National Review: The Right to Life
But does Terri Schiavo have a natural right to life?Yes. She is a human being. She has committed no crime and therefore she has forfeited not one of her natural rights. Our American faith teaches us that, "all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness." And the purpose of all American government is "to secure these rights," not destroy them.
What then is to be done?
The "auxiliary precautions" of Florida government — in this case the Florida supreme court — have failed Terri Schiavo. It is time, therefore, for Governor Bush to execute the law and protect her rights, and, in turn, he should take responsibility for his actions. Using the state police powers, Governor Bush can order the feeding tube reinserted. His defense will be that he and a majority of the Florida legislature believe the Florida Constitution requires nothing less. Some will argue that Governor Bush will be violating the law. We think he will not be violating the law, but if he is judged to have done so, it will be in the tradition of Martin Luther King, Jr., who answered to a higher law than a judge's opinion. In so doing, King showed respect for the man-made law by willingly going to jail (on a Good Friday); Governor Bush may have to face impeachment because of his decision.
How would the Florida Department of Law Enforcement (or whichever state police agency would be used) accomplish its ordered goal of reinserting Terri Schiavo's feeding tube? Using coerced funding (taxation) to pay for the wages of employees and equipment, the FDLE would request the feeding tube's reinsertion. Notice here what the two National Review authors conspicuously left out. If the owners of the hospice refuse, the FDLE would then order the owners and their employees to step aside so a government or government-hired physician or nurse could reinsert the tube. If the owners and employees refuse this, they'd be detained or arrested. If the employees and employees resist, they could be shot. And on, and on, and on.
This, I submit, is naked authoritarianism. This is the denial of the ability to enjoy one's life in the name of supporting that life.
By asserting a "right to life," Mr. Bennett and Mr. Kennedy have implicitly subjugated a far more fundamental and important right: the right to self-ownership and the right to one's property. They reject one's right to ownership as long as that owner refuses to use his or her property in order to nurse a "culture of life" or something similar. This is then, no fundamentally different from the environmentalist or welfare statist or unionist (i.e., collectivist) claim that it is our duty to help others live unfouled, healthy, materially fulfilling lives...even if it means doing it against our will and at our expense.
Figure this: can anyone else point out the absurdity of simultaneously asserting a "right to oil changes" or a "right to food" or a "right to underwear" while claiming to be proponents of freedom and liberty? All of the above, by their explicit meaning, demand corrective action if those "rights" are violated when individuals do not acquire their oil changes, food, or underwear. If they had none and none were donated, then the nature of rights theory demands forceful action be taken to provide justice to those "victims," which would mean stealing the right to property one person has and giving it to another.
The right to self-ownership avoids this potential and actual tyranny by not creating the problem of collective duty in the first place. Upholding this right would create just two issues to resolve: who is the legitimate owner of what resource and if the right to that resource was violated, what is the just response to the violation of that right? The fundamental right is what should always be protected and enforced, not something made up on the grounds of theology or emotional appeal. My right to self-ownership makes it a crime to kill me so there is no need to have a separate right to protect life.
The specific problem of how to delegate that right in the event of death or incapacitation is a personal, private matter. Given that human beings are fallible, there will be cases of dispute like this. It is not up to the state to decide who owns what in such cases because, as we see happening today, the state screws it all up my making all of its citizens partly involved.
I have little doubt Mr. Bennett and Mr. Kennedy would dispute a person's right to self-ownership. Why openly advocate slavery? But they are disputing a very important corollary to that right: the ownership of property external to the human body. In this case, it is Woodside Hospice's land and equipment. Furthermore, assuming Terri's husband, Michael, has a contract with the hospice to follow his instructions, these two want to violate the contract as well. Governor Bush and his police force do not have the right to tell them what to do. For the governor and Florida's law enforcement are not the rightful owners of that property.
And neither is Bill Bennett or anyone else who advocates the force of government to solve this problem. What they want are slaves to keep this woman alive.
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What are you talking about, Drizz? Did I miss something this time or did you miss the boat?
Let's start here, there are conflicting reports of what Mrs. Shiavo wants. Therefore I feel we must err on the side of caution and assume that Mrs. Shiavo wants to live. It is the duty of the willing to defend those who cannot defend themselves.This is non-coercive and therefore acceptable to the market anarchist philosophy.
