Rights are absolutes by any reading of natural rights theory.
Waller's line of reasoning is not premised in natural rights. Instead, he attempts a conversion to the divine right of kings with a spot of flag waving window dressing. Unused to thinking about the extrapolations, most men in the freedom movement buy in.
Geraldine Ferraro was nominated for the office of Vice President and her name was carried on the ballot in every state in 1984.
Again, why would he float such as issue today when our rights are under a focused attack from this administration? Motives matter and can explain a lot.
Let us move on to consider the authority of the Constitution.
Government has no rights; States have no rights. Only individuals have rights. Government is a tool we use to provide for services we can't get out of the Yellow Pages. That was the original idea anyway.
Government should never have been allowed to convert our inherent rights, as enunciated by Thomas Jefferson, into privileges controlled by the State. The Rev's 'reverence' for the Constitution is one in a long line of attempts to anoint that document, the Constitution, into the equivalent of the Ten Commandments. It was not. It is a tool written by men who were all too fallible. They no more intended it to be written on stone tablets than they intended the presidency, the CEO of one branch of government, to obtain the status of a monarch.
In this way the Rev spins the issues, enthroning by the premises thus deified the tyranny now oppressing us. This travesty should turn the stomach of any freedom oriented American.
These assertions contravene all of the founding premises on which natural rights theory stands.
The understanding of the nature of inherent rights and the capital invested in the enterprise for liberty preceded the Constitution. The war had been won, the the costs sunk, investments made when the switch was pulled.
By declaring revolution and stating its principles, inherent natural rights for all, the founders involved women and men in an enterprise that necessitated their acceptance of risk; a tiny percentage of the population comprised of men and women, actively participated. These individuals donated, struggled, provided the capital, and died. The benefits were enjoyed by many who never lifted a finger as well as by those who actually opposed the war.
The act of declaring the founding premises created a contract between those in positions of leadership and those investing in the enterprise. Women believed that after the Revolution their own rights would also be secured and ratified as inherent. Abigail Adams was typical of those women, who coming from a culture that had admitted the spiritual equality of women easily extended this into other arenas. They were defrauded.
By the same assertions of principle the founders enunciated adherence to a world view that asserted that the natural rights of each individual preceded all government, then and today.
They then proceeded to ignore that clear contract, beginning the conversion that confronts us today. They did so in large part because the Southern States threatened to withdraw. They should have let them and good riddance. Then those opposed to the continuation of slavery would have been better positioned to end that atrocity far earlier.
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