There are three basic rights:

Life. Liberty. Property.

All other rights that we possess ultimately relate back to one of the three basic rights.

For example, the right to bear arms relates to all three of the basic rights. To protect your life, liberty and property naturally requires that you have the means to do so.

Constitutions and other documents do not GRANT rights. They can only claim to protect them. Governments cannot take away rights. Of course, they can certainly infringe on them by brute force, but regardless, those rights are still ours.

If it requires the compulsion of another, it is not a right, unless it is the self defense of life, liberty and property. If someone is standing on my lawn, I am entitled to use reasonable force to remove them. If I am starving to death on the street, I am not entitled to compel another to feed me, nor to appeal to the government to compel another to feed me.

Will be back with more on this later.

Property is not a basic right. It requires enforcement by outside agencies; tradition, government, corporation -- take your pick. But it requires enforcement by an outside agency.

But, then, I'm a functionalist sort of libertarian -- I recognize personal liberty as the best solution to social woes; individualize and decentralize while maintaining social contact and the end result is the maximum personal liberty for all individuals.

Of course, using language like that gets you mistaken for a progressive far too often -- mainly because they cloak their aggrandizement of regulated authority in terms of civil liberties.

IConrad:

I must disagree most strongly. Property is a basic right, moreover it is a crucial right. Without the absolute right to property, we have nothing. Government would give to each "according to his needs". Production and trade would be impossible in the absence of private property rights. Indeed, the most prosperous nations are those nations that have the strongest protection of private property rights.

Whether the government, a private agency or the individual "enforces" the right, the right is still vested in the owner of the private property. Another agency may be protecting the right, but the right is inherently vested in the private property owner.

In a nutshell, the following statement most concisely reflects the proper status of private property. Courtesy of Mises Institute.

"Property is a naturally arising relationship between human beings and material things. Property and enforceable property rights make possible economic calculation, a wider and more productive division of labor, and therefore increasing levels of prosperity. Indeed, civilization itself is inconceivable in the absence of private property. Any encroachment on property results in loss of freedom and prosperity."

Property is a basic right because all rights stem from the concept of self-ownership. If you own yourself, you are your own property. And everything you accomplish, earn, and buy with your property is your property. Your rights extend only over your property alone. Our government was a social contract designed to secure that property and so that the punishment for violations of property rights did not exceed the crime.

I think that people have the right to pursue property and a right to the property that they have successfully pursued.

To say people have a right to property. Like saying someone has the right healthcare. People may/will start believing that if you have nothing, then you are destitute.

I understand that being in control of your basic property, your body, obviously means you could never be without property. But "progressives" would eventually pervert this, as other things.

HERE IS SOMETHING TO CONSIDER, There has to be a non-vote permanent libertarian stance which should NEVER change, such as keeping taxes low, property rights, our piece of mind, gun rights, Please be advise that if we have the wrong republicans or democrates joining the libertarian party they turn it into another socialist party. Because if we get more of them to outvote some of us who want to keep most of the libertarian stance then we have a problem. I also do not want someone using our libertarian stance who is a total socialist getting nominated, because the other parties falling and then they come to us because of there hungry political power.

MARK B WROTE: Indeed, civilization itself is inconceivable in the absence of private property. Any encroachment on property results in loss of freedom and prosperity."

Then I guess we have no 'civilization' here in America..as surely none of us TRULY own any TRULY "PRIVATE" property (land etc.)..as surely we all merely rent it from "the state"..and have for a loooooooooooong time! (property taxation)

Btw MARK, I tried to answer you in 'our' little money discussion on the other thread but was stifled.. I will try to paste it here..if you don't see it, it was stifled yet again..

MARK B WROTE: "Gold will continue to be extracted, whether for coinage or non coinage is immaterial. So your Mother Earth argument fails."

