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Through a combination of being familiar with the likes of John Locke and other natural rights theorists in my studies, and recent discussions here which have touched on the topic of property rights, I have came to wonder whether or not anti-discrimination laws are legitimate.

As Locke said, the most basic rights are those of "life, liberty, and property", and these are unalienable, and enshrined as such in the US Constitution. To quote from a site Lemur linked to on another thread, "A property right is the exclusive authority to determine how a resource is used, whether that resource is owned by government or by individuals."

Surely anti-discrimination laws such as the Race Relations Act 1976 stamp all over the fundemantal right to the ownership and use of property? If a businessman owns a premesis, who is the government to tell him who he must let work on it?

Maybe this is another topic I'm coming on to, but if the anti-discrimination laws are themselves against the most fundamental laws of the land (those by constitution, whether written or unwritten, since both US and UK constitutions are based on these fundamental rights), surely citizens have no obligation to obey them?

Maybe I am too influenced by the individualistic theory of resistance proposed by George Buchanan in 'de Juri Regni apud Scotos'. While people may criticise this saying it means everyone taking the laws into their own hands and could cause anarchy, I find it to be sound as a political theory.

Indeed, these ideas are the very ones on which the UK political tradition is based. To quote another figure, Francis Hutcheson wrote "For wherever any Invasion is made upon unalienable Rights, there must arise either a perfect, or external Right to Resistance" (I conceded I got that quote from wikipedia).

Say for example a white-supremacist refuses to serve a black guy in his shop. Even if the courts would try to punish him, IMO he is no longer bound to recognise those courts, since they are themselves trying to enforce laws which take away his property rights. And in doing so, they act illegaly, and renounce themselves of all legal authority.

Thoughts?

PS - I am not racist. (wish we had the 'surprise' smiley here)

I just support peoples' right to be racist, so long as they don't start trampling on others rights because of it.

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As a relationship status might read, it's complicated. If I own an acre of land, do I have a right to dump toxic sludge there? How about if I can guarantee that I'm only polluting my land, and nobody else's? Am I allowed to practice polygamy on my land? If not, why not?

If we accept that some usages of ownership are subject to the needs of society as a whole (and unless we're insane, we do) then the Race Relations Act is not "stamping all over" property rights. There are some usages and activities with our society deems unacceptable, whether they're on private property, public property, or on the moon.

You can certainly argue over whether the Race Relations Act is an appropriate public interest, but that's something of a different conversation.

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"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."

Doesn't sound inalienable to me...

This always confused me. When we put people in jail, are we violating their inalienable right to liberty? That's what inalienable sounds like it means to me.

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I would say you can do what you want on your own land if it doesn't affect anybody else's, but as soon as it does, then you are interfering with their own property rights.

One difficult issue I can think of with that is that if your land was not well fenced off, unwitting bystanders might step on it and die from the toxins. Although I guess then you could maybe be obliged by the government to put up a warning, since it is still obliged to protect the lives of its citizens as another fundemental right. I guess it's the same logic you use for welfare, you have to take a person's money off them to provide to another, but I suppose the government is obliged to maintain these people's lives as a fundamental right and stop them starving etc. But such issues should only appear when fundamental rights clash with each other.

As for polygamy, who cares what you do in your own bedroom? The government doesn't have to grant legal status to what you might want to call a 'marriage'.

You can't subject fundemental rights to the greater public good.

I always just presumed they are inalienable for law-abiding citizens, I think the natural rights authors/documents imply this very heavily, to the point they would make no sense if it wasn't the case.

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What legal theory are you basing this on? Because we can and we do aridge each and every right when appropriate to do so. Freedom of speech does not allow you to yell "Fire!" in a crowded theater, for example. Your right to bear arms is abridged when you go to the courthouse or the state capitol building. Almost all of your "fundamental" rights get abridged when you go to prison. Why do you allow this exception in your legal theory?

Are the "natural rights" authors the same people who promote "natural law"?

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You act as though the two are mutually exclusive- they're not. In reality, the two are mutually inclusive. Any law necessarily infringes on someone's freedom- there's no other way for them to function. Just because a law may be necessary for the function of society doesn't mean it's not chipping away at your rights.

Vis-a-vis race relations: Speaking personally, whether such a law exists or not would make no difference to my behavior. If I ran a business, I'd want any paying customer I could get regardless of race. If a business owner is a bigot and wants to lose business in favor of his bigotry, I would say "let him". People can take their money elsewhere. But as you said, it is complicated (when it comes to our government).....

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Your overall point is sound, of course, but I'm having trouble understanding what you mean by "the two." Are you referring to property rights and the Race Relation Act, or what? Could you clarify?

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Acknowledging that the original OP refers to the US and UK it might be interesting to note an article in the German Constitution that deals with property rights:

Article 14 [Property, inheritance, expropriation]

(1) Property and the right of inheritance shall be guaranteed. Their content and limits shall be defined by the laws.

(2) Property entails obligations. Its use shall also serve the public good.

