More generally problematic, your view would let any state persecute a minority of voters in that state and bind the federal government from guaranteeing equal protection to all Americans. We’ve run this experiment and found a long history of enforcing slavery, segregation, and persecution of gay people. Minority rights need special protections from the local majorities in states, and the 14th amendment is in no small part representing the will of the majority recognizing the rights of minorities are vulnerable here. Restricting a women’s ability to get a medical procedure a heavily gerrymandered state legislature finds distasteful is the latest in the long line of states rights consequences here.
And abortion is not just a medical procedure, there is a third party involved: the baby. Now I find the religious view that a baby exists as soon the sperm touches the egg ridiculous. But I find equally ridiculous the dismissal of a viable baby's life implied by calling it just a "medial procedure".
The reality is that there is likely a broad consensus in the US for legalising abortion up to 12 weeks, the way it is in most of europe.
Yeah, that's true, but there's also been a broad consensus in the US for federally legalizing (or even just decriminalizing) cannabis for well over a decade, and we haven't even managed to get that done due to the minority party overwhelmingly blocking even the most popular legislation if it goes even remotely against their moneyed interests.
Just because there's broad support doesn't mean that it will happen. At this point the Rs are going to have to be thoroughly crushed in congressional elections for a while, like what happened in the 30s through 60s, if any popular legislation is going to be passed.
There is no federally enumerated power to ban substances. That should be a state issue according the the 10th ammendment.
Both abortion and schedule I drug prohibition/anti-prohibition require Constitutional ammendments legally.
""" hold thatRoe andCasey must be overruled. The Con-stitution makes no reference to abortion, and no such rightis implicitly protected by any constitutional provision, in-cluding the one on which the defenders ofRoe andCaseynow chiefly rely—the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. ... is time to heed the Constitution and return the issue ofabortion to the people’s elected representatives. “The per-missibility of abortion, and the limitations, upon it, are tobe resolved like most important questions in our democ-racy: by citizens trying to persuade one another and thenvoting. """ https://www.scribd.com/document/579588941/19-1392-6j37
That it's rooted in the court's idea that there is no inherent constitutional protection against abortion bans, and therefore lower tiers of law (including federal US code) instituting arbitrary bans. Currently it looks like a states' rights issue because the bans are only in state code at the moment. The door is left open for federal code to fully ban abortion however, and Republican leaders have been messaging that this is their next step. https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2022/05/mitch-mcconnell-ackn...
I don’t think they went so far as to definitely say there is no federal right to an abortion under any circumstances. I think they’ve left open the possibility that the due process right to life entails a right to an abortion when necessary to save the life of the mother (and possibly even when necessary to prevent severe long-term harm to her health-such as if continuing with the pregnancy was highly likely to cause her to go blind, for example). I could certainly see a future ruling (even by the current SCOTUS majority) upholding a federal right to an abortion in those very restrictive circumstances. All it might (sadly) take, is for America to have its own Savita Halappanavar
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Savita_Halappanavar
Additionally, regarding left or right federal legislation: this would very likely be struck down by the same court under the reasoning that the constitution does not grant the federal government the power to regulate abortion.
Any federal legislation would have to come in the form of an ammendment.
I think, if Congress enacted a narrow federal right to an abortion – such as the right to an abortion to save the life of the mother – the current SCOTUS majority would be likely to uphold it - the right to life (including that of the mother) is arguably "deeply rooted in the nation's history" – and "life" is even explicitly mentioned in the text – and so such Congressional legislation would arguably be a legitimate exercise of the Section 5 power to enforce Section 1. Plausibly, they might even uphold a statutory federal right to an abortion to save the mother's health, since the right to health has an obvious connection to the right to life.
Where's the common sense stuff? Where's the stuff most people would vote for?
On a closer reread I can’t tel what your actual point was. Though it’s not what I thought.
The point was that since carrying a pregnancy to term has a higher risk profile than having an organ removed, a pregnancy should be voluntary in the same way we wouldn't coerce someone into giving up their kidney for someone else.
That being said, I think it is perhaps noteworthy to say if women lose the bodily autonomy for carrying children, it is outrageous that dead people should retain the bodily autonomy to not be organ donors.
So? You wouldn't mandate mandatory kidney removals if we could mitigate the long term risk of not having one because that risk isn't the reason we don't unilaterally harvest organs from people against their will.
Regardless of where the risk is clustered (at the event or in the long tail following it), it is the harm to an individual via a non-consensually driven medical event.
I think it's fine. The cancer is not able to survive in it's own and has a significant negative impact on the person carrying it. To make medical removal illegal even in cases where continuing to carry the cancer threatens the life of the one carrying it displays reckless disregard for their safety.
Alas, none of that is true, and your remark can only win you a comfortable position in the mental gymnastics Olympics. And a 1st place in the moral bankruptcy competition, for comparing infants to a disease.
Yes.
>So, I should be forced to give blood if someone’s life is at risk and they need my blood (or, kidney)?
If that someone being in risk was the inevitable biological result of your actions, then yes. You should be forced to save him/her. Because you put him/her there.
Should men be required to donate organs to women they got pregnant, if indicated?
This is obviously very silly and not thought out. Banning abortion is just as silly.
Yes, if you can
1- Prove that I infected them
And,
2- Prove that no other solution would save the infected person, and organ donation would
>Should men be required to donate organs to women they got pregnant
Not if the impregnation was consensual. The person infected with Covid or hit by a car didn't consent to those actions, but a pregnant woman consented to impregnation unless she's raped, therefore she should accept responsibility for the associated risks. Rape is one of the very few reasons where abortion should be allowed. But it's something like 0.1% or so of abortion reasons, the vast majority of abortions are morally indefensible.
You know people can be raped right?
[1]: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/aug/19/republican-tod...
until just now, the courts have repeatedly confirmed for several decades that abortion was protected at a federal level through the constitution.
In many cases, like abortion until today, under the Supreme Court’s substantive due process jurisprudence, and in some cases building at least in part on Roe which was just overturned.
Slavery and segregation were a sui generis issue because Black people are not only a minority, they are a discrete and insular minority. That is not true of gender and sexual orientation. Women and gay people are born into all families at predictable percentages. That drives social change as to those groups in a way that does not apply to a racial minority group.