..Apparently you're very poor at math, etc..I believe if, for example, all those bank deposit number$, little green rectangles, etceterot were to be 'honestly redeemed' in gold today..using the figures I've heard as to gold holdings of 'the treasury' and 'the fed' together..each ounce of gold would command HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS OF 'DOLLARS' (fed tokens)..IT SHOULD BE OBVIOUS THAT THE USE OF 'GOLD AS MONEY' WITHIN AN HONEST, %100 RESERVE SYSTEM TODAY WOULD BE, BY FAR, BY VERY VERY FAR, THE BIGGEST SOURCE OF DEMAND FOR GOLD MOTHER NATURE HAS EVER SEEN..THINK ABOUT IT!!

Do some fairly simple number-crunching..<and btw, tell me what number you used as total federal reserve tokens (probably 'dollars' to you) extant..

Btw, as an a$ide, I have a dear, very knowledgeable friend who makes the claim that, the use of gold and silver 'as money' was supposed to be limited to THE GOVERNMENT/GOVERNMENT OPERATIONS/etc...another way of LIMITING "THE GOVERNMENT"..

..'the people' were to be free to use whatever they wanted/agreed to..

neither democrat nor republican would ratify the first amendment today let alone the entire bill of rights.

"Property is not a basic right. It requires enforcement by outside agencies; tradition, government, corporation -- take your pick. But it requires enforcement by an outside agency."

HUH?!? It requires no such thing. A neanderthal who considers 'his' cave to be 'his' property can defend it with whatever tools come to hand. It doesn't require an outside agency, it doesn't require government at all. It doesn't even require *sentience*.

Even wasps, termites and ants all have property. If you think it can't exist without an external agency to enforce it, try sticking your hand in a fire ant bed and tell me how you can't be bitten because they have no property to defend.

If you think property can't exist without an outside agency, try debating that one with a watchdog. But do yourself a favor, debate it from *beyond* the end of the chain.

There are no rights. There is only that for which one is willing to fight, die, persuade and kill. To the extent that one can agree with others to view certain things as "rights" in exchange for peace, then the parties to that agreement may treat those things as "rights." Individuals who are not parties to that agreement have no standing to claim such "rights." Thus, the explanation for why it would be justified under certain circumstances to use torture against those not parties to the agreement ( i.e. Al Qaeda)to obtain information that would save lives, but not justified to use torture against a soldier of a nation that is a member of the Geneva Convention. This concept is known as the "social contract." In the United States people have the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, unless one commits a murder and receives the death penalty, or commits a crime and is imprisoned, or unless what makes one happy is heroin. There is a right to property, unless eminent domain, which is part of the agreement, applies. Since there is no god, there are obviously no god given rights. Libertarianism, at least in the form espoused in this blog, is suited to domestic politics, but not foreign policy except where international agreements apply.

What about the right of defense? You cannot have a right to life, liberty, and property without the natural right to defend yourself and those other rights. Therefore the right to bear arms, or use jujitsu or a watergun, is a right. It is a right of action against an aggressor, like the ants have a natural right to bite you for infringing upon their property, threatening their lives and liberty. It is the only way to not require an outside agency to be part of your existence. You don't have a natural right to protection from an outside source. A Consitutional right, yes, but as we can all tell, a malicious government acting with disregard to the Constitution can be an aggressor to the natural rights, thus the need to defend oneself.

I appreciated Mark Smith's observations about rights. I have never understood the word "right" -- or, come to think of it, the word "deserve," which is used a whole lot by feel-good types. ("Oh, go on, you *deserve* that hot-fudge sundae!" "You deserve better than that loser!" "I am a worthwhile, caring, deserving human being.") Where do people get their meanings for those terms? To me, like Mark implied, it seems that there must be some entity that defines a right.

The Constitution created those rights for American citizens when it defined our country and the limited role of our government. (Did you ever notice there's no corresponding Bill of Disclaimers, listing ways in which citizens may *not* hold the federal government accountable? Or even a Bill of Wrongs, forbidding citizens from doing ANYthing at all? What do you suppose that says (not that you're the ones who need to hear it) about what the framers had learned of the menace of centralized government? It's not even a contract, where each party agrees to some things in exchange for others; it's just a wall outside which the government is not to step.)

