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> I don't see how a libertarian would make a good case for the government to force the mother to continue to sustain and provide for it. So all neglect laws sh

> I don't see how a libertarian would make a good case for the government to force the mother to continue to sustain and provide for it. So all neglect laws should be removed? > The libertarian thing to do would be to ban such regulation. That requires a constitutional amendment. Those are not easy to get passed.

morgante 11y ago
> So all neglect laws should be removed? I am not a libertarian, so I wouldn't. But several libertarians I know have said we so, and also argue that there should be no duty to feed the poor, etc. > The libertarian thing to do would be to ban such regulation. That requires a constitutional amendment. Those are not easy to get passed. That depends on what regulation we want passed. The First Amendment already includes some pretty important limits on the power of government (included limits which Paul seems loathe to enforce).
- natmaster 11y ago
  "several libertarians I know have said we so" This is a first for me to hear, though it's important to note libertarians are individuals too, and have their own ideas! I have not found any libertarians promoting children as full-class citizens; so this is very new to hear this. Suffice it to say, I don't think that viewpoint is common. "First Amendment ..." to the constitution. Are you just agreeing with me here?
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
tzs 11y ago
> So all neglect laws should be removed? That was the position of Murray Rothbard [1], who was one of the major intellectual founders of modern libertarianism, particularly anarcho-capitalism. He was a founder of the Ludwig von Mises Institute. Most internet libertarians seem to be followers of his school of libertarianism (although they often do not know it...). His book "The Ethics of Liberty" covers children in chapter 14. You can find the PDF online. There's a big chunk of chapter 14 here [2]. Here's the most relevant part: Even from birth, the parental ownership is not absolute but of a "trustee" or guardianship kind. In short, every baby as soon as it is born and is therefore no longer contained within his mother's body possesses the right of self-ownership by virtue of being a separate entity and a potential adult. It must therefore be illegal and a violation of the child's rights for a parent to aggress against his person by mutilating, torturing, murdering him, etc. On the other hand, the very concept of "rights" is a "negative" one, demarcating the areas of a person's action that no man may properly interfere with. No man can therefore have a "right" to compel someone to do a positive act, for in that case the compulsion violates the right of person or property of the individual being coerced. Thus, we may say that a man has a right to his property (i.e., a right not to have his property invaded), but we cannot say that anyone has a "right" to a "living wage," for that would mean that someone would be coerced into providing him with such a wage, and that would violate the property rights of the people being coerced. As a corollary this means that, in the free society, no man may be saddled with the legal obligation to do anything for another, since that would invade the former's rights; the only legal obligation one man has to another is to respect the other man's rights. Applying our theory to parents and children, this means that a parent does not have the right to aggress against his children, but also that the parent should not have a legal obligation to feed, clothe, or educate his children, since such obligations would entail positive acts coerced upon the parent and depriving the parent of his rights. The parent therefore may not murder or mutilate his child, and the law properly outlaws a parent from doing so. But the parent should have the legal right not to feed the child, i.e., to allow it to die. The law, therefore, may not properly compel the parent to feed a child or to keep it alive. (Again, whether or not a parent has a moral rather than a legally enforceable obligation to keep his child alive is a completely separate question.) This rule allows us to solve such vexing questions as: should a parent have the right to allow a deformed baby to die (e.g., by not feeding it)? The answer is of course yes, following a fortiori from the larger right to allow any baby, whether deformed or not, to die. (Though, as we shall see below, in a libertarian society the existence of a free baby market will bring such "neglect" down to a minimum.) [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murray_Rothbard http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murray_Rothbard [2] http://mises.org/library/children-and-rights http://mises.org/library/children-and-rights
- GabrielF00 11y ago
  Is the world envisioned in the second paragraph really one that people want to live in?
  - morgante 11y ago
    I actually would much prefer it. If a parent is so terrible that literally the only force compelling them to feed their children is a legal one, then someone else should be raising that child.
    - GabrielF00 11y ago
      I don't fully understand this comment. The current system provides a mechanism for someone else to raise the child (CPS can take the child away). In Rothbard's world, who intervenes in the case of parental neglect? The text implies that nobody intervenes.
sukilot 11y ago
The fact that mothers give birth to babies,not to fully formed and educated adults, is a major unsolved problem of Libertarian and Objectivist (and part of Conservative) philosophy.

