don't think you will. I think that issue will remain on this board as you think you must have the last say on the word. But, as long as it remains in your posts, I'm going to address it.

    The reality is, over 95 percent of the American people who were alive during slavery did NOT own a slave. And, in all reality, they should be whizzed off because the average slave made more money, dressed in better clothes, and ate better than his blue collar white skin counterparts.

    I notice you used wording from the illegally ratified 14th Amendment. That's shameless. You cite a law that was illegally enacted and whose real purpose was to eliminate unalienable Rights in order to bolster your position.
     
  16. Resistance101

    Resistance101 Banned

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    You have this consistent ability to be wrong. I consulted the COURTS on this issue. NO GOVERNMENT, ESPECIALLY OURS, HAS AUTHORIZED A ROBBER TO COME INTO A RESTAURANT AND TAKE PEOPLES VALUABLES. Come on dude. Have a real conversation.

    The courts rejected your claim that the Constitution "gave" us any Rights. Check out these United States Supreme Court rulings:

    The absolute rights of individuals may be resolved into the right of personal security, the right of personal liberty, and the right to acquire and enjoy property. These rights are declared to be natural, inherent, and unalienable.” Atchison & N. R. Co. v. Baty, 6 Neb. 37, 40, 29 Am. Rep. 356 (1877)

    Men are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights,-'life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness;'and to 'secure,'not grant or create, these rights, governments are instituted.
    BUDD v. PEOPLE OF STATE OF NEW YORK, 143 U.S. 517 (1892)

    ..The right there specified is that of "bearing arms for a lawful purpose." This is not a right granted by the Constitution. Neither is it in any manner dependent upon that instrument for its existence. United States v. Cruikshank 92 US 542 (1875)

    It seems to me that the United States Supreme Court didn't agree with you there. They ruled that the Constitution does not grant nor create Rights; the Rights are not dependent upon the Constitution for their existence; such Rights are absolute (they cannot be limited by the government.) Now, on the issue of having arms in defense of our country, maybe you may want to familiarize yourself with the law.
    10 U.S. Code § 246.Militia: composition and classes
    (a) The militia of the United States consists of all able-bodied males at least 17 years of age and, except as provided in section 313 of title 32, under 45 years of age who are, or who have made a declaration of intention to become, citizens of the United States and of female citizens of the United States who are members of the National Guard.
    (b)The classes of the militia are—
    (1) the organized militia, which consists of the National Guard and the Naval Militia; and
    (2) the unorganized militia, which consists of the members of the militia who are not members of the National Guard or the Naval Militia.

    The people you reference can only protect the government's interests. It is the people (the unorganized militia) who protect you from the tyranny of government. The only thing you got right was that maintaining the Right to insure the security of a free State and individual Rights are not the same thing. Still, the law protects a civilian militia just in case the government gets too big for its britches.


     
    Last edited: May 23, 2020
  17. Resistance101

    Resistance101 Banned

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    I can only extrapolate from your posts what you have written.

    Insofar as my "elaborate rationalizations" regarding "ourselves and our Posterity" you can bet your butt and the family farm, they are not mine. Chief Justice Roger Taney of the United States Supreme Court gave a synopsis of the law, citing over 20 pages of laws in the Dred Scott v. Sanford decision back in 1857 in reaching that conclusion. I've never debated that with anyone who actually READ what Taney wrote. But, I'll leave you a link. You never know when you might run across someone honest enough to actually want the truth:

    https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/60/393

    And here is my response to the alleged right to vote (sic):

    https://democracyjournal.org/magazine/28/the-missing-right-a-constitutional-right-to-vote/

    Just because you think God would have done A or B to convey the concept of Rights, you've provided NO source that says either the Bible, the Declaration of Independence, or the Constitution of the United States require such a standard. You can't even cite a case out of the Anglo Saxon Law upon which our legal system is derived to sustain such a standard.
     
  18. Resistance101

    Resistance101 Banned

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    America is not a democracy. See Article 4 Section 4 of the Constitution of the United States
     
  19. Farnsworth

    Farnsworth Well-Known Member

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    Nothing to it; it was merely a piece of propaganda, which was why its composition was delegated to Jefferson, an inexperienced youngster, with oversight from a much older man. Few of the 'Founders' actually ever practiced what they preached in real life, and just because they did a lot of name dropping of this or that philosopher in the letters and speeches doesn't mean those named had any actual influence on their decisions and practices. Jefferson's real main influence, for instance, was 'Bolingbrokism', not Locke or any other philosopher. This was a man who claimed to deplore slavery and wrote a political treatise on it's dangers, while in real life constantly bragged to his friends what great investments they were, even financed Monticello using them as collateral. Their political rhetoric was no more meaningful and genuine than those of today's pols.
     
    Last edited: May 23, 2020
  20. Kokomojojo

    Kokomojojo Well-Known Member

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    If you havent already, you will soon discover, correcting all their bullshit spin can turn into a full time job, because the next thread they will rewind and repeat despite being proven wrong. Once upon a time that was considered trolling.
     
    Last edited: May 23, 2020
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  21. WillReadmore

    WillReadmore Well-Known Member

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    Suggesting slaves were better off than some is seriously disgusting.

    It demonsrates a total misunderstanding of the line in our declaration of independence that you yourself have posted.

    The fact that acceptance of slavery as a feature of the US was not limited to the south is clear. The progress we've made towad rights even in the face of majority opposition is a testament to the power of our constitution.

    But, I'd point out that the job is not done.
     
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  22. WillReadmore

    WillReadmore Well-Known Member

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    Obviously. Robbery is a crime. Your example attempted to show that a crime is a crime.

    But, what I said wasn't a crime.
     
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  23. WillReadmore

    WillReadmore Well-Known Member

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    Our government is organized as a republic.

    But, the fact that we have states doesn't mean we aren't a democracy.

    The fact that we are a representative democracy (rather than full and direct democrcy) also doesn't mean we aren't a democracy. Representation is the only possible method of implementing democracy in a population of our size.
     
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  24. edna kawabata

    edna kawabata Well-Known Member

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    Is it "extrapolation"or is it making up opinions I don't hold? I'll be the judge.

    The ruling that African Americans could not be considered citizens and that Congress could not prohibit slavery is widely considered to be one of the worst Supreme Court decisions ever made. It helped Lincoln get elected and racists seem to like to cite it. Good thing the 14th Amendment came along.

    Indeed there is no affirmative right to vote in the Constitution but giving the right to vote to women, to former slaves and people of color assumes all others already had the right to vote.

    The founding fathers were influenced by John Locke and ideas of the Enlightenment, classic republicanism which drew its power from the will of the people and constitutions like the Magna Carta and British common law.The closest the Constitution, I think, comes to any religious connotation is St. Augustine's idea of "natural rights" in the form of inalienable rights. Basic rights the government can't take away.
     
    Last edited: May 23, 2020
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  25. Resistance101

    Resistance101 Banned

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    Whether you get disgusted by the facts or not seems like a personal problem. If you want to get into some serious research, I'll be more than happy to give you sources. I'm not "suggesting it;" I'm stating it as a fact.

    Slavery is a part of life. It apparently does not cross any moral lines as every religion you can name has practiced it and we still practice it today. Yeah, it's a bit more subtle. But, it's still slavery and has NOTHING to do with unalienable Rights.
     

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