7 ms·
>"In a 4-1 ruling, the court found that prohibitions on using marijuana violated the 'right to the free development of personality'" Perhaps that is out of con
by esaym 11y ago
>"In a 4-1 ruling, the court found that prohibitions on using marijuana violated the 'right to the free development of personality'"
Perhaps that is out of context, and I don't know their constitution as a whole, but I am not finding a lot of sense in that sentence.
If drug use can be considered a "right to the free development of personality", then how else could America's "right to Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness" be interpreted?
- pmoriarty 11y agoIt's never about what the laws say, but rather about who interprets the laws.
- esaym 11y agoI've always hated that a "law" can be interpreted really.
- pmoriarty 11y agoThat's the nature of communication. There can be no communication without interpretation.
- Natsu 11y agoWe do have some separation between eval (legislative) and apply (executive) though, but that mostly only works for a few things like presidential pardons.
- InclinedPlane 11y agoNot possible for it to be otherwise. Also, not desirable. The law is not like an OS that society runs on, that's a very dangerous but sadly pervasive idea. The law is a tool that society uses for its own betterment, hopefully in the service of justice and liberty.
- intopieces 11y agoWithout it, our Constitution would be almost worthless. Segregation was brought down by the Interstate Commerce Clause!
- sk5t 11y agoI would argue that the ICC is something that seriously diminishes the Constitution, as the courts have applied such tortured logic so as to allow the federal government to regulate virtually anything.
- drumdance 11y agoI personally think the Constitution should be thrown out and start over. It's an archaic document reflecting a radically different society. Some love to treat it as sacred, but if it's so sacred how come we've had to amend it so much? Though come to think of it I wouldn't mind a few amendments to the Bible and Koran.
- intopieces 11y agoThe veneration of the Constitution is a weak point in American government. It's riddled with policy mistakes (see: Impeachment, where the Vice President would cast the deciding vote in his own trial should there be a tie) and rediculous vagaries (Judges serve for life so long as they remain "in good behavior"), not to mention the validation of the fundamental evil of slavery which was, at the time, already a point of contention. Rather than an objective framework for government, the Constitution has morphed into a shield against discourse, a talisman wielded to justify policies that deserve to be questioned. It's our National Bible, where things are right because see, it says it right there.
- Retra 11y agoWhat else would you do with it?
- copperx 11y agoThis is your engineering or science background clashing with reality. I, for one, am glad that laws are interpreted and not taken as hard rules. Stupidity would reign otherwise, because it is impossible to create a hard and fast rule that will stand the test of time in a changing civilization. Unfortunately, I have met too many CS types that are surprised by the concept of law interpretation. That's why liberal education is important.
- ahomescu1 11y agoI was following and agreeing with you (and was going to upvote you), until the last 2 sentences. You could have made your point without bashing "CS types" and CS/engineering education.
- im3w1l 11y agoDon't you think it is scary to invest that much power in a post that is unelected and for life?
- aakilfernandes 11y agoThose words are from the Declaration of Liberty, not the Constitution. I'm not sure how/if SCOTUS uses the Declaration in their decisions. But it certainly does illuminate the feelings of the founders.
- djent 11y agoUnfortunately the Supreme Court can't find laws unDeclaration-of-Independance-al.
- maw 11y agoAs far as I'm aware that phrase isn't anywhere in the US constitution -- just the Declaration of Independence. It doesn't have any legal force. The phrase "el libre desarrollo de la personalidad" however is present in the Mexican constitution, although in its context it isn't clear to me how it applies.
- esaym 11y agoAh, I see.
- cookiecaper 11y agoTrue, but people still basically accept it as a canonical element of American philosophy and believe it should be used to justify governmental actions. The Constitution contains the very similar phrase "promote the general welfare".
- bpodgursky 11y agoSorry, HN is full of morons who like to downvote. The Declaration of Independence has indeed been cited by the Supreme Court to give evidence of the intent of the drafters of the Constitution, where the phrasing in the Constitution is ambiguous. So you are perfectly correct.
- Retric 11y agoThey have used other documents from the time period for the same reasons. The point is it does not have direct legal Athority only incite into the way people thought.
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- cookiecaper 11y agoPeople use statements from the Founding Fathers to justify anything they want. For example, since the Preamble to the Constitution specifies that it was set up to "promote the general welfare", there are many people that believe the government's job goes beyond providing favorable conditions for free markets and keeping them reasonably fair all the way to literally owing them a wage just for breathing, since the "general welfare" is not helped by some people being poor. The fact of the matter is that if you're in a position to justify something you strongly believe in, no matter how high, visible, or supposedly rationally-based that position is supposed to be, you're going to find a way to push it through. Look at the ruling in Obergefell; even liberal publications said the legal basis cited for it was rubbish. In the general case, people will use whatever pretense they can to get what they strongly believe in, and justify it by saying that they're making something good happen (that is, the ends justify the means). Social sciences are like 90% this, and from thence comes the phrase "never trust a statistic you haven't faked yourself". It's not universal, but it happens way more often than most of us want to admit, in every field.