morgante 11y ago

> So all neglect laws should be removed? I am not a libertarian, so I wouldn't. But several libertarians I know have said we so, and also argue that there should be no duty to feed the poor, etc. > The libertarian thing to do would be to ban such regulation. That requires a constitutional amendment. Those are not easy to get passed. That depends on what regulation we want passed. The First Amendment already includes some pretty important limits on the power of government (included limits which Paul seems loathe to enforce).

natmaster 11y ago
"several libertarians I know have said we so" This is a first for me to hear, though it's important to note libertarians are individuals too, and have their own ideas! I have not found any libertarians promoting children as full-class citizens; so this is very new to hear this. Suffice it to say, I don't think that viewpoint is common. "First Amendment ..." to the constitution. Are you just agreeing with me here?

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

tzs 11y ago

> So all neglect laws should be removed? That was the position of Murray Rothbard [1], who was one of the major intellectual founders of modern libertarianism, particularly anarcho-capitalism. He was a founder of the Ludwig von Mises Institute. Most internet libertarians seem to be followers of his school of libertarianism (although they often do not know it...). His book "The Ethics of Liberty" covers children in chapter 14. You can find the PDF online. There's a big chunk of chapter 14 here [2]. Here's the most relevant part: Even from birth, the parental ownership is not absolute but of a "trustee" or guardianship kind. In short, every baby as soon as it is born and is therefore no longer contained within his mother's body possesses the right of self-ownership by virtue of being a separate entity and a potential adult. It must therefore be illegal and a violation of the child's rights for a parent to aggress against his person by mutilating, torturing, murdering him, etc. On the other hand, the very concept of "rights" is a "negative" one, demarcating the areas of a person's action that no man may properly interfere with. No man can therefore have a "right" to compel someone to do a positive act, for in that case the compulsion violates the right of person or property of the individual being coerced. Thus, we may say that a man has a right to his property (i.e., a right not to have his property invaded), but we cannot say that anyone has a "right" to a "living wage," for that would mean that someone would be coerced into providing him with such a wage, and that would violate the property rights of the people being coerced. As a corollary this means that, in the free society, no man may be saddled with the legal obligation to do anything for another, since that would invade the former's rights; the only legal obligation one man has to another is to respect the other man's rights. Applying our theory to parents and children, this means that a parent does not have the right to aggress against his children, but also that the parent should not have a legal obligation to feed, clothe, or educate his children, since such obligations would entail positive acts coerced upon the parent and depriving the parent of his rights. The parent therefore may not murder or mutilate his child, and the law properly outlaws a parent from doing so. But the parent should have the legal right not to feed the child, i.e., to allow it to die. The law, therefore, may not properly compel the parent to feed a child or to keep it alive. (Again, whether or not a parent has a moral rather than a legally enforceable obligation to keep his child alive is a completely separate question.) This rule allows us to solve such vexing questions as: should a parent have the right to allow a deformed baby to die (e.g., by not feeding it)? The answer is of course yes, following a fortiori from the larger right to allow any baby, whether deformed or not, to die. (Though, as we shall see below, in a libertarian society the existence of a free baby market will bring such "neglect" down to a minimum.) [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murray_Rothbard http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murray_Rothbard [2] http://mises.org/library/children-and-rights http://mises.org/library/children-and-rights

GabrielF00 11y ago
Is the world envisioned in the second paragraph really one that people want to live in?
- morgante 11y ago
  I actually would much prefer it. If a parent is so terrible that literally the only force compelling them to feed their children is a legal one, then someone else should be raising that child.
  - GabrielF00 11y ago
    I don't fully understand this comment. The current system provides a mechanism for someone else to raise the child (CPS can take the child away). In Rothbard's world, who intervenes in the case of parental neglect? The text implies that nobody intervenes.

sukilot 11y ago

The fact that mothers give birth to babies,not to fully formed and educated adults, is a major unsolved problem of Libertarian and Objectivist (and part of Conservative) philosophy.