From: Tim Griffiths <T.G.Griffiths@exeter.ac.uk>
Date: Fri, 31 Oct 1997 21:04:43 +0800
To: Tim May <tcmay@got.net>
Subject: Re: Terrorism is a NON-THREAT (fwd)
In-Reply-To: <v03102808b07e5e475a19@[207.167.93.63]>
Message-ID: <6f5aafe147%Tim@tim01.ex.ac.uk>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain



Tim May wrote:

> At 8:11 AM -0700 10/30/97, Tim Griffiths wrote:
> 
> > We hear on TV etc people saying "If this draconian measure saves the
> > life of one innocent child its worth the loss of my right to walk in
> > the park, or whatever". This is clearly shit, but can people suggest a
> > sensible measure of when new legistlation is justified?
> 
> Is this a trick question, or sumpin'?
> 
> If not, then the answer is "the Constitution."

 I was trying to start from somewhere more fundamental than the
 Constitution, but if I understand you, you're saying that an arbitary, 
 allbeit 'self-evident', set of limitations are set down (i.e. the US
 Constitution) at some point in time and no new laws should be made that
 contradict this set of rules.
 By doing this, aren't we putting a dictatorial limit on whatever
 democracy we come up with? In effect saying "we're all equal under God,
 and God wrote the Constitution"?                            
 
> (I see that T.G.Griffiths@exeter.ac.uk is not an American. I apologize for
> my U.S.-centric response. Consult your local Charter or whatever to see if
> similar rights are spelled out. I suspect most adhocracies do not have
> rights clearly spelled out, modulo the irony that several people's
> republics have had nominally more rights-ensuring constitutions than the
> U.S. has had.)

No, this is the UK, we don't get rights here. Well, not quite true - for
example we do get the right to bear arms (1888 - can't recall the Act
offhand, but can find it). However, Her Maj. Gov reserves the right to tell
us exactly _which_ arms we can bear, which is why I've just handed my
beloved handguns in.
What we do get is more and more US-style laws being passed here, but
without the protection of a Constitution, e.g. looks like we'll get
Megan's Law shortly, but without a constitutionally-given right to privacy.

Tim G.