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Wednesday
July 25, 2007

The True Meaning of "Civil Rights" by William Scott Dwyer

The modern version of civil rights is now a fait accompli -- an uncontroversial part of the American culture. Yet the original meaning of "civil rights" as introduced by Thomas Paine has all but been forgotten, if it was ever understood to begin with. In it's original incarnation, "civil rights" meant essentially the same thing as the "unalienable rights" referred to in the Declaration of Independence. Today, however, the term "civil rights" has devolved into the opposite of its original meaning and is now synonymous with ethnic rights, which are the antipode of the individual rights endorsed by Paine and Jefferson. (Read more...)
Discuss this Article (38 messages)

Friday, August 3, 2007 - 10:39pm

Robert:

...roping off the 100 acres is not saying nature has any rights - that is a bogus argument here...

Well, if one is not preserving it for the sake of nature, then why don't other people have as much right to occupy it as you do? What gives you the right to rope it off and deny anyone else access to it. If you're not using it, why don't others have a right to use it?

John, it's beyond absurd. There isn't a shred of common sense in any of this nonsense. It's government regulations run amuck. You'd think that once it had gotten this bad, the regulators would step back and take another look. But they just continue to pile one regulation on top of another, without giving it a second thought.

A woman I know was renting a house, when a city inspector came by to look at the property. The inspector noticed that the linoleum tiles in her kitchen were a bit worn. The renter was perfectly fine with the tiles the way they were, but the inspector told her that she couldn't continue to live there unless the tiles were replaced. She was also told that since there was no inside access to an inlaw unit, which could only be entered from the outside, the unit was in violation of the building code and was therefore illegal. The owner had also converted a space above his garage into a very nice studio apartment, but the unit could not be rented, because the ceilings were half a foot too low.

My neighbor across the street took four years to build his house, and had a litany of horror stories about dealing with the city, much like what you went through.

In San Francisco, where I used to live, the owner of a flower shop wanted to add some apartments onto her property above her store, so that her Japanese relatives would have a place to stay when they visited her. It took her five years to complete, with repeated denials by the city in response to complaints from neighbors about the addition's impinging on their view. All that was necessary to stop construction and require a revision of the architectural plans was a complaint from a disgruntled neighbor. In the same section of the city, activists sought to deny permission for a McDonald's franchise, because it was a fastfood chainstore that would alter the trendy, upscale character of the neighborhood. They also sought to prevent Blockbuster video from moving there, allegedly on the grounds that it would cause a parking problem and traffic congestion. The real reason was that Blockbuster would be competing with Le Video in the next block. The neighborhood activists were friends of the owner.

And so it goes. No matter where you live, you get stories like these.

A book that is worth reading in this connection is Grassroots Tyranny: The Limits of Federalism by Clint Bolick, which addresses this kind of petty bureaucracy at the lowest levels of government.

- Bill

Saturday, August 4, 2007 - 5:10am

And to think building codes were NOT done to regulate owners on their own property, but commercial building to prevent shoddy work.......

Saturday, August 4, 2007 - 3:03pm

Here's a thought, just for fun:

Consider the notion of "property," which we've been discussing, more or less. If one can own technology as such, as in patents, the consider "property" as a technology. Suppose that I claim a patent on the technology of "property." Then only those people who I allow, can use my intellectual "property," right? Now suppose that a Marxist made the claim...

Sunday, August 5, 2007 - 1:34am

Phil,

I don't understand your question. Could you give us an example of what you mean by the "technology of property" and of how it would apply to Marxism?

- Bill

Monday, August 6, 2007 - 12:33am

Bill,

I am not sure where you stand on the issue of a �nature preserve.� You reject an original acquisition for the purpose of a preserve, and I reject that, too. On the other hand, you seem to accept a purchase for the purpose of a preserve from a previously legitimate original acquisition, writing: �the buyer has full rights of use and disposal, including maintaining the property as a nature preserve.�

What if I buy a tract from a timber company and do nothing with it? No use or disposal and no �maintaining the property�? Let�s say I contemplate my natural tract of land from home and never go there at all. Further, I place covenants onto the title that bar development, cutting of trees, walking paths, etc., in short covenants that exclude any future use whatever.

Do you accept my right to exclude others even though I am making no use of it and intend never to?

(Edited by Jon Letendre on 8/06, 12:51am)

Monday, August 6, 2007 - 1:39am

I really think the practical solution is to have government auction off unclaimed land to the highest bidder. If the land is worth developing, a business can bid on the lands it deeems can make use out of. If for some reason a rich tycoon wants to buy a tract and keep it as a nature preserve, well I don't see what's wrong with that either so long as he outbid others to buy that land. Now this ideally only works if we don't have a piece of unclaimed land where someone has already made use of it. At that point we need a different set of criteria and I think Bill's makes the most sense. Better to have some type of "squatter's rights" in this case.