Andrew pointed out that "rights" often get confused with "shoulds" (my wording). We may think it's really important; we may even need a thing or a service to live. But need does not equal right.

I also (warning: radicalism here) have a problem with property rights. It's a planet. It's just a planet, with stuff on it. We're here for a while, and then we go away. While we're here, we settle on a spot, and we use some stuff. Many of us successfully get most people (not governments, alas) to leave us alone and not mess with the stuff we've grown to depend on for well being and for comfort.

I bought an acre that was "stolen," long ago, from Native Americans. I say stolen, because I believe they had the right to the property, because my moral barometer tells me so. What was taken from Africans brought here for slavery is incalculable, and their descendants continue to pay the price. I see tragic injustice there, but only because that's how I *feel*. I can't prove the injustice to anyone, because I don't have the contract signed by the perpetrators showing that they had sworn not to do such things. Apparently, my moral code does not jibe with the codes of the "explorers," and of the first European immigrants.

I don't really get how someone can own a piece of a planet. It's just squatting, and a social contract, bolstered by pieces of paper.

It's critical for our coexistence that we create and recognize the "right" to personal property. Mark B.'s quote from the Mises Institute says it well, though that passage, at least out of context, is teleological. I suppose if all they were trying to do was convince people who don't care about libertarian ideals that we must practice libertarianism anyway, then that was the thing to say.

The rights we have in this country are inalienable because the framers said so. Maybe they thought God said so, but that's not provable, defensible -- nothing. That doesn't cheapen the rights. It just takes them out of the clouds and makes them something we can talk about with acumen and skill. To recognize that rights are borne of social contract, and not of some mystical black box, is to avoid, I think, a great deal of unprofitable contention.

I disagree with Andrew's position that if a right requires someone else to enforce it, then it's not a right. By this standard, children would be lost. So would the elderly and disabled, and, if the standard is applied literally, so would a lot of plain old people who cannot survive without a community. Think about it: Every time I go to sleep, I suddenly lose all my rights?

However, I do agree that it is untenable to assert a right that extorts cooperation from someone else (government doctor, taxpayers), and that that *is* a good ruler for measuring the rightness of a right. But that just comes back to the contract, social or written: If the doctor has freely contracted to treat a certain group, for a certain period of time, etc., then that group has a right to his treatment.

If our government officials swear, in front of TV cameras, to uphold the Constitution in return for the trust we place in them by granting them authority, then they've got a shipload of amends to make.

I'm new to this chain of thought, but have read Ayn Rand and accept her arguments. So I would like your inputs on this question. Do I have a "right" to clean air? Do I have a right to not have my neighbor put particles in to the air, which will cause sickness and death or even just unpleasantness?

And naturally I could also ask about drinking water, do I have a "right" not to have ground water or rain water contaminated? Please help reconcile my libertarian side with my environmental side.

ED WROTE: "And naturally I could also ask about drinking water, do I have a "right" not to have ground water or rain water contaminated? Please help reconcile my libertarian side with my environmental side."

Many 'libertarians' I've met might argue that 'pollution' is/can be merely a form of 'trespass'..although some is inevitable today, isn't it?..(I direct you to your 'garbage can'..)

But I can't help but wonder just how much these stinking, Big Government Republicrats contribute to unnecessary, ridiculous 'pollution'/environmental degradation/etc..

..for example, how many trees must be cut down, etc. ad nauseam, for paper needed to administer just their stinking 'income tax?'

..how many commuters drive 15+ miles one way in order to sit in a fairly $pacious, air conditioned government office and 'work' at a phony 'job' which amounts to LARGELY pushing some phony papers, etc. around all day?..(imo, we and 'the planet' would all be better off if we merely gave 99% of these paper pushers some federal reserve token$ while they sit home, smoke dope and watch cartoons all day!!..if they so choose)

..How much pollution/environmental degradation is caused by the WAAAAAAAAAAAY OVER-REACHING (to say the least) stinking Republicrat military machine?

