The fact is that the States cannot deny someone the right to vote based on race, gender, etc.. but it is up to the states whether you can even vote at all. They give you the right to vote. If they choose not to, that is up to them. The Federal Government cannot come in and require they give all citizens the right to vote.

Again, I will give you that little quote from the Supreme Court, in case you missed it: “The individual citizen has no federal constitutional right to vote for electors for the President of the United States.”

You and he would have been right if you said simply “there is no Constitutional right to vote in federal presidential elections,” but the statement “there is no right to vote” is wrong for several reasons.

1. There is a right to vote in federal presidential elections. It is established at the state level by state constitutions or state statutes. Every state has done this and any citizen in any state who is arbitrarily denied the right to vote has a claim under state law.

2. There is a Constitutional right to vote in federal elections for House Representatives. I cited U.S. Const., Art. I, § 2.

3. There is a Constitutional right to vote in federal elections for Senate. I cited U.S. Const., amend 17, cl 1.

Do you understand these three points and why your repeated statement “there is no right to vote” is incorrect? What is your background, anyway? Do you have any real legal training beyond reading libertarian blogs? I can only assume from your comments that you have only a lay person understanding of the law, and not even a very good lay understanding.

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Your fundamental misunderstanding, as well as Dan’s, stems from your inability to grasp my most basic point: the word “right” has many different meanings. That word is not limited to definition #1 (as I defined above) or definition #2. I know this is a somewhat complicated philosophical area, but I didn’t think it would be this hard for you to get.

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As for public education, it is also a right. No, the federal Constitution does not establish it as a right, but most state Constitutions do. I live in Pennsylvania, for example, and the Pennsylvania Constitution requires the state to provide public education. “The General Assembly shall provide for the maintenance and support of a thorough and efficient system of public education to serve the needs of the Commonwealth.” PA Const. Art. III, § 14

Check your own state constitution or statutes and I bet you find some provision that requires the state to provide public education.

If you don’t understand the simple concept that “right” can be more than just “federal Constitutional right,” then you may not understand this either. I don’t know how to make it any easier for you to understand, though.

If we have a right to vote, I wonder why felons cannot vote in most states. I also wonder why many groups want a constitutional ammendment to guarantee a persons right to vote if that right already exists.

You can rant on and on and on but the law is the law is the law is the law. I guess if the Supreme Court doesn’t convince him, nothing will.

This is Legal Girl, signing off. Your understanding is my success.

“Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of Electors, equal to the whole Number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in the Congress…” U.S. Const., Art. II, § 1.

Every state has established by statute that popular vote will be the manner of directing the electors. A right established by statute is still a right. This is what I was talking about when I said this kind of thing may be too deep for amateur Con law.

So that takes care of a right to vote (although it is statutory or state-level and not Constitutional) in presidential elections. What about other federal elections?

“The House of Representatives shall be composed of Members chosen every second Year by the People of the several States.” U.S. Const., Art. I, § 2.

“The Senate of the United States shall be composed of two Senators from each State, elected by the people thereof.” U.S. Const., amend 17, cl 1.

Yeah, those are definitely guaranteed by the federal Constitution.

Your Bush v. Gore point is entirely irrelevant to this discussion, Dude. If you read what I was writing, I was not talking about a Constitutional right in definition #3. What about that is not getting through to you? I’m not saying that an uninsured person in the US has standing to sue the government in federal court for denying the constitutional right to health care. Is that what you got from reading what I wrote?

Speaking of polls, though, this one shows just how crazy our country has become.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2010-03-22/scary-new-gop-poll/?cid=hp:mainpromo2

The Republican Party went totally off the rails in trying to defeat this legislation. Instead of pointing out the parts where they disagreed with the Democrats’ proposal or where they had alternate proposals, they fueled all sorts of ridiculous anti-government, anti-Obama anger. It’s the kind of irrational babble that has been happening on this blog (e.g. “the president hates profitable corporations”). Just look at how nutty Republicans have gotten:

67% of Republicans believe that Obama is a Socialist.
57% believe that Obama is a Muslim.
45% say that Obama was “not born in the United States and is not eligible to be president.”
38% say that Obama is “doing many of the things Hitler did.”
24% say that Obama “may be the Antichrist.”

Maybe some of this craziness will cool off now that the matter is settled. Meanwhile, these completely ignorant people are saying they disapprove of the bill when they clearly have no idea what it is and what it does.

I said that there are lots of ways to define the word “right” when you asked if I thought health care was a right. These are the three alternatives that I identified:

1. Enumerated rights in the Constitution, like the right of free speech.
2. Implied rights in the Constitution, like the right of privacy
3. Philosophical rights, things that are desirable or valued

Although I think there is a case for the second one, it requires more than a lay person’s understanding of Constitutional law (it requires a willingness to study Constitutional jurisprudence and not just listen to what commentators say about it). The case for viewing the “right to health care” in the context of definition #2 is good, but it is not compelling, and I am willing to drop it for the sake of our discussion here because it is creating problems for you.

Under the third definition, yes, I think access to health care is absolutely a right. Society has already accepted this with laws that require hospitals to treat sick and injured patients who show up. If we viewed health care as a privilege, some hospital administrator could turn away sick, injured, and dying people who might not be able to pay. Thank goodness we don’t live in that world. This reform legislation modifies the way society as a whole takes care of a certain class of people (those who are above the poverty line, so do not qualify for current public programs, but do not have the resources to pay for private insurance). Now, instead of treating these people when they show up at the hospital with massive issues, they will have insurance covered access to preventative care and primary care physicians.

Increasing access to health insurance is a desirable thing, and it has nothing to do with the Constitution under this definition. It is a right that should be guaranteed to every person, in my opinion.

An analogy might be the right to have food to eat. It isn’t a right under definition #1 and nobody I know is making an argument for it being a right under #2, but it is something that we guarantee in this country. We have food stamp programs and other assistance programs that make sure that people can buy food to eat because we don’t want them starving on the streets in the wealthiest nation in the world. There are countries without safety nets like this and people really do starve. That’s why we started putting social safety nets in place during the Great Depression. There is very little difference between that kind of safety net (that guarantees people can survive with food to eat) and extending health insurance coverage to needy families (so they can survive illness and injury). You may have dreams of doing away with the entire welfare state, but don’t hold your breath. In this universe, time runs forward, and that debate has already been resolved definitively.

Personally I think it would be better if the government ran health care like a utility company and got rid of the insurance companies. Private industry in health care has been a failure in this country. This is one of the few areas where socialism has been shown to work. This middle of the road shit is helpful – and moves us in the right direction, but it’s far more complicated than it needs to be. I predict a big confusing mess coming this way. But that’s life.

Opinions on health care were so divergent, I don’t think it would be possible to come up with a system that a majority agreed on. We’re lucky to get this. Now, if we can just clean it up and forge it into something better…