But really there is no more land left that is unclaimed (except the moon, and there is simply zero value or point to owning a piece of the moon since you can't do anything at all with it and there are no moon bases or any practical ability to get there and stay there) so really today the issue of unclaimed land just isn't an issue anymore.

Monday, August 6, 2007 - 6:30am

But really there is no more land left that is unclaimed

The land under the ocean is not claimed - unless you want to consider the UN as making claim.......

Indeed, that is the issue involved by the Russians in claiming the North Pole.....

(Edited by robert malcom on 8/06, 6:32am)

Monday, August 6, 2007 - 10:19am

Do you accept my right to exclude others even though I am making no use of it and intend never to?

Good question, Jon. It is tempting to say that this should not be allowed. But the problem is that when you do that, you are dictating how someone can use his property, and that, as we have seen, has disastrous implications, which I think far outweigh the possibility that with absolute property rights, you may get someone who decides not to develop the land or allow others access to it.

You see the principle underlying all of this is individual autonomy. If you deny the right to the use your property for whatever purpose you see fit, including non-development, then you are saying that someone other than the owner -- the government -- can decide how the property is to be used. But that gives the government the right to determine its use, in which case, the government could, theoretically, put the kind of restrictions on it that you worry about. And we have seen the kind of prohibitions on land development that the government has already imposed, courtesy of the environmentalist movement.

I'd prefer to take my chances with a private owner. At least in that case, there is a market incentive working against this kind of non-use: Others can offer to buy the property at a handsome price, if the present owner agrees to drop the covenants barring its development. There is considerably less likelihood of the non-use of land becoming a problem under private ownership than there is under public ownership, in which the government can impose non-use restrictions on the entire economy. At least, a private owner can't do that. He is restricted to the use of his own property and could even be persuaded to sell the property if the price is right.

- Bill

Monday, August 6, 2007 - 6:33pm

Or, alternatively, one could go with a Georgist solution. In brief, Henry George pointed out that the value of a piece of land, as such (minus the improvements) is created largely by the uses of the land surrounding it - the community. Thus, the value of ownership of land is unearned value, under this premise. Or rather, the value is unearned by the land owner, but is actually earned by the community as a whole.

Clearly there are exceptions to this, and it apparently fails to recognize the value of the real estate developer or speculator in analyzing land value, both present and projected and acting accordingly to bring resources to bear upon development. However, there are a host of problems with the absolute ownership concept, some of which have already been addressed. Why is my desire to use the land as a work of art of lessor or greater validity than your desire to strip mine it for the coal?

And, if you did mine the land and create a great hole, might you not also disturb the local water table, either lowering it or - as has happened repeatedly in states such as Montana, among many others - polluting it for all the users with wells, thereby injuring or destroying a thriving cattle or farm industry? Who owned that water? When you own a piece of land, how far down do the rights go, BTW?

If they go all the way to the center of the earth in a conic section, as would seem only to be fair, respecting other adjoining properties, then do you have the right to take that whole conic section, perhaps using the proposed space elevator, into space, leaving an enormous hole and an opening for raw magma to bubble up through - i.e., a super volcano? Perhaps this would be what you want; as the liquid magma pours into your hole, you send it out into space to build more O'Neil colonies, but to the definite detriment of your adjoining neighbors...

As to the technology of property, clearly that is what we are discussing. It is not enough to simply declare that the right to material property flows from the right to take the actions necessary to sustain ones life. That much is clear, but it is only the first step, as has been demonstrated by the discussion so far. What is needed is a technology that correctly, rationally determines the validity of a title to property, its boundaries, both physical and in terms of usage, and provides a set of institutions and procedures capable of enforcing rational decisions as to resolution of conflicting claims.

I suggest that a nice place to start in this analysis might be with Spencer MacCallum's "The Art of Community." Take a look at his analysis of how the nation-state may have arrisen out of the conflict over the water of the Tigris Euphrates. When these issues lack a technology for resolution, which starts, of course, with a philosophy that correctly analyzes the fundamental issues, then the natural course is the resort to violence.

Monday, August 6, 2007 - 9:41pm

Thanks, Bill

We agree on that.

One question, and please, anyone who knows, do weigh in:

Bill wrote, �there is a market incentive working against this kind of non-use: Others can offer to buy the property at a handsome price, if the present owner agrees to drop the covenants barring its development.�

Can that happen�and if so, how/why? I was under the impression that this can�t happen as the law is today. For example, a person cannot buy a home with a covenant-burdened deed, erase the covenants and resell, can they?! (Can a person erase covenants that THEY created, but that the next and subsequent owners cannot?)

Bill, perhaps you would argue for erasable covenants, or you just don�t know, like me? (My guess is that covenants are permanent, so that if I place zero-use covenants on my natural tract of land, it�s a done-deal short of an Act of Congress.)

