Reply #186: Clear thinking ... [View All]

>> If I drive drunk on an empty road, how does that endanger the public? Answer: it doesn't, except in your imagination. It can't: the road is empty. So driving drunk IN AND OF ITSELF is not dangerous, yet our freedom to do it is curtailed by law.

If you drive drunk on a truly empty road, you won't get arrested. The presence of the arresting officer necessarily precludes the "empty road" defense. Additionally, driving drunk is a danger to people and property that might approach you unexpectedly on an otherwise empty road. Ultimately, there is no "right" to drive drunk (or even to drive at all)... thus the government needs only a legitimately enacted law to prohibit drunk driving.

This is not a situation which is analogous to the right to reproductive freedom. Reproductive freedom is protected under the 14th amendment to the Constitution, and thus no law, enacted legitimately or otherwise, may curtail that right barring a constitutional amendment. A limited government must be granted the authority to take certain actions, and American government has not been granted the authority to sterilize the population.

>> You have no problem accepting all sorts of restrictions on your behavior including many that make no damned sense at all, but you apparently get the creeping grues at the thought of a small, sensible restriction to prevent overpopulation.

This is fairly rudimentary constiutional law and political theory here. "Certain behaviors" are not protected to the extent that reproductive freedom is. Restrictions on random behavior (i.e. traffic laws, drinking, drugs, etc.) that are not protected by the Constitution need not make any "damned sense" in order to be legitimately enacted -- they require only a majority vote of the governing body. Certain behaviors (such as the right to bear arms, reproductive freedom, speech, search & seizure, etc.) require higher standards in order to be legitimately enacted. There is no standard under which a Forcible Sterilization can be legitimately enacted.

Additionally, even if the ability to limit reproductive freedom were granted the federal government, there is a Constitutional doctrine known as "least restrictive means" ... i.e. even in a justified use of authority, a government cannot be excessively restrictive when there are less restrictive alternatives. You suggestion of forcible sterilization is neither "small" nor "sensible". Forcible sterilization simply cannot be legally enacted in this country under any current doctrine or reasonable interpretation of the Constitution.

Z