Secondly, you use taxation as a reason to not insert the feeding tube. Perhaps if you lived in Ancapistan you'd be correct, but this isn't Ancapistan, is it? Apparently the American people feel that Medicare is somehow nessecary and using medicare in the Democratic system, however rediculous, is acceptable to many people within the current system.
Thirdly, you bring up the subject of the government using force to re-insert the tube. I completely agree with your analogy. But what if the situation is reversed? What if government uses coercian to not allow it to be reinserted? A couple people have been arrested for giving Mrs. Shiavo water. Is this not an example of the governmental coercian you supposedly oppose?
Here's the deal. We don't know what Mrs. Shiavo wants so we must assume that she wants to live. Her body is her property and we have no right to destroy it. Secondly, government has no right to tax us to keep her alive. The right thing to do here is to keep her alive by using voluntary resources. It's that simple.
Posted by: somasoul on March 25, 2005 04:41 PMsomasoul, no, I don't know what Mrs. Schiavo wanted to happen to her. Only her words to her friends and family have any idea. It may well be the case she wanted to be kept alive as long as possible no matter what befalls her. She may have never brought it up within her social circle. On the very grounds of appealing to the state to solve and *enforce* their side of this issue (as if it has powers of reason beyond other humans), they've violated basic free market anarchist rules.
I plead with you to re-read what I wrote regarding the danger of an affirmative duty in my original post. If you take the notion seriously, to remain consistent you must also advocate the forceful redistribution of wealth and labor towards other situations where lives are at stake.
I don't put any value in the fact that a majority of Americans want the government to provide services. It only matters because anarchists are in the minority and therefore face the threats inherent in refusing to agree with the majority.
I think you've assumed a few things about my thoughts on the case. Ideally, if the husband had decided he no longer wanted to care for his wife, her family would choose to take over. However, he states that she does not want to be kept alive in the event of severe disability. Therein lies the primary conflict: the desire of her family to keep her alive and her alleged desire to die. As a default position in cases where there is *nothing* to guide us, I'd agree the proper thing to do is prolong life. But we do have some things to go on: the statements of her husband and the statements of the friends and family that disagree with what he says she wants. Where to default on the matter of "he said; she said" is a different argument entirely.
I agree that if she is to be kept alive, it should be done with private resources. I want to note that, assuming my interpretation of your "It is the duty of the willing to defend those who cannot defend themselves" is correct, it comes perlilously close to the advocation of private resource distribution, up to and including the point of coercion.
Posted by: Drizz on March 26, 2005 05:46 PM"It is the duty of the willing to defend those who cannot defend themselves" is correct, it comes perlilously close to the advocation of private resource distribution, up to and including the point of coercion."
No. What I meant was is that if you belive in something, as an anarchist, it is imperitive that you take steps to see it done. If you want Terri alive it is imperitive that you do something to make it known that you want her alive. In an anarhcist society nothing would be done unless the willing, volunteers, actually do it. In our current system if we want a road fixed the unwilling may do it through use of coercian. It an anarchist system the only way to have it done is by the willing.
(Damn, that reads really bad. I need more coffee.)
Posted by: somasoul on March 30, 2005 03:43 PMThat did read bad, man.
I stand by my remarks and will clarify. IF Terri wanted her life prolonged and IF the means to do so could have been secured privately and voluntarily, THEN there is no reason from my perspective to prevent such a thing from happening. As I understand it, her parents and likely thousands of willing donors would have taken over her care. I wouldn't object to that, not in the least because it simply isn't any of my business. However, it enters the spectrum of my business when the state is used to secure those means and it is quite evident the state was heavily involved.
On the other hand, IF Terri did not want her life prolonged, that ends all discussion and we proceed to the simplest and least painful way to end her life.
But you used the word "duty" and barring further definition from you, your statement reads as one that requires humans to help the weak, even if they don't want to help. I fail to see how you go from "if you belive in something" to "it is imperitive that you take steps to see it done"; that doesn't follow, whether you're an anarchist or not.
Have some more coffee and get back to me.
Posted by: Drizz on April 1, 2005 12:38 PM