Monday, August 6, 2007 - 11:14pm

Jon,

I was referring to the owner who created the covenants and who was offering to sell his land only on the condition that the buyer except the sale with the covenants attached to it. A prospective buyer could make the owner a conditional offer to buy the property at a higher price if the owner dropped the covenant requirement. The owner could drop it, since it was he who created it as one of the conditions of sale. I'm talking about before he sells it to anyone.

- Bill

Tuesday, August 7, 2007 - 8:20pm

I'm reminded of "Hitchhikers' Guide to the Galaxy." Suppose this land - i.e., our solar system, Milky Way galaxy, local galactic cluster, or bubble universe were in fact claimed - even created or manipulated by some other intelligence. In that case, we are all trespassers, right? At the very least, it would seem that the rightful owners could tell us to get the Hell off their property... One could only imagine what kind of title covenants might be involved.

Tuesday, August 7, 2007 - 11:41pm

Phil,

First of all, it wouldn't serve our interest to obey them if they told us to leave, even assuming it were possible for us to go somewhere else.

Secondly, it wouldn't be in their interest to evict us. They'd have nothing to gain by doing so. Even if they could do everything better than we could -- even if they had an absolute advantage in all lines of production -- it would still be to their comparative advantage to trade with us (see David Ricardo for further details on the law of comparative advantage), so there would be no reason to force us off the planet.

You have to assume that anyone who was intelligent enough to have created earth or to supervise it from some other part of the galaxy would also be intelligent enough to recognize the value of human civilization and to allow it to flourish.

- Bill

Wednesday, August 8, 2007 - 6:07pm

Not necessarily true. Suppose that you are the European or Maori who discovers Vanuatu, with three thousand years of isolation and a universal culture of ritual murder, canibalism, and deep superstition. You realize that you could use the islands to create a great naval or shipping base - as was being proposed, in fact, by the libertarians who temporarily overthrew the socialist government there in the early '80's. But the natives are in the way, taking every chance to raise their prestige as a "Big Man," in their particular tribe by killing you or your compadres and hauling your body back to be the centerpiece of a feast in their honor.

So, is it worth it to you to try to civilize these people, given the time, resources and risks? Aren't there a thousand better investments awaiting your limited time and money? Wouldn't you be better off just introducing smallpox or influenza and then moving in after the holocaust?

I don't know, but I would suggest that any civilization capable of interstellar travel would have little or nothing that they would want from a bunch of superstitious, violent savages, which is how we would appear to them, even at our best.

Assuming that they had no prior property claim, they would likely buy us off for the equivalent of some shiny beads - indefinite life extension, a VR paradise in which our every whim is magically carried out, etc. I'm assuming that a truly advanced civilization would be ethical - they wouldn't just exterminate us as annoying vermin, unless we gave them cause...

However, if they did have a valid prior claim, and we just happened to evolve due to their having neglected their property for a few hundred millions of years because of more interesting and lucrative projects, then why would they go to all the trouble of buying us off, educating us to the point of marginal rationality, etc.? They could much more easily just replicate themselves, already educated and capable and rational.

Wednesday, August 8, 2007 - 6:53pm

Anyway, here's what I think may be more in the direction of a workable concept of "property," based on the more general concept of fairness.

You are always free to bid for the exclusive right to use something as you see fit, for whatever purpose you choose. If someone else outbids you, then too bad. There are no favorites, just cold cash, which goes into a community pool in the form of a shareholding enterprise, in which probably everyone has one share - no more and no less. This takes care of the problem of poverty, pretty much, as so long as the community as a whole is lucrative and successful, even the bums who sit on their tuchases and booze it up will have enough to keep from starving - and possibly quite a bit more, depending upon how productive everyone else is.

You don't own anything "permanently." Your purchase is bounded in both space and time, and you also didn't just somehow drop out of reality regarding your responsibilities not to infringe upon your neighbors, meaning that you keep your pollution, noise, etc., on your own property except as freely negotiated with your neighbors, the waste disposal companies, etc. If you create risks for your neighbors, then you are liable for bonds or insurance to cover those risks, as well.

All this is only fair. Anything you claim as property was taken from the commons and denies everyone else that chance by the very nature of the exclusive claim. That's why you have to compensate them, first by your bid and secondly by dealing with all prior use claims in an equitable manner.

However, the neat thing is that having handled all that, you are not in a state of conflict with anyone who is rational, anyway, and you can do whatever you want.

Wednesday, August 8, 2007 - 6:55pm

Phil, what are you going on about? Extraterrestrials laying a claim to Earth? Interstellar travel? yeesh, you might wanna lay off the sci fi stuff for a bit.

Wednesday, August 8, 2007 - 7:28pm

Not only is John right, Shiva has the prior claim, although Yahweh has some good lawyers filing suit.

It is expected that Osiris will pronounce judgment before Ragnarok.

Thursday, August 9, 2007 - 8:31pm

Nice to see that someone else here has a sense of humor...