The U.S. has a unique history with respect to slavery and segregation, but it does not with respect to women's rights or gay rights. Nearly every other developed country has left those issues to the democratic process. The European Court of Human Rights came to the exact opposite conclusion as Obergefell a year after that case, finding that the EU Convention on Human Right's marriage article did not apply to same-sex couples. Switzerland did not allow same-sex marriage nationwide until this year, and Italy still does not. Yet the EU continues to stand.
The European Court of Human Rights, and the Council of Europe under which it operates, are actually not EU institutions.
Your thesis seems to be "countries and states can oppress people and society won't totally collapse", which seems like a very weak position to take. I'd hope you don't think "not collapsing" should be our goal. We want life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness for all people, right? Not life, liberty, and happiness for some, and well, at least the government remains standing, for the rest.
Like, in some sense, an oppressive government standing is worse than it failing, right?
In the long run, it jeopardizes the possibility of ordered progress because people perceive it as a serious intrusion into society and culture by elites—which judges are—and will resist and eventually revolt. That’s exactly what you see happening in the US right now.
No, with the January 6 riots? we see a minority no longer interested in the democratic process now that they don’t feel they are winning anymore.
How can you look at this Supreme Court, where multiple appointments were the result of heavy lobbying by large wealthy conservative faith groups to a president who lost the popular vote, and parliamentary tricks to keep the seat open, and see it representing a return to majority rule from rule by elites.
Never mind the fact that not a single abortion will be stopped on account of this. What will change is that there won't be any safe abortions, essentially this will cause the same number of fetuses to be aborted, it will also result in the death or in complications with a fairly large percentage of the mothers. It may (will?) even result in suicides.
This is in my opinion the real tragedy, the 'pro life' (I use their moniker but I disagree with it) groups are essentially 'anti mom'.
That minority is now in jail, and according to the laws in the US, those people have also lost their ability to vote. The people who active participated in the riot is no longer even an minority vote, but outside the voting process altogether.
Time to abolish the states, perhaps, and move to a loose confederation of city-states + regional rump-states that encompass former rural areas, bound together by a Common Economic Protocol. Let the blue areas in Austin, downtown Houston, Miami, Pittsburgh & Philadelphia, etc. be blue, and the red areas surrounding them be red. Conversely, let the red areas in Jefferson (northern California + southern Oregon), eastern Washington, upstate NY, etc. be red, and the dominant metro areas in those states be blue.
It's reasonable to say that the purpose of the judiciary is to protect rights, even when doing so is unpopular. If the judiciary was consistent in how it did that (for example: providing equal deference to the rights created by Roe and Heller) we might see less revolt. The issue is not "elite intrusion" but inconsistency.
Society's "right to decide" does not impugn my right to life and liberty. And the court is deeply inconsistent about whose rights, lives, and liberties it protects.
> Taking away a society’s right to decide the scope of social institutions like marriage
What gives El Paso residents the right to decide what the scope of marriage is in Austin? Indeed, what gives the government the right to regulate the "scope of marriage" at all?
There is no way this can be upheld, right? How on earth can citizens of state 1 go after citizens of state 2 for something that's legal in state 2?
> More generally problematic, your view would let any state persecute a minority of voters in that state and bind the federal government from guaranteeing equal protection to all Americans.
Who decides when the will of a state's majority is "democracy at work" and when it's "persecution of the minority violating equal protection"?
I'd suggest reading about the run up to the civil war. "State's rights" in that context was the slave states demanding that the free states capture and return escaped slaves outside of the slave states. Put simply, they wanted to enforce their fugitive slave laws on states that were completely uninterested in enforcing those laws.
The idea that "state's rights" in US political discourse reflects some principled division, rather than just being another lever people in power used to fight other people in power, is fiction. This has and remains fundamentally about a minority asserting their views over the majority, including outside the borders of their state.
I think you and cm2187 above are making similar arguments, but to my thinking it doesn't really matter: with the time and money it takes to rectify the situation, unconstitutional laws do serious damage regardless. I'm not a lawyer, but oh what I would give for legal review on the constitutionality of laws as a precursor to implementation rather than post-mortem.
As another person suggests below - these states don't care anyway, they are following the same game plan as 1859.
Yes, it’s insane. But I don’t have faith in our courts to not split this hair and allow it for abortion specifically because they are so clearly partisan on social issues here.
Even without the insanity of the Texas law though, it’s still a huge issue for poor women in red states.
> Who decides when the will of a state's majority is "democracy at work" and when it's "persecution of the minority violating equal protection"?
The federal government passes laws, or a constitutional convention passes amendments, and federal courts interpret them. The 14th amendment was interpreted to apply this protection before but now it is not.
I'm pretty sure it will be seen as a violation of the constitution's interstate commerce clause, which gives that authority exclusively to the federal government. However, it is possible that a pro-life administration would institute an order that does make it illegal to cross state lines for an abortion, similar to how sex tourism is illegal.
States have no jurisdiction outside their borders. Just like, say, Wisconsin having a law on the books that makes it illegal to leave the state (while "intending" to continue living in the state) to get married elsewhere, where the marriage wouldn't be legal in Wisconsin (https://docs.legis.wisconsin.gov/document/statutes/765.04) is ridiculous, likewise claiming that you get to apply your law somewhere else that you have no legal jurisdiction is insane.
...not that that stops the US government from doing the same thing if a US citizen travels to another country with a lower age of consent to bang some 16-year-old. It's this magic "intent" which we don't know how they can possibly know - were you over 21 and did you go to France to fuck that 15-year-old you've been playing video games with, or did you just go to France and happen to fall for that 15-year-old that you've been playing video games with hard after they showed you the tourist sights you've always wanted to see, ...then fuck them?
Does it get prosecuted often? No. Is it another bullshit law, waiting to conveniently be used to make you guilty when the powers-that-be need a reason to make you guilty? Yes. Oh-so-yes.
As such, Texas is overstepping its jurisdiction. And sidestepping the law by making it civil cases... Which they can adjudicate.
So, states can get into their mess by staying civil cases, when do we see an escalation?
Just like how the US federal government can go after non-US citizens for something that is legal in their non-US country? Perhaps?
Interstate travel is specifically protected federally and incorporated against the states. Kavanaugh’s concurring opinion specifically says this is an easy question to answer and it would be presumably unconstitutional to prevent people from having abortions in other states. Suggesting otherwise at this point is fear-mongering in very bad faith.