..I could almost go on forever here..but..

Hello Clark,
You make several good points and I whole heartily agree our government has been the problem many times and not just domestically but look around the world at our foreign policy.

However you did not answer my central question. So let me take a stab at it. Yes we do in fact have the "right" to clean air and water.

Lets have a little thought experiment. Your sitting on your front porch with Glock 19, my favorite handgun, in one hand and a nice Winchester Model 1300stainless steel, again a favorite at your side.
Your neighbor is Union Carbide and on this nice day they are up wind of you. Then your good corporate neighbor releases tons of methyl isocyanate in to their air space which shortly becomes your air space. You know the rest of the story. So what is more important gun rights or clean air rights?

Next what if your sailing on the Cuyahoga River one of the days ignition takes place? Are you more concerned about clean water or liberty?

Just to be absolutely clear I in no way absolve the government for its mistakes but please unrestrained communities of people who form corporations are not much better.

One reason that I'm a libertarian is because of its stand on principals and reason not just whim. But this party seems to fall far short in the environmental arena. Just repeating that the government has done bad things does not answer the basic question. If I do have a right to clean air and water, then how can those be enforced? Obviously relying on corporate good neighbor policy is a laughable approach.

Bottom line, if I have a right to life, then I must have a right to those god given resources of clean air and water. I believe to be a serious party we need to have answers to these most basic issues.

There are conflicting iedations of whether the Right to Possess Property is a natural right.

{'
The federal courts have been particularly bedeviled by "mixed" cases in which both personal and property rights are implicated, and the line between them has been difficult to draw with any consistency or principled objectivity. The case before us presents a good example of the conceptual difficulties created by the test.

Such difficulties indicate that the dichotomy between personal liberties and property rights is a false one. Property does not have rights. People have rights. The right to enjoy property without unlawful deprivation, no less than the right to speak or the right to travel, is in truth a "personal" right, whether the "property" in question be a welfare check, a home, or a savings account. In fact, a fundamental interdependence exists between the personal right to liberty and the personal right in property. Neither could have meaning without the other. That rights in property are basic civil rights has long been recognized. J. Locke, Of Civil Government 82-85 (1924); J. Adams, A Defence of the Constitutions of Government of the United States of America, in F. Coker, Democracy, Liberty, and Property 121-132 (1942); 1 W. Blackstone, Commentaries 138-140.

Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart, Household Finance Corp., 405 U.S. 538, 552 (1972)
"]

Thomas Jefferson seemed to believe otherwise; that a right to own property was an entitled right given by a state:

["
It is agreed by those who have seriously considered the subject, that no individual has, of natural right, a separate property in an acre cf land, for instance. By an universal law, indeed, whatever, whether fixed or movable, belongs to all men equally and in common, is the property for the moment of him who occupies it, but when he relinquishes the occupation, the property goes with it. Stable ownership is the gift of social law, and is given late in the progress of society.

Thomas Jefferson, letter to Isaac McPherson, August 13, 1813, "The Writings of Thomas Jefferson", Definitive Edition, Albert Ellery Bergh, Editor, Vol 13; pp 333,334
"]

The Right to Property is not a 'Natural Right' as can be inferred by Constitutional original intent either. The Constitution implies the Right to Possess Property is not an absolute. There four instances of the word 'property' in the constitution:

*Article. IV.; Section. 3.; Clause 2: irrelevant here, since is about Federal Property, not private: "Territory or other Property belonging to the United States".

*Twice in the due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment "...nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation."

*In The the privileges and immunities clause of the Fourteenth amendment: "No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."

The relevant Constitutional Clauses clearly that there is not absolute right to own property, only a right to be properly compensated for it, whenever the government has taken it for public use, and that when property is taken in civil and/or criminal court room proceedings, the tribunal must adhere to due process of law.