- PhasmaFelis 11y agoIt just baffles me how people keep trying to use "maybe the government should protect people who can't protect themselves" as a self-evident example of egregious governmental overstep, instead of the fundamental reason we invented government.
- cookiecaper 11y agoWe invented government to provide a fair and equitable structure that everyone could operate under. The idea is that everyone can conduct their affairs in peace under our laws, and that those laws will allow (note, not guarantee, as the government can't force someone to be productive or useful) individuals to prosper and flourish by protecting their fundamental natural freedoms. Government does not exist solely to "protect those who can't protect themselves". Whether a person has substantial physical resources with which to "protect himself" or not, that person can petition the government for relief and participate in the democratic process. The thing here is that "protect people who can't protect themselves" is so generic it can mean anything, just like "the pursuit of happiness" or promotion of "the general welfare". Do you mean protecting employers against employees that want to steal time or goods? Do you mean protecting workers against idlers who want to consume their resources without having done anything to earn them? What about protecting companies against frivolous lawsuits from people just trying to get a big settlement? These likely aren't the problems you're thinking about, but they're the problems some people out there are thinking about. See what I'm saying? People are going to bias their opinion to favor their individual circumstances, but again, we all have to live under the government's rule, and it needs to be as fair and equitable as possible for everyone. Not just rich people and not just poor people; not just atheists and not just theists; not just healthy people and not just sick people. The interests must be well-balanced to maintain social order.
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- rayiner 11y agoThe Declaration of Independence, where that phrase comes from, is basically marketing bullshit. It's full of rhetorical flourish that Jefferson got away with precisely because it has no legal significance. After all, that same document says that "all men are created equal" while the Constitution enshrined the institution of slavery for another few generations. The closest analogue in the Constituon is the idea that due process protects those fundamental rights inherent in "ordered liberty."
- dreamdu5t 11y agoThere is no analogue in the Constitution because the Constitution enumerates the specific powers granted to the Federal Government. Drug prohibition is not one of them, and the entire Federal war on drugs is held up by the lynch-pin supreme court case Wickard v Filburn... where the Supreme Court decided that "interstate commerce" applies to goods literally not involved in any commerce whatsoever. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wickard_v._Filburn https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wickard_v._Filburn https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gonzales_v._Raich https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gonzales_v._Raich
- rayiner 11y agoWickard v. Filburn isn't the lynch-pin of the Federal war on drugs. It's a ridiculous case, but it's also a narrow one: does the Commerce Clause cover marijuana grown for personal use. That is obviously not interstate commerce within any sensible definition of the concept. However, the drug trade in general is archetypal interstate commerce. Almost nobody grows and processes their own weed or their own cocaine. It all happens through cross-border commercial transactions.
- dreamdu5t 11y agoPossession is illegal at the Federal level. All drug commerce that does not cross state lines is also illegal. There could be no federal war on drugs at all without the interstate commerce power the supreme court has derived. Going further, the purpose of the interstate commerce clause was to give the power to regulate tariffs (and other taxes) between the states, not make entire trades illegal because sometimes those goods are sold elsewhere.
- ahallock 11y agoWhy don't we stop enumerating specific rights (which leads to picking winners and losers and inconsistent application) and refactor them into a few basic principles. Such as the basic property right of self ownership. Since you own your body, not the State, you may use marijuana. Simple.
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- Retra 11y agoYou think vague principles like "self ownership" are going to make for consistent legal frameworks? How about we throw out our constitutions and make "be a good person" the law and leave it at that.
- rtkwe 11y agoThen every court case becomes a philosophical argument about the meaning, bound, and effects of those 'few basic principals.' Without a steady legal framework with predictable outcomes large society binds up pretty quick.
- PhantomGremlin 11y agoWe actually have such an amendment: The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people. Unfortunately the Supreme Court treats it like a fucking joke[1]: Even though the woman grew cannabis strictly for her own consumption and never sold any, the Supreme Court stated that growing one's own cannabis affects the interstate market of cannabis. The theory was that the cannabis could enter the stream of interstate commerce, even if it clearly wasn't grown for that purpose and that was unlikely ever to happen (the same reasoning as in the Wickard v. Filburn decision). It therefore ruled that this practice may be regulated by the federal government under the authority of the Commerce Clause. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenth_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution#Commerce_clause https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenth_Amendment_to_the_United_...
- 11y ago
- crpatino 11y agoYou people do realize that the Mexican Supreme Court does rule about the Mexican Constitution, right?