> who decides
More like, what laws decide. If the majority is infringing on protections from federal or state constitutions or federal or state legislation, the majority doesn’t win. Otherwise they do. Majorities can affect the laws given enough time and sustained effort.
Sure, but if they throw someone seeking an abortion in jail or tie them up in the court system, it may be irrelevant whether is is legal because that person still can't travel. That of course assumes they have the money and resources to travel, and that the health care systems in those neighboring states is accessible.
I don't have the stats in front of me, but we already know there is going to be a flood of people from Idaho into WA seeking services and we have very few clinics east of the Cascades as it is.
My understanding is that the number of US citizens who believe that abortion should be illegal in all circumstances is less than 15%.[0] Indeed, looking at this poll more than 75% of the people fell short of believing abortion should be illegal ("legal in only a few circumstances").
With the percentage so low, I find it hard to believe that the people in _any_ US state would like abortion to be banned. Again, it would be interesting if you had any data to back up this statement.
[0]: https://news.gallup.com/poll/393104/pro-choice-identificatio...
I'd understand if "the left" was trying to take away some other person's right, but this is the opposite. They're trying to preserve rights.
A tyranny of the majority in conservative states is now restricting rights, it's going to cause death / suffering.
The thing that makes these discussions so frustrating is that people often seem to be completely deer-in-the-headlights ignorant of the other side's arguments.
The argument of pro-life people is that there are two human beings involved in the abortion: the mother, and the child. Making abortion legal gives the mother the right over her body by removing the right of the child to not have her life taken away. In the eyes of pro-life people, "taking away some other person's right" is exactly what "the left" are doing.
Now you might not agree that there is a child in this case; you might think that children begin existing and having rights once they pass through the birth canal and not before. Or you might think that even if there is a child that has rights, the mother's right to bodily autonomy trumps the child's right to life. But you can't say "I don't understand where they're coming from; 'the left' isn't trying to take away some other person's right" without being profoundly ignorant of the basic views of the people you're arguing against.
I think people want to make it about that, and that's fine. But should we force people to donate their livers, kidneys, bone marrow because someone will die otherwise? Oh, and the person you are donating to has Alzheimer's and you have to take care of them until either one of you die.
Forced birth is kinda/sorta/almost the same thing. The woman is forced to donate aspects of themselves that will affect them forever (more than just 'organs' in some ways), they may not even live through the event, and then take care of it for the rest of each others lives.
Long ago, I dated a woman who had broken her hip in such a way she could not have a child without losing the ability to walk for the rest of her life. She couldn't get her 'tubes tied' because she was too young. Think about that for a minute and the position she was in and now think about a position she might be in if she were in her early twenties today. She wouldn't be able to have a normal life and even back then, she never wanted to be unable to run with her child. IIRC, she's "tied" her tubes and her and her husband have adopted a child. But damn, it isn't always so black and white.
Well, from a moral perspective, it is about that. I'm not sure which of those two positions you take (not a person / mother's rights supersede children's rights), but if you're going to be honest you've got to figure out which it is and why.
And for the vast majority of people who vote pro-life (at least, all the ones that I know), that's what it's about too. And I note that you haven't really challenged the core logic I've put forward there, but rather on some of the sticky implications.
> Oh, and the person you are donating to has Alzheimer's and you have to take care of them until either one of you die. ...The woman is forced to... take care of it for the rest of each others lives.
And, here's again where there's a basic ignorance that a five-minute conversation with someone who's pro-life would clear up. Nobody who's pro-life would say that women should be forced to raise the children; they can be put up for adoption.
> But should we force people to donate their livers, kidneys, bone marrow because someone will die otherwise?
There's a difference between causing someone to die by action, and allowing someone to die by inaction. Pushing someone into a raging river is different than failing to dive in to rescue them.
> Forced birth is kinda/sorta/almost the same thing. The woman is forced to donate aspects of themselves that will affect them forever (more than just 'organs' in some ways), they may not even live through the event...
This is your strongest point. I mean, yeah, birth is crazy. And it would totally suck to go through it if it wasn't something you'd chosen to do. But it's not like the child was able to choose this either. It's a terrible situation for both people.
> Long ago, I dated a woman who had broken her hip in such a way she could not have a child without losing the ability to walk for the rest of her life.
So first of all, this sort of situation is quite uncommon; and while there are zealots who would take a hard line, lots of people would be willing to compromise in this sort of a case. Secondly, there are lots of people worldwide who are OK with abortion in the first trimester, but not the second and third. I think there are reasonable justifications for this.
But thinking about it from a moral perspective, let's try this scenario.
You're taking a tour of some tall factory with a bunch of people you don't know. While you're on a catwalk 4 stories up, something catastrophic happens, and at the end of it you're holding for dear life to a railing, and a stranger is dangling over the factory floor, holding for dear life to your legs.
You're not afraid of falling yourself; your arms are wrapped firmly around the railing, which you're pretty sure isn't going anywhere. But you have some sort of a degenerative joint disorder in your hips. You can already feel the tendons stretching from the stranger dangling below you; you're pretty sure that by the time help arrives to pull him up that enough damage will be done that you'll never walk again. You're also pretty sure that if you kick him hard enough right now, he'll let go and fall to his death, leaving your legs intact.
Is it moral for you to kill the stranger to save your legs? Should it be legal to kill the stranger to save your legs?
> Is it moral for you to kill the stranger to save your legs?
Is it moral? I think you might be mixing morality with ethics. Whether it is moral or not is highly dependent upon my culture and upbringing, whether it is ethical or not ... see the speeding trolley problem, because it is remarkably similar, where instead of "saving a bunch of people" I'm saving my future.
> Should it be legal to kill the stranger to save your legs?
How would a police officer know the difference between slipping and me kicking? I'd have to admit that it ever happened. Even if there are witnesses, it would be unreliable accounts. This gets into how Roe vs. Wade came about in the first place. I have some right to some privacy: the ability to keep my mouth shut, for one. You can say it is illegal all you want, but you also have to enforce it. Are police officers going to come give my wife random pregnancy tests to see if she stops being pregnant? How will they know the difference between a miscarriage and an abortion?
> I mean, yeah, birth is crazy. And it would totally suck to go through it if it wasn't something you'd chosen to do.
