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Re:Steve Wozniak: Internet should not have gatekeepers or re... by rayiner on Wednesday August 15, 2012 @03:38AM (#4385027)
This is historical revisionism. "Inalienable rights" made for some great rhetoric in the Declaration of Independence, but the Constitution does not use the phrase (and uses the phrase "right" only a couple of times in the main articles).

Government is a set of people, and rights arise from consensus and practice among those people. When the Founders spoke about "rights" they were referring to those recognized by British consensus and practice.

Re:Steve Wozniak: Internet should not have gatekeepers or re... by mbreese on Wednesday August 15, 2012 @03:51AM (#4385050)
That's why there was a great initial push after the Constitution was ratified to establish the Bill of Rights. People didn't feel that it was safe enough to leave things like the freedom of speech to be covered under common/unwritten law. So some of the unwritten/understood parts of the Constitution were written into the first 10 amendments.
Re:Steve Wozniak: Internet should not have gatekeepers or re... by sageikosa on Wednesday August 15, 2012 @07:04AM (#4385388)
There was also great initial resistance, not because the opponents didn't want to safeguard rights; but because they feared enumerating some rights for named protection would leave other rights not named unprotected.
Re:Steve Wozniak: Internet should not have gatekeepers or re... by danielweber on Wednesday August 15, 2012 @11:50AM (#4386523)
And if Hamilton could print out this discussion page, he'd be shoving it in people's faces and pounding his fist on the table furiously. "See? I told you so!"