(3) Expropriation shall only be permissible for the public good. It may only be ordered by or pursuant to a law that determines the nature and extent of compensation. Such compensation shall be determined by establishing an equitable balance between the public interest and the interests of those affected. In case of dispute respecting the amount of compensation, recourse may be had to the ordinary courts.

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Those two. In specific to your post the law would be the Race Relations Act and the freedom would be property rights- but I was speaking generally since the 'law limits freedom' is true in all cases.

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Even the most ardent proponents of the rights of the individual acknowledge that the enactment/fulfillment of one individual's rights must be limited to the extent that it would interfere with another person's rights.

So, you can plant purple corn on your property but not dump toxic waste as the latter can be demonstrated to, at least in the fullness of time, infringe upon the property rights of those around you.

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When shouting fire in a theatre, it is as I said, "such issues should only appear when fundamental rights clash with each other". It is an act which will of itself threaten people's right to life. Here we have one fundemental right (free expression) contrasting with another (right to life). In which case, the person who wishes to exercise his right to expression must at the same time do it in a manner that will not threaten others lives. The difference with anti-discrimination laws, the subject of this thread, is that they do not protect a fundamental right. There is no fundamental right to enter shop x, or be employed by business x. Therefore the fundemental right to property cannot be infringed in order to gain these.

For the courthouse example, surely that is an example of public and not private property? If so, then the rules regarding them would be based on what the public as a whole want.

For the issue with prison, I said in reply to Sasaki that it is very clear these rights are considered inalienable only for law-abiding citizens.

As for "natural law" as espoused by Aquinas etc, it certainly had a big impact on English concepts of their common law and the ancient constitution, from which of course we get our Anglo-Saxon (to use the crude racial term, before anyone points it out) idea of natural rights.

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I have always maintained this. But to relate it to the OP, black people do not have a fundamental right to enter every white guys shop if they don't want them there.

That sounds like it could be very very open to abuse, it sounds a bit collectivist/totalitarian.

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Unless your "purple corn" affects the market price of "purple corn" nationally, thus invoking the commerce clause and allowing for interference from the federal government.

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As long as you have separate executive, legislative and judiciary powers I do not think it is. If you do not trust in the independence of the jurisdiction that keeps an eye on the law and government actions being in line with the Constitution, I guess the value of any Constitution is somewhat limited.

Regarding the "collectivist" character, I guess any society that - to a certain extent, let's not forget we are "just" talking about property here - the interests of the many above the interests of an individual has a collectivist touch. Is this necessarily a bad thing? That't probably for the people of that society to decide.

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You should be able to do whatever you want with or on your property - refusing people because you're racist, building a coffee store or a factory, doing drugs, as long as you don't infringe on other people's rights. So you can't pollute.

But you should be able to discriminate and build without zoning restrictions. You should be able to pave over any stupid useless annoying wetlands you want. And if Lemur had a professionally designed and built safe containment for hazardous waste he should be able to store waste.

CR

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If the government has a right to regulate commerce, then they can say you can't operate a business if you discriminate against people on the basis of race.

What troubles me is that even if the laws upheld someone's right to discriminate based on race, which they do not when it comes to running a business, it would still be an abhorrent law that needed to be abolished. That's why there was a civil rights movement. There is no benefit whatsoever to society to allow racial discrimination to occur, especially in the workplace or places of business. I note that some folks will fight tooth and nail to uphold what is by definition unjust treatment of other people, on the basis of a principle which they would argue against if it was happening to them. Suppose you were denied social security benefits because you where white. That would be quite the injustice, and you might start some kind of civil rights movement to put a stop to that unjust treatment.

I must confess, nothing warms my heart more than seeing the government assessing severe penalties against businesses run by hateful bigots.

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That only works if the society disapproves of the bigot. For example, if the fashion is race based, then the bigotry is quite valueable to not taint the fashion brand.

How should age restrictions be handled based on total property rights?

And is Freedom to roam more of a restriction law or a granting law?

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The government has the power to regulate commerce. But do you have the right to shop at any store you want? That's the question.

It's a question of individual rights--what rights to business owners have. They can open and close when they want to, for example, even if it might be better for the town as a whole to have access to a gas station 24 hours a day (this is how I almost ran out of gas once, lol, "open 9 AM to 1 PM" whaat?).

Everyone pays into social security so everyone has the right to get money back.

That's a weird way of looking at it. You don't support people being penalized simply because they are hateful bigots right?

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Nevertheless, I'm in favor of the laws. It is easy enough to imagine the 8 golf courses in town refusing access to african americans--and probably not suffering much business wise. And basically I think the fundamental rights approach is too inflexible. Just because there's nothing wrong with night clubs discriminating based on dress, reading clubs being "women only", etc, doesn't mean we should have golf courses refusing access to black people. I see no reason for the law to be blind to whether something is justifiable discrimination and unjustifiable discrimination.

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Actually they do, the constitutional right to private property means that any preceding anti-discrimination laws are in themselves unlawful, and a citizen has no obligation to acknowledge them.