I venture you don't have at least one child? There is no way to explain having a child, and raising a child to someone who hasn't done so. There is life before ... and then there is life after. It is hard. I've been to boot camp, I've been to war, I've saved lives and ended them. And you know what ... having a child was initially, the hardest thing I've ever done in my life. It is quite sudden, even though you have some 7-8 months to prepare. I wouldn't wish those first few months on my worst enemy. If I were a single mom/dad, it would have devastated my career, especially because as a father, I had TWO DAYS of vacation after the birth. Hell, it did negatively affect my performance for years.
It was worth every second because I loved my child, especially because my first one died during childbirth. But if I resented my child, I can't imagine the psychological torture that child would have to live through.
> Nobody who's pro-life would say that women should be forced to raise the children; they can be put up for adoption.
And who the fuck is going to adopt them? The foster care system is already overrun and under-funded. So, good luck with that...
On the contrary, I do have a child, which I adopted. I know a little bit about the birth mother's situation; I'm pretty sure a lot of people would have recommended to her to have had an abortion. I'm very thankful that she didn't -- she chose to take a risk, and there's a beautiful precious life as a result.
I don't know the situation in the US at the moment, but I can tell you that in my country, there is absolutely no problem finding adoptive parents for healthy newborns. Obviously if there's significant risk of damage due to alcohol or drugs, or significant health issues or genetic abnormalities, it's more difficult; but the last time I looked into it, those cases represented a very small fraction of the total number of abortions done in the US.
Regarding raising children: apparently all 50 states in the US have "Safe-haven" laws [1], which allow parents to drop off infants at designated locations. There is absolutely no reason for anyone in the US to feel trapped into raising children.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Safe-haven_law
None of that change the fact that pregnancy itself can be terrifying and even dangerous, of course.
> The foster care system is already overrun and under-funded.
Let's expand this argument a bit: "The foster care system is overrun and under-funded; we can help reduce pressure on the system by killing children who might go into it." I mean, if you're OK with killing children to reduce pressure on the foster care system, wouldn't it make more sense to kill the older children? Say, those who haven't been adopted by the age of 5?
If you're shocked / disgusted / horrified at the idea of killing innocent 5-year-olds, then you know how genuine pro-life people feel about the argument that we should use abortions to reduce pressure on the care system. You should 1) reflect on what moral justification you have for not feeling the same way; 2) have more respect for people who do feel that way.
So they only kinda sorta care about the child in the womb but not about the mother or the child when they are born.
If folks are going to ban abortions they should at least expand child and mother care, in my opinion.
On the other hand, pre-Roe, the maximum tax rate was 70%, with 25 different tax brackets. I'm guessing that folks that support today's decision are probably okay with the tax increases and big government that will follow.
Put another way, the case several days ago that allows child school credit to be used for Catholic school ALSO allows the same credit to be used for the Church of Satan School of the Gifted. The unintended consequences of all the rulings during the past week are going to be an interesting things to observe.
Suppose for the sake of argument that you're a person who thinks health services for children and paid family leave are important; but you also think that abortion is the moral equivalent of murder. You can vote for:
* Team Blue, who will increase children's health services and advocate for paid family leave, but slaughter millions of innocent children [Remember, I'm not claiming this is true, I'm trying to put you in the mind of a hypothetical person who believes this way]
* Team Red, who will decrease children's health services and family leave, but restrict the slaughter of innocent children.
I mean, if that's what you actually believe, then it really has to be Team Red, doesn't it?
I don't pretend to know what politicians think; it seems pretty likely that a lot of them are cynically using abortion as a ploy to get people to vote for policies that favor their rich donors. But I can tell you that an awful lot of people who actually vote are genuine in their opposition to it. If you want people to vote differently, you have to understand where the voters are coming from, not where their politicians are coming from.
Personally, I believe anti-abortion is a double edged sword that I don’t know how to traverse. I respect everyone’s right to choose but I also understand how politicizing the issue is favorable for politicians as they can yank at the heart strings and at the same time effect specific class of citizens more than others. And that last part bothers me.
It’s not so much the belief but the use of that as a belief to disenfranchise communities who are most vulnerable. I don’t know how to reconcile that fact, internally.
Team Red is only opposed to abortions for other people.
"The Only Moral Abortion is My Abortion": https://joycearthur.com/abortion/the-only-moral-abortion-is-...
However, the Red politicians are tugging at those heart strings for the votes but have interest of expanding child or maternal care.
The problem aren't the people, it's the POS politicians, in my opinion. Since 2008 or so, politicians have been driving a divide between the voters of the different teams, getting re-elected by showcasing their wedge, and constantly screwing the people on both teams. I believe empathy for voters is the path forward.
I still think about Ted Cruz waving good bye at the dude who was pissed that kids got killed and he's dining at a restaurant. That's the issue. That dude is probably Team Red, probably doesn't agree with me, but fuck me if I don't support him going after a POS politician for not doing their job.
Empathy for voters; Re-examination of our politicians. It's not Team Red or Team Blue. It's the politicians of both sides that failed everyone.
...and states run by Team Blue tend to have fewer abortions, in part because of easier availability of contraception, but also in part because people are less desperate and feel more able to cope with unplanned pregnancies. (And the country as a whole has fewer abortions after seasons where Team Blue is in control than Team Red.) Many pro-life people who saw what a danger Trump was made exactly this case to their peers, both in 2016 and 2020.
Additionally, most Team Red people I talk to actually do believe in a social safety net; they just want to make sure it's not wasted on "lazy people". They don't have an accurate picture of exactly what it is that Team Blue and Team Red are both doing with the social safety net. (They don't even tend to have an accurate picture of what Team Blue and Team Red are doing in terms of abortion.)
Rather than slagging these people as regressive hateful backwards bigoted hypocrites, it's better to engage with them: Take their preferences into account, make sure they're informed of the actual situation on the ground. (Again, I'm talking about the individual voters, not politicians, who may well be hateful backwards bigoted hypocrites.)
Or they’re more capitalist in their thinking and expect people to take care of themselves as opposed to leaving it up to the government.
Who is right and who is wrong comes down to opinion. But I don’t believe it’s as simple as “the other side doesn’t care as much as we do”
My proposal is as follows: Take the GDP, per capita, per state and compare expansion/contraction of before Roe and after Roe. We can measure % change in the 10 years pre Roe to 10 years post Roe. The hypothesis is that states never cared about children and as such, post Roe, GDP expansion in states that had abortion abolished experienced a much higher GDP, per capita growth than before.
