Judith Jarvis Thomson, near the end of her well-known article “A Defense of Abortion,” writes,
… while I am arguing for the permissibility of abortion in
some cases, I am not arguing for the right to secure the death of the
unborn child. It is easy to confuse these two things in that up to a
certain point in [...]
Archive for the ‘rights’ Category
Obama on Abortion
Posted in Politics, philosophy, rights, tagged abortion, Obama on August 19, 2008 | 1 Comment »
“The Right of the People to Keep and Bear Arms shall not be Infringed”
Posted in History, Politics, rights, tagged gun control on June 26, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
The Supreme Court upholds the Second Amendment:
Answering a 127-year old constitutional question, the Supreme Court ruled on Thursday that the Second Amendment protects an individual right to have a gun, at least in one’s home. The Court, splitting 5-4, struck down a District of Columbia ban on handgun possession. Although times have changed since [...]
Steyn in Vancouver—One Time Only!
Posted in Politics, Religion, liberty, rights, tagged diversity, fascism, Islam, multiculturalism on May 27, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Wretchard quotes Mark Steyn, speaking in Vancouver before he goes on trial:
What we’re up against is not primarily defined by what’s going on in Iraq and Afghanistan. Those are still essentially military campaigns and we’re good at those. … it might be truer to say that this is a Cold Civil War – by which [...]
John McCain and Edmund Burke
Posted in Politics, liberty, philosophy, rights, tagged McCain on May 2, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Jonathan Rauch argues that John McCain is a true conservative, in the mold of Edmund Burke–and that “movement” conservatives aren’t. Rauch starts with a nice precis of an aspect of Burke’s thought that influenced, among others, Freidrich von Hayek:
Burke is the father of modern conservatism, and still its wisest oracle. Tradition-minded but (contrary to [...]
Locke v. Rousseau
Posted in Politics, liberty, philosophy, rights, tagged Locke, political philosophy, rights, Rousseau on February 28, 2008 | 2 Comments »
Jonah Goldberg captures the political half of the course I’m now teaching precisely:
I think the fundamental difference, the difference that defines the difference between American, Anglo-American conservatives and European welfare states, leftists or liberals, is Locke versus Rousseau. Every philosophical argument boils down to John Locke versus Jacques Rousseau.
Locke holds that we have natural rights, [...]
Arkes on Brown v. Board of Education
Posted in Equality, rights, tagged Brown, equal protection, Equality, law, segregation on February 11, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
I recently attended a talk by Hadley Arkes on jurisprudence in which, among other things, he criticized the reasoning of the Supreme Court in Brown v. Board of Education, the landmark school desegregation case from 1954. The Court declared the unconstitutionality of segregation on the basis of Kenneth Clark’s social science research on the [...]
McCain’s Speech to CPAC
Posted in justice, liberty, rights, tagged conservatism, John McCain, justice, liberty, rights on February 7, 2008 | 2 Comments »
John McCain reaches out to conservatives.
I am proud to be a conservative, and I make that claim because I share with you that most basic of conservative principles: that liberty is a right conferred by our Creator, not by governments, and that the proper object of justice and the rule of law in our country [...]
“Relating to the Legal System”
Posted in Religion, rights, tagged Islam, Religion, rights, sharia on February 7, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
The Archbishop of Canterbury, head of the Church of England, holder of the office once held by St. Cuthbert, St. Dunstan, St. Anselm, St. Thomas Becket, and Robert Kilwardby, says that British adoption of certain aspects of sharia is unavoidable:
Dr Rowan Williams told Radio 4’s World at One that the UK has to “face [...]
