Tuesday, June 17, 2014

Human Rights = Property Rights

Come on baby dry your eyes
Wipe your tears
Never like to see you cry
--Human League

I have seen this quote from former Supreme Court Justice George Sutherland before and thought I had it recorded in these pages--but apparently not. Currently I am unable to find the original source but pretty sure I will run across it (again).

Justice Sutherland well captures the inseparabililty of human rights and property rights:

"It is not the right of property which is protected, but the right to property. Property, per se, has no rights; but the individual--the man--has three great rights, equally sacred from arbitrary interference: the right to his life, the right to his liberty, the right to his property...The three rights are so bound together to be essentially one right. To give a man his life but deny him his liberty, is to take from him all that is worth living. To give him his liberty but take from him the property which is the fruit and badge of his liberty, is to still leave him a slave."

These pages have concluded similarly (e.g., here, here). Rothbard also offers perspective.

1 comment:

dgeorge12358 said...

Liberty is always freedom from the government.
~Ludwig von Mises