Information can be sourced from St. Luis FED.
If you have another idea, please let me know. I'm personally curious about this and would like to explore so feel free to pick apart my post as it will just render a more thought out experiment.
Thanks.
edit: If someone is a data scientist that can comment on what is the correct methodology to take or what pitfalls to consider, I would highly appreciate it.
Do they count in the census? Can I say they're a dependent?
Heck, why don't we make periods and ejaculation illegal. After all, those eggs and sperm are viable! Men shouldn't be allowed to pull out, wear condoms, or masturbate. Won't someone think of the children?! Oh, I almost forgot to ban sodomy too! Good heavens!
And what about contraception? That's coming next. What is your argument then?
The thing is, we have evidence based ways to reduce the need for unnecessary abortions, but the "right" isn't concerned about that. We know, for a fact, that access to contraception and sex education dramatically reduce abortion levels.
We know for a fact that making it illegal does not, it merely causes dangerous abortions to increase.
How do you square that? The "facts don't care about your feelings" crowd somehow can't grasp, or refuse to grasp, the consequences of their actions.
I'm also interested in how you feel about the rights of rape victims. Perhaps you'd like to carry the baby for them?
> For that reason, in future fases, we should reconsider all of this Court's substantive due process precedents, including Griswold[1], Lawrence[2], and Obergefell[3].
The decision advocates for re-ruling on each of these cases. If these should be decided against their current status, expect states to outlaw contraception, gay relations, and same-sex marriage.
1. Ruled that contraception bans are unconstitutional https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/griswold_v_connecticut_%2819...
2. Ruled that sodomy bans are unconstitutional https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/lawrence_v._texas
3. Ruled that same-sex marriage bans are unconstitutional https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/14-556
In other words, Thomas has always been crazy about this sort of thing but no one else on the court agrees.
Hence why nobody else signed on to this concurrence.
What needs to be fixed is the cap on the House. Remove that and the larger states get more power in the House. For example the Democrats could get a majority to push legislation to protect abortion at the national level.
People need to fix the issues in the system rather than relying on the courts to legislate for Congress.
Did the slave States like this compromise, yes. Is that the only reason for it? No.
"To the framers themselves, Madison explained that the Senate would be a "necessary fence" against the "fickleness and passion" that tended to influence the attitudes of the general public and members of the House of Representatives." - https://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/minute/Senate_C...
Texas, like most "conservative" states is gerrymandered to all hell. So it's very very simple how conservative minorities are enforcing their social views on the majority.
It only takes the support of 5.1% of US voters to filibuster a bill, 8.1% to appoint/block a supreme court nominee and 12% to defeat a filibuster:
https://www.reddit.com/r/politics/comments/2jnmbe/i_did_the_...
It's even more than that. In the council (where the governments of the member countries are present) you need majority based on number of citizens in the countries and also votes from a number of countries, so that few big countries can't overrule the small ones, but you always need support from small and big countries.
What nonsense. This is not about state's rights.
Just yesterday the Court decided that no, California doesn't have the right to restrict guns. That's the inhabitants of Utah imposing their social view on the acceptability of guns on the residents of California.
It's about states rights when it comes to things you don't support, like abortion, and it's about the constitution and the rights it gives everyone, when it comes to things that you support, like the right for every nutjob to kill children with AR-15s.
There is no logical reasoning behind these decisions aside from a vindictive, right-wing court, imposing its social will onto the entire country.
But ignores Heller 2008 and McDonald 2010 which both, for a long time, have ruled that this word argument is complete nonsense. That regardless of what you want to believe, 2A is an individual right.
Heller v DC - It's an individual right to own a firearm. You can't ban handguns or anything else just because you say so.
McDonald v Chicago - You can't just not issue permits to carry. 2A includes the right to carry outside the home.
NYPRA v Bruen - You can't say you MIGHT issue a permit, you will if they meet the legal requirements established by your state.
Please stop with the intellectually void argument that 2A is how you see it because you think the first few words invalidate "the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed".
It's weak, and more importantly, it's over. It has been nail in the coffin settled for 12 years now.
The court's analysis that 'keep and bear arms' implies an individual right to carry a handgun (or a weapon 'in common use') for self defense purposes is exactly the kind of drawing of 'legislative-style' boundaries that the court railed against in today's ruling overturning Roe and Casey.
Can you point to a scotus case that has clarified or determined the text of the abortion amendment?
Basically, if the court had been told (i.e. someone had actually been present to argue, which your attorney won't do if you disappear and stuff) that an NFA weapon was of the kind used by the militia/military it should've come out differently. The court said:
"The Court cannot take judicial notice that a shotgun having a barrel less than 18 inches long has today any reasonable relation to the preservation or efficiency of a well regulated militia, and therefore cannot say that the Second Amendment guarantees to the citizen the right to keep and bear such a weapon."
Judicial notice is messy but given it was a criminal case, with a right to argue about everything that might be used to convict, a competent lawyer - hell, even an incompetent lawyer - should have challenged everything, and by that time "trench guns" from WW1 would have certainly, easily been identifiable as the kind of weapon suitable for militia use.
So whatever it is you are talking about does not apply like it does to CA, NY, NJ, HI, MD, and others being MAY ISSUE states.
In TN now, you need no permission to concealed carry, so unless prohibited by other laws or statutes anyone is free to do so, regardless of religion or what the local police think your rights should be.
IIRC, you need private gun ownership to have a militia (as the founders understood them). I believe the idea was regular citizens would organize when needed and bring their own guns.
Lots of ways to wring hands about a very badly written amendment.
>The Second Amendment is naturally divided into two parts: its prefatory clause (A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State) and its operative clause (the right of the people to keep and bear Arms shall not be infringed).
Here's the first Google result for your entertainment:
You Can Purchase a Fully Functional Army Tank Online Because This Is America
https://www.complex.com/pop-culture/2015/09/armslist-sells-f...
I'm aware and my point was explicitly about being able to drive them around wherever I like, under the guise of it being the rough equivalent of concealed carry for an MLRS.
You can't; there's restrictions. At the minimum, it's likely that people would argue they're heavy and would harm infrastructure (or outright destroy it in the case of some tanks).