That being said; I am still very uncomfortable with the usage of the terms "First-Tier" and "Secondary-Tier" rights in analysis of the right to own property, because it either irrationally defines it as a 'Natural right', or wrongfully places it in the All Else category. I view the Right to Possess Property as being in a class of corollary rights which flow the the axiomatic 'First-Tier' Rights, or rights which require extra action by the state before they can be abridged(fair market compensation).

ED WROTE: However you did not answer my central question. So let me take a stab at it. Yes we do in fact have the "right" to clean air and water.

Sorry for waffling, ED..I am not sure how you or anyone else but me perceives the term "rights"..but if someone pollutes 'your person/property' etc. and I'm sitting on the jury...they are guilty of the crime of 'trespass' (AT LEAST) in some form..

Your Union Carbide example would make my blood boil..if tarring and feathering were still the norm that would be the least of their worries if I were King!..

I do acknowledge it seems many Republicrats who SADLY call themselves 'Libertarians' seem oblivious to 'pollution'/trespass ..constantly siding with the scumbags..

I hope a_r_k was not in response to my post since I said very little about property and was making the point, at least I thought I was, that clean air and water are an essential element of the "right" to LIFE.

I'm with you Clark, that's why I have my Glock and Winchester handy in that thought experiment:)

But I suppose no one on this fourm one want's to tackle why as libertarians we say nothing about the environment and the relationshhip to the right to life.

I pretty sure a few years ago there was an envirnmental plank in the party platform and it just pointed fingers at the feds while ignoring the other 800lb gorrilla in the room. I see now the platform just ignors this inconvienient natural extension to the right to life.

I was hoping though that someone would argue that we don't have the right to clean air and water and then stand on that priciple and start driniking the water from the Potomac river:)

Ed, I am kind of in the same boat as you, but don't shoot:)

My position, which I think is very libertarian (I'm not an anarchist for reasons such as these), is that a legitimate purpose of government is to enforce the rights of individuals against the infringement upon those rights by others. Since air and water are fluid and NATURALLY used by everyone in the process of living, polluting them is an act of aggression against soverign individuals. Heavy fines and damages should be imposed on the polluters and they should be so cost prohibitive that cleanliness and efficiency is more beneficial to companies that otherwise don't care about harming people or the environment. The penalties must be hefty enough to prevent the harm to others.

I don't buy the argument sometimes given by libertarians that companies will be benevolent because of bad publicity being harmful to business. It hasn't worked so far.

There are plenty of private environmental organizations that can and do monitor polluting companies AND governments. But someone has to enforce the penalties. If it takes a militia led by Ed, so be it.

I have one question for the group. Why do people continuosly go to Exxon and Mobile gas stations? They are consistently 10 cents more per gallon everywhere I go. Considering the price of gas these days, why would anyone pay extra?

I'm glad you stuck to your guns (as it were), Ed, and kept returning to your point. I have the same discomfort.

I don't have a clear sense of how pollution would be handled under a libertarian government. But watching you and the others grapple with this, I find Nick's last post clarifying. It *is* trespass; since we all use the water and the air, and since they are dynamic, it begins to seem pretty simple: No pollution of air or water is legal. From there, it's just a matter of gathering evidence and prosecuting.

Since nothing is perfect, there would still be pollution, but public interest would likely land the worst offenders in court. If it really is as simple as I see it at the moment -- that each of us must clean up after him/herself (corporate entities included) -- then the legalities would be much simpler than they are now, as they snare endlessly around how much is too much, or who is doing so much good that it will be overlooked, or who is too important to the economy to challenge.

Don't do it. Don't steal a little, don't murder a little, don't rape a little, don't pollute a little.

Nick,Clark,Kristen your all invited to go sailing next time you're in Annapolis and no shooting but maybe some shooters. I'm heartened that there are other libertarians out there that sees the need for limited government to enforce our air and water rights. I hope I have time to bring this issue up every time a blog topic offers it's self.