Inalienable right

The term inalienable rights (or unalienable rights) refers to a set of human rights that are absolute, not awarded by human power, not transferable to another power, and incapable of repudiation. Several different sets of inalienable rights have been suggested by philosophers and politicians.

Origins

It has been argued that the idea of inalienable rights is derived from the freeborn rights claimed by the Englishman John Lilburne in his conflict with both the monarchy of King Charles I and the military dictatorship of the republic governed by Oliver Cromwell. Lilburne (known as Freeborn John) defined freeborn rights as being rights that every human being is born with, as opposed to rights bestowed by government or by human law.

The concept of inalienable rights is central to the ideology of liberalism. Inalienable rights played important roles in the justifications for both the French and American Revolutions. 17th-century philosopher John Locke discussed the idea of inalienable rights in his work, and identified them as being "life, liberty, and estate (or property)". The 1776 United States Declaration of Independence, written by Thomas Jefferson, famously asserts:

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, 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. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men."

Chief Justice Salmon P. Chase wrote in the case of John Van Zandt, who had been charged with violating the Fugitive Slave Act, that:

"The law of the Creator, which invests every human being with an inalienable title to freedom, cannot be repealed by any interior law which asserts that man is property."

Criticism

Template:Cleanup-sect The concept of inalienable rights has been criticized by Jeremy Bentham and Edmund Burke as groundless. Bentham and Burke claim that rights arise from the actions of government, or evolve from tradition, and neither of these can provide inalienable anything. (See also Bentham's "Critique of the Doctrine of Inalienable, Natural Rights"[1], Burke's "Reflections on the Revolution in France").

The Declaration of Independence says that all men are "endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights." Critics argue ^{[citation needed]} that use of the word "Creator" signifies these rights are based on theological principles, and asks which theological principles those are (since none of the major religions of the world assert the existence of inalienable rights), or why those theological principles should be accepted by people who do not adhere to the religion from which they are derived.

David Hume and G. E. Moore criticize inalienable rights that are said to be based on Natural Law as a non sequitur, deriving an "ought" statement from an "is". (see also the naturalistic fallacy of David Hume and G. E. Moore) . Jonathan Wallace states in his paper "Natural Rights Don't Exist,"[2] that the phrase "We hold these truths to be self-evident" is simply a "more elegant version of 'Because we said so.'"

Jean-Jacques Rousseau states in "The Social Contract" that the existence of inalienable rights is unnecessary for the existence of a constitution or a set of laws and rights. The idea of a social contract – that rights and responsibilities are derived from a consensual contract between the government and the people – is the most widely recognized alternative.

Samuel P. Huntington, an American political scientist, wrote that the "inalienable rights" argument from the Declaration of Independence was necessary because "The British were white, English, and Protestant, just as we were. They had to have some other basis on which to justify independence".

References

Locke, John. Two Treatises on Government. 1690 (primarily the second treatise)
Lloyd Thomas, D.A. Locke on Government. 1995, Routledge. ISBN 0-415-09533-6
Waldron, Jeremy [ed.] Theories of Rights 1984, Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-875063-3

External links

“Natural and Inalienable Right to Freedom” Slaves Petition for Freedom to the Massachusetts Legislature, 1777.
Natural Rights Don't Exist by Jonathan Wallace. The Ethical Spectacle, April 2000.