Separately, explosives are also tightly controlled, but are still a key part of armaments.
The government owns the roads, ergo can sidestep a lot of the what might otherwise be mandated under strict scrutiny for their usage with rational basis tests. E.g., "the roads are rated for <x> class of vehicles, and a tank is <y> class."
But you're wrong, while I couldn't drive my tank around, I could certainly load it onto a tractor trailor and show it off around town. I would argue that's functionally the same thing.
A multi rocket system, is not a gun. It's ordnance. So this argument is weak and I don't need to extend into that except for.... ALSO LEGAL. Again, you are going to need to follow the rules of the NFA, and ATF's explosives requirements. The larger issue will be to get Lockhead Martin to sell you one! Which they will not. But you come up with the cash for 1000 of them, and I bet they do.
Explosives are regulated because they have no defensive purpose. I mean, they do, but it's tough to use them defensively and accurately. If you cite Heller vs DC, they are dangerous AND unusual, key point to use "AND" there.
Arms do actually mean arms. Arms meant cannons too. But bombs were never really arms.
The line in this case is drawn rather inconsistently by the federal government agencies, and more fairly but even increasingly restrictive by congress.
Any other questions?
Legally, how is:
> You can purchase a tank but not operate it anywhere off your own property.
functionally different than:
> You can purchase a handgun but may not carry it concealed on your person off your own property.
Emphasis on Legally. In both cases these are allowed weapons for people to own, which, while not exact parallels (Tanks can cause infrastructure damage and such) at their core seem very similar from a legal perspective, especially because of the NFA requirement for tanks. That latter is important to consider because the NFA largely deals with guns of varying sorts in its rules.
Also context: I'm an ignorant Canuck who occasionally lives stateside.
There is no NFA requirement for the tank itself. Only for the cannon, and the ammunition if it has an explosive payload. The tank is just a vehicle. If you can make it street legal, you are free to drive it anywhere you like.
The more interesting thing you bring up inadvertently is "on your own property". If that's the case, I should be able to own all the machine guns I like without NFA stamps on my own property right?
The NFA is an unconstitutional law that sought to put a tax on rights. Then extra double unconstitutional when in 1986 they said "Oh, we longer accept the tax for certain still legal things". We specifically deny behavior that elsewhere, like voting. All handguns were supposed to be included, and all rifles with barrels shorter than 18". 18" stuck for shotguns, but rifles were moved to 16" for silly reason I can't recall exactly. Pistols got dropped because even in 1934 the public reaction wasn't going to fly.
It doesn't matter though. The point of all of this is 2A is an individual right, enumerated, and verified with previous and recent court decisions. Abortion is not, so people using the BUT STATES RIGHTS comments about the NYRPA decision vs Roe overturn are being completely ignorant of the realities here.
It's very silly to compare them.
Since you seem to know a lot about "arms," is a sword an "arm?"
> functionally different than:
I believe you can take your tank off your property, assuming you went to the DMV and got license plates and a VIN number for it.
Knives and swords are arms, yes. This was most recently seen in states that tried to ban switchblades outright. Switchblades are pretty poor fighting knives, but have the same public reaction fueled by media as pitbulls.
I talked with a lobbyist responsible for the switchblade deregulation in my state. After her research it came to "What makes a weapon will always be up to the judge, but the easy test is can you swing it?". Which is fair I think. That said... I also trained with my state's swat unit for a class and they talked about their justification for getting their gun out according to dept policy being "Any time a weapon is involved", which can mean gun, knife, sword, folding chair, sharp pencil or really big box of hot dogs depending on intent.
You're right about the tank. So long as you have the right markers, mirrors, vision, licensing, etc. You're good to go. Although you won't enjoy it as a daily driver after the initial buzz wears off.
Unclear on explosives.
As far as "arms," the line is drawn at being able to be operated by a single person. So it would appear unconstitutional to prohibit keeping and bearing cannons and tactical nukes, though Congress can prohibit sale and interstate transfer.
"As the quotations earlier in this opinion demonstrate, the inherent right of self-defense has been central to the Second Amendment right. The handgun ban amounts to a prohibition of an entire class of “arms” that is overwhelmingly chosen by American society for that lawful purpose.
The prohibition extends, moreover, to the home, where the need for defense of self, family, and property is most acute. Under any of the standards of scrutiny that we have applied to enumerated constitutional rights, banning from the home “the most preferred firearm in the nation to ‘keep’ and use for protection of one’s home and family,”, would fail constitutional muster."
If people had commonly used cannons to protect their homes, maybe tanks would be protected under the 2nd Amendment by their logic.
Edit: to pull context from another comment here.
"The 'militia' was the entire adult male citizenry, who were not simply allowed to keep their own arms, but affirmatively required to do so.… With slight variations, the different colonies imposed a duty to keep arms and to muster occasionally for drill upon virtually every able-bodied white man between the age of majority and a designated cut-off age. Moreover, the duty to keep arms applied to every household, not just to those containing persons subject to militia service. Thus the over-aged and seamen, who were exempt from militia service, were required to keep arms for law enforcement and for the defense of their homes."
This issue is that the States became lazy once the Feds got their standing military. All States should require citizens to muster for arms and disaster training at least twice a year.
You can argue that the previous decision was wrong all you want (I personally think it was), but you can't allow the states to just ignore the supreme court and do whatever they want or all constitutional protections are meaningless.
I mean it obviously can, as the law at issue in Dobbs did that, and it was allowed.
It's effectively saying 'the existence of state laws that attempt to restrict a right, even ones which have been rule unconstitutional, is itself evidence that it's okay for states to impose restrictions on constitutional rights.'
Which seems like a very odd argument to make the day after striking down a 100 year old NY State law restricting gun carry rights on the basis that there's no evidence of a long tradition of such restrictions being passed by states.
tl;dr we have a really dogshit system that essentially puts 9 people in charge of everything
It's not a stretch. They are literally "on a whim law makers." They decide what issues they want to take up and change the way they interpret the constitution depending on how they want to rule on an issue. In theory, they could be held in check by congress, but in practice that is impossible. Especially since the justice's are political weapons of congress. There's a reason the supreme court nominations have been huge campaign points for the last few elections. They have basically unchecked power.
> The constitution still somehow works in the U.S, and supreme judges doing a great job at keeping it honored.