No, the civil rights movement adressed legitimate grievances against discrimination enforced by the state, eg Jim Crow laws. They were, of course, very much unconstitutional, and trampled over all sorts of basic rights.

The state should never institutionalise discrimination, but individuals should always be free to discriminate on their private property, since it is their constitutional right to do what they please with it.

Oh, I agree that is would be foolish for a business owner to reject perfectly good employees on the grounds of their race. But it's their business, and their problem. Of course it is also a problem for those who cannot get employed by them because of their race, but they have no right to demand an infringement of the employers rights because of it.

And your example with social security is irrelevant, since it (presumably, not sure for US) is run by the government, and as I said, the state cannot institutionalise discrimination.

While I agree with your sentiments, I cannot approve of the method, which seems to involve the government illegaly penalising busness owners because of some populist anger at their bigoted views.

Since when were fundamental rights (ie right to property) subject to the views of the majority?

I would much rather see bigoted businessmen punished by, say, organised boycotts.

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Wait a cotton-pickin' moment -- you live in Britain, which has no constitution. Never has, probably never will. The Constitution of the United States, on the other hand, does not place the "right to private property" as some sort of mega-right that supersedes all other laws and amendments. So I'm not following your reasoning even slightly. Can you clarify?

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Property is in every way not inalienable. It has never been inalienable, actually. It cannot ever be, either. It wouldn't be practical if it were: if you hold by the idea that a state should provide for necessary infrastructure you are at some point going to (a) need some land to build it on, and (b) need some collected property (usually called taxes) to pay for it. If you don't, you had better hope someone didn't violate your property rights by taking it away from you, 'cause there would be no way to be protected from theft or misappropriation.

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We have an unwritten constution, everyone accepts it, heck, we even had a civil war over it. And the whole of British political theory has been based on them since 1690, with the Whig dominance etc.

Anyway, as for "mega-rights", there is no such concept, only fundemanetal rights, inalienable so long as a citizen abides by the law (surely you agree with this?). The USA might have a legal system in order to ensure that all laws passed are constitutional, but the legal system itself only has authority so long as it fulfils this duty. If Congress passes a law that is in fact against the constitition, and has it approved and implemented, that should be no means make a citizen feel bound by it.

I am aware of the impracticality of idealism with these fundamental rights, and have gave examples where they may conflict with each other. But the OP and the issue of anti-discrimination laws does not concern fundemental rights. It gives black people the legal authority to demand entrance into another man's property (not a fundemental right), and in doing so tramples all over the white-supremacists right to property (which is a fundamental right).

Fundamental rights should only ever be compromised when they come into conflict with each other.

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We do have the Magna Carta, one of the foundations of constitutional law. Just a small technicality.

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A shop is generally considered to be a kind of semi-public space. Anyone can enter and browse or buy and so long as their actions remain within those activities then they have every right to remain in the shop. A person's home is an entirely different matter and you can refuse to let anyone you wish in for whatever reason you want.

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@Miotas: And to add to this, a shop is also particularly complex because of the number of times it is rented rather than owned by the shopkeeper.

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i have a similar view when it comes to things like burkas.

progressives ties themselves in knots trying to justify the anti-discrimination laws that are 'demanded' by the multitude of victim groups whose interests they claim to represent, but then find themselves in a sticky position with things like burkas which represent a problem for the liberal paradise they 'think' they're building.

the answer; ban the burka.

wrong.

ditch the anti-discrimination laws, and leave to people to act in their own interests:
> Want a bank-loan; "sorry, i am not in a position to properly assess your trustworthiness"
> Want a job; "sorry, i am not in a position to properly assess your trustworthiness"
> Want a date; "sorry, i am not in a position to properly assess your trustworthiness"
> Want a favour; "sorry, i am not in a position to properly assess your trustworthiness"

Take part in our society, or ostracise yourself from it, understand the consequence of your own actions. that doesn't mean you have to have tea and crumpets at elevensies, or turn up at the cricket pitch on sunday afternoon, but walking around like a ninja and expecting to be treated like a normal human being is rank stupidity. whatever the law says I think you are a idiot!

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I don't believe there's any right to shop at any store you want and have the government force all store owners to serve you.

That'd also be completely different. The government takes your money, it had **** well better pay it back.

Though I don't expect to get anything from that Ponzi scheme.

There's the principals of freedom and owning your property, and not merely being a custodian for the government.

CR

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I don't see what burkas have to with this debate at all. Thinking someone looks stupid in their clothes or being unable to provide someone with a certain service because they won't prove their identity has nothing to do with racial discrimination.

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I'm a bit confused here, somebody please help me out. I have always been of the understanding that anti-discrimination laws apply to employment only. They do not apply to choosing a customer base. Look at the women's health clubs for example, like Curves. They simply do not and will not accept male customers for a number of reasons, ranging from it can make the other female patrons uncomfortable, to simply not having the facilities to support males.

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yes it does.

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