Topic: Consent of the Governed - page 2. (Read 2795 times)

That reasonable people can't be opposed to the US Civil War in your world view makes me not take you seriously.

What's so difficult to understand about theft? Theft, simply put, is the expropriation of property; viz., without the consent of the owner (not any different than consent of the governed). The only right is that of the owner to restitution (for being put out) and the return of his property. He can aqcuire, if they are willing, the help of others to re-obtain it if necessary, and if truly recidivist, jail the offender.

What you're saying is that 1% disagree that consent is required when obtaining objects (specifically those things which were previously owned). This means that there is only the strong and the weak, and that the strong may take by force, from the weak, those things which may belong to others or until such time as the weak organize and commit the same offense on those who were once their masters.

If that is the case, then there is no meaningful definition of justice or lawfulness or fairness and therefore no need for judges or juries or prosecutors or defenders, as that would make them a mere farcical organization which covers the true purpose of their action - that being to subjugate the weak, and to use deception, pretending that the rule of law was applied.

Is the disagreement that the concept of property doesn't exist?

The right to self-defense.

Nice strawman, though, equating slavery with property rights and attacking Spooner for a position you admit he disagreed with.

Look Spooner up on wikipedia.  He was a great guy but the US Civil War exposed a lot of problems with his logic.  He felt that slavery was wrong and should be abolished.  He felt the Lincoln was pushing the south for reasons that were totally immoral.  He felt that the slave owners had a right to secede rather than lose their property.  He was honest enough to put all this in writing.

Spooner never got over the criminal law question.  99% of people feel that property is a legal right and that if you take it without consent and without legal authority, you deserve to go to jail. 1% do not agree - what gives the 99% the right to jail the 1%? 

Was that meant to be some kind of dig?

Was this something he wrote when he opposed the US Civil War?  My problem with Spooner is he never offers anything better than government by consent.  All you have to do is take a look at Iraq or Afghanistan to see how the US fares when it governs without consent - do you really want to bring that to places like Nebraska?

In re UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

"Obviously there can be no law of treason more stringent than has now been stated, consistently with political liberty. In the very nature of things there can never be any liberty for the weaker party, on any other principle; and political liberty always means liberty for the weaker party. It is only the weaker party that is ever oppressed. The strong are always free by virtue of their superior strength. So long as government is a mere contest as to which of two parties shall rule the other, the weaker must always succumb. And whether the contest be carried on with ballots or bullets, the principle is the same; for under the theory of government now prevailing, the ballot either signifies a bullet, or it signifies nothing. And no one can consistently use a ballot, unless he intends to use a bullet, if the latter should be needed to insure submission to the former.

No attempt or pretence, that was ever carried into practical operation amongst civilized men—unless possibly the pretence of a "Divine Right," on the part of some, to govern and enslave others—embodied so much of shameless absurdity, falsehood, impudence, robbery, usurpation, tyranny, and villany of every kind, as the attempt or pretence of establishing a government by consent, and getting the actual consent of only so many as may be necessary to keep the rest in subjection by force. Such a government is a mere conspiracy of the strong against the weak. It no more rests on consent than does the worst government on earth.

What substitute for their consent is offered to the weaker party, whose rights are thus annihilated, struck out of existence, by the stronger? Only this: Their consent is presumed! That is, these usurpers condescendingly and graciously presume that those whom they enslave, consent to surrender their all of life, liberty, and property into the hands of those who thus usurp dominion over them! And it is pretended that this presumption of their consent—when no actual consent has been given—is sufficient to save the rights of the victims, and to justify the usurpers! As well might the highwayman pretend to justify himself by presuming that the traveller consents to part with his money. As well might the assassin justify himself by simply presuming that his victim consents to part with his life. As well might the holder of chattel slaves attempt to justify himself by presuming that they consent to his authority, and to the whips and the robbery which he practises upon them. The presumption is simply a presumption that the weaker party consent to be slaves.

Such is the presumption on which alone our government relies to justify the power it maintains over its unwilling subjects. And it was to establish that presumption as the inexorable and perpetual law of this country, that so much money and blood have been expended." -- Lysander Spooner

Nothing like stirring the pot eh?