We'll just have to agree to disagree. They choose how they want to interpret it depending on how they want to rule. There's no consistency and it's frankly a disgrace. Has been for a while too, this isn't something new to this current court.
If the supreme court cannot respect precedent or at least provide a very good reason why precedent should be overruled, then what we have is a country ruled by a set of god kings with zero accountability. When faith in the system crumbles as a result of extreme partisan decision making, what you get is balkanization.
Pages 47 through 74 of the court's decision, https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/21pdf/19-1392_6j37.pdf, provide their reasons for why precedent should be overruled.
Yet what we recently learned is what the supreme court decides is of little consequence. It's just the temporary whim of whatever political party happens to be in power. In 10, 20 or whatever years it takes to get a liberal court back, then roe v wade comes back and the court reinterprets a "well regulated militia" to mean, ah, a "well regulated militia".
First of all, what do you think a militia even is? It is a group of CITIZENS that form an ad-hoc fighting force.
Secondly, the amendment says "the right of the PEOPLE to keep and bear arms".
It doesn't say "the right of the military". It doesn't say "the right of the militia". And it doesn't say "the right of peace officers."
When the Declaration of Independence was drafted, "We the People" did not mean "military".
Thirdly, the Bill of Rights explicitly grants rights to people, NOT the government and NOT the military. Yet somehow, conveniently, that is different for the 2A?
You might not like the 2A, but the meaning is clear and supported by history. This "well-regulated militia" nonsense is the climate-change-denial of the 2A.
I'm always surprised by how few people realize that the SCOTUS doesn't make laws for states. I'm also surprised at how deeply convinced the notion of "the federal government and SCOTUS supersede state laws" is ingrained into our culture.
The SCOTUS only provides opinions and jurisprudence on matters. They don't "make laws" and can't command anything with any sort of enforceable power. Abortion could have been abolished yesterday, last month or even last decade if any state wanted it to.
Any state level Supreme Court can run contrary to the judgements of the SCOTUS without having to fear enforceable retribution. We've seen this recently with the case of interstate "travel bans" during COVID, "Sanctuary Cities" during Trump's first couple months of presidency and the spotty legalization of marijuana in certain states.
"The 'militia' was the entire adult male citizenry, who were not simply allowed to keep their own arms, but affirmatively required to do so.… With slight variations, the different colonies imposed a duty to keep arms and to muster occasionally for drill upon virtually every able-bodied white man between the age of majority and a designated cut-off age. Moreover, the duty to keep arms applied to every household, not just to those containing persons subject to militia service. Thus the over-aged and seamen, who were exempt from militia service, were required to keep arms for law enforcement and for the defense of their homes."
This issue is that the States became lazy once the Feds got their standing military. All States should require citizens to muster for arms and disaster training at least twice a year.
Or how about, since we banded together in order to create a more perfect union, and so that I, as a citizen, can focus my time on pursuing happiness, rather than mustering every six months, we agree, through our democratically elected representatives, to just pay some money into a kitty and out of that fund a professional police force, fire department, and a state national guard. That way we get sufficient people trained in the use of arms to secure our liberty, and we don't have to act like we're a bunch of 18th century farmers any more.
Also, we've seen all the institutions you mention collapse in the face of disaster. It would be far better for the citizens to be responsible for themselves in a collation with larger bodies than be dependent upon those larger organizations. For example, in Florida it makes sense to have the community trained on preparation and local response. People need to know what to materials to gather and what is already stockpiled locally. In the face of a hurricane, the community guard, i.e. the people, would be responsible for triaging the situation until reinforcements arrive. As it stands, the people huddle together en-mass hoping that the Federal government, or even the State will come to their rescue.
In a plain reading, it makes sense in context for this to mean "well trained". It would be rather odd for it to both say, in a supporting clause, that it's subject to arbitrary Government control, and also in the main clause that the right "shall not be infringed".
Who has the right to food? A well balanced breakfast or the people?
To what end?
That's not a rhetorical question. How far do you want to go? P90s? RPGs? Stinger missiles?
What would the societal benefit be there?
To get some long lost rights back.
>How far do you want to go? P90s? RPGs? Stinger missiles?
Silencers/supressors are currently banned in the US (requires a tax stamp and long waiting period) but legal in other highly restrictive countries like England/UK. They're basically mufflers for guns and not like in the movies. Short barreled rifles would be nice too; we have those now but it's a "technicality," where anyone who owns them for recreational shooting can, on a whim of a bureaucrat, become a felon sentenced to decades of prison. That's not how a free society based on laws should work. Pot falls under the same category. It's still not legal at the federal level and if the DEA decides it wants to start raiding people's homes looking for pot, it certainly can, and people can be prosecuted for it.
>What would the societal benefit be there?
We're a society of individuals, not a society of Borg. Freedoms of the individual are the greatest benefit a society can have.
Which specific rights? Don't wax on the pseudo-libertarian bullshit, as you're communicating with an actual libertarian.
Please, do tell.
Reread what I wrote, I put them in there.
>pseudo-libertarian bullshit
Dunno where this came from, maybe time to tone it down a notch. You sound a little emotional.
Not emotional. I just don't suffer fools gladly. That'd be you, in case that escapes you.
Toodles!
It's pretty obvious you are trying to sound intelligent by claiming to be an "actual libertarian," (is there a certification for that by chance? Social or economic?) and using a cliché, but the content of your dialog is pretty thin.
Here's the summary: you asked a question, I answered, you went into a mindless rant and starting name calling. I'll bet you even started to type "LINO" then thought better of it. I don't even know what your position is, your dialog was so thin. Maybe take a deep breath and take time to collect your thoughts. Who's the one suffering fools again?
I'll give you the last word, make it count.
Those aren't rights.
Those are (whether you agree with them or not) laws.
Those are different things.
What you advocate is license (definition 3)[0], not liberty.
Those are wildly different concepts.
>We're a society of individuals, not a society of Borg. Freedoms of the individual are the greatest benefit a society can have.
That we are, but we still all need to live together. Unless, of course you want to move to the middle of the desert or atop a mountain, the rights of others must also be respected.
I'd point out that you never did answer my question: "To what end?"
I'll clarify, since a good faith reading of your response would make me think you didn't understand the question rather than ignoring it in favor of your trained-in prejudices.
What would be served (other than you being able to kill people with impunity) by removing restrictions on, say P90s or RPGs?
If your intent is to have the means (and the desire?) to kill lots of people, then I get your point.
But if you wish to live in a free, peaceful society based on the rule of law (rather than the rule of the gun), I don't see your point at all.
As a (small 'l') libertarian, I note that I can only exercise my liberties freely in a society governed by the rule of law.
Having folks around with the means and will to kill anyone they feel like in large numbers isn't a libertarian principle.
Rather, it's a delusional state fed by this idea that your whole life is only the result of your actions, when 200,000+ years of human existence shows us that liberty comes from collective action to protect those liberties.
Having a bazooka doesn't make you more free. Nor is it a "right" per se.
What gives us liberty is the actual work required to maintain a free society.
"I've got guns, so back off asshole!" isn't a libertarian idea. Rather, it's a backward, "might makes right" authoritarian idea.
If you want to be completely isolated from other humans, go ahead and do whatever you want. But if you're going to live in a society, you need to work with your fellow members of that society to maximize individual rights and liberty.
What you propose does none of those things and are more appropriate to a street gang or mafia. Or is that your desire?
The constitution is short and vague on many things. People read between the lines. That's just as true of abortion as it if of gun rights.
If you read the constitutions as written, there is no right for individuals to have guns. It's very clear, this is for organized militias. If you read the constitution as written most of what the federal government does today isn't allowed, it's all mostly approved by an incredibly wide reading of the commerce clause.
The Court is picking and choosing rights. They force Maine to give priority to their religion, they force California/NY/MA to give priority to their gun rights, they force everyone to abandon reproductive rights. That's a choice in how to interpret a very vague document.
>The Second Amendment is naturally divided into two parts: its prefatory clause (A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State) and its operative clause (the right of the people to keep and bear Arms shall not be infringed).
"Many historians agree that the primary reason for passing the Second Amendment was to prevent the need for the United States to have a professional standing army. At the time it was passed, it seems it was not intended to grant a right for private individuals to keep weapons for self-defense."
So no. Your quote is not what the 2nd amendment means at all! It is a modern twist reinterpreting it.
They force Maine to not discriminate against religious schools. Maine can choose to not pay private schools at all or Maine can choose to pay all private schools.
Maine is not allowed to say that the local Catholic school is bad but a non religious local school is good. That is, in effect government choosing that religion is bad.
> they force California/NY/MA to give priority to their gun rights They force CA/NY/MA to follow the guidelines the court has set around the 2nd amendment. Notably in this case, you can not require someone to prove they have a need to exercise a right.
The NY law stated that you had to prove you needed a gun in order to get a license. That is opposite of how a right works. Let's re-frame this as a 1st amendment issue.
There is a large amount of misinformation in the world, this is causing civil unrest and issues(i.e. vaccine, elections). When the constitution was written, the founders could not conceive the internet, radio and TV or even large scale printing presses. Therefor, in order for you to publish a book or post a comment on a site that has to possibility of receiving over 200 views, you need to submit an application to your city hall in order to do so.
We would call any such law absurd on it's face.
>they force everyone to abandon reproductive rights. They are doing the opposite of forcing. They are saying that each state has the ability to decide what rights their citizens have.
This is not in conflict with the earlier gun control decision as the 2nd amendment defines the gun rights at the federal level. The supreme court has not found any text that defines reproductive rights at the federal level.
As has been pointed out by others the NY law was arbitrary. The local law man decided if you were worthy of getting a concealed permit. This would be like if the local law man decided if area women were worthy to be allowed an abortion.
The US would be better with fewer guns, but this was a badly written law.
New York* I believe.
I'd also note that the Sullivan Act[0] was put into law 111 years ago, and was perfectly fine until last week.
What has changed to make it unconstitutional now?
You might disagree with the court, but that doesn't matter since any law similar to SB-8 related to guns would be handled by that court.
That said, I think CA/NY and others should absolutely do it. They should be super aggressive and start using the tactic created in SB-8 on all kinds of issues if for no other reason than the ridiculousness of relying on civilian enforcement of laws.
You know they won't just magically disappear right? They will still exist en masse. Guns are mostly banned in Mexico, but the cartels use them to control the government. Careful what you wish for.
States rights? Ha. Hypocrisy and blatant power grabs by the Federalist Society .
Shameful and likely the downfall of America.
Such extreme power grabs continue to be railroaded through by an extreme right wing unconcerned with the 300 million living Americans whose rights they are stomping upon.
1) we must eliminate the filibuster.
2) we must eliminate the electoral college
3) we must impeach the seditious conspiracy and cut the head off the snake that spawned it. The federalist society must be investigated for installing Supreme Court judges and we must impeach every last one of these criminals. Clarence Thomas and Kavanaugh are also both subject to serious sexual crimes accusations that were steamrolled right over by the Republican juggernaut.
We cannot allow this theocracy-in-waiting gain absolute power, and to ignore their machinations to this end is no longer possible.
Edit: Since HN is rate-limiting me. There have been proposals that try to either give a Red State advantage, in particular, the electoral college. However, California could reasonably be split into 7 states (2 Red, 5 Blue) that would still have greater populations than Utah, netting +3 sets of Senators.
[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jefferson_(proposed_Pacific_st...
Jefferson will never ever happen because there's no mechanism for it to happen, and because it would be by far the poorest state with the absolute worst economy in the nation, so I'm not even sure why we should discuss it.
Oh and by the way the Jefferson plan specifically excludes the Emerald Triangle.
https://constitution.congress.gov/constitution/article-4/#ar...
Would the federal government carpet bomb a state that tried? No. But there are other means to exert force and stop secession. Besides, the U.S. Government has no reason to ever willingly let California (or Texas, or really any state) leave the union, so why would they ever sit down at the negotiating table?
In states where there is a majority for abortion, abortition is legalised by law, not by court, i.e. the way it should be. It is in states where there is no majority for abortion that it is not. How is it not democratic?
For things to be done at the federal level, it needs a broad consensus across the country, not a 51% majority where the 49% is dead against. The EU has similar safeguards where you need effectively 3 keys to enable a law (European parliament, European commission, and the Council), not a simple 51% majority. Nothing prevents you from legislatating at a state level, but if you want to impose your views on other states, it needs to be a broad consensus. What you seem to complain about is that voters in California cannot impose their social view on the inhabitants of Utah.