Voter ID vs Carry ID

[ferric021]

Stemming from another thread (http://www.mnguntalk.com/viewtopic.php?f=21&t=33826&st=0&sk=t&sd=a) it seemed prudent to move this discussion to its own thread, I'd like to discuss the idea of comparing the Voter ID law to the Minnesota Carry law and its ID requirements.

Our language has devolved to the point where rights, privileges, and immunities are all lumped together under the term 'right'. However they are all quite different.

Not everyone has the right to vote in a US election. Only citizens can.
However, anyone occupying US soil anywhere on the planet has the right to defend themself against unlawful violence, regardless of their citizenship status or any other qualifiers.

Right are attributes recognized by our government as possessed by all people.
Privileges are attributes associated with citizenship or other qualifiers, and are granted by the government.

Despite the common term 'right to vote', it is in fact a privilege. Language matters - we should make a point to use it correctly.

This post pointed out that the 'right' to vote is not technically a constitutional 'right' and though I am not a lawyer I disagree, and maybe a lawyer will jump on and point to evidence to make this discussion trivial.

I found this link with a quick google search:
http://www.usconstitution.net/constnot.html#vote

The Right To Vote
The Constitution contains many phrases, clauses, and amendments detailing ways people cannot be denied the right to vote. You cannot deny the right to vote because of race or gender. Citizens of Washington DC can vote for President; 18-year-olds can vote; you can vote even if you fail to pay a poll tax. The Constitution also requires that anyone who can vote for the "most numerous branch" of their state legislature can vote for House members and Senate members.
Note that in all of this, though, the Constitution never explicitly ensures the right to vote, as it does the right to speech, for example. It does require that Representatives be chosen and Senators be elected by "the People," and who comprises "the People" has been expanded by the aforementioned amendments several times. Aside from these requirements, though, the qualifications for voters are left to the states. And as long as the qualifications do not conflict with anything in the Constitution, that right can be withheld. For example, in Texas, persons declared mentally incompetent and felons currently in prison or on probation are denied the right to vote. It is interesting to note that though the 26th Amendment requires that 18-year-olds must be able to vote, states can allow persons younger than 18 to vote, if they chose to.

This is in a section of what things are NOT in the US Constitution.

However, I don't think that missing an explicit law stating 'the people have the right to vote' changes anything, due to the wording in the US Constition for the numerous amendments (such as the 26th amendment below) very clearly calls the right to vote a 'right':
http://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/amendmentxxvi

SECTION 1.
The right of citizens of the United States, who are 18 years of age or older, to vote, shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or any state on account of age.
SECTION 2.
The Congress shall have the power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

Now let's look at the 17th amendment:
http://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/amendmentxvii

The Senate of the United States shall be composed of two Senators from each state, elected by the people thereof, for six years; and each Senator shall have one vote. The electors in each state shall have the qualifications requisite for electors of the most numerous branch of the state legislatures.
When vacancies happen in the representation of any state in the Senate, the executive authority of such state shall issue writs of election to fill such vacancies: Provided, that the legislature of any state may empower the executive thereof to make temporary appointments until the people fill the vacancies by election as the legislature may direct.
This amendment shall not be so construed as to affect the election or term of any Senator chosen before it becomes valid as part of the Constitution.

In my reading, this amendment clearly gives the right to vote for senators to 'the people' but then goes on to basically give the states the right to decide who the people are based on who is allowed to vote for the most numerous branch of the state legislatures.

Article I section 2 of the US constitution states:
http://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/articlei#section2

The House of Representatives shall be composed of members chosen every second year by the people of the several states, and the electors in each state shall have the qualifications requisite for electors of the most numerous branch of the state legislature.

This states that the members of the House of Representatives shall be chosen by 'the people' but once again continues to give the States the right to define who 'the people' exactly are.

Now let's look at the 2nd amendment:
http://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/second_amendment

A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.

According to the amendment, 'the people' have the right to keep and bear arms, but I don't believe anywhere in the US Constitution does it say 'anyone occupying US soil' has the right to keep and bear arms. Not only that, but as far as I understand there are no clauses which state how to define 'the people' in this sense or exactly which 'arms' can they bear, at which point I believe the 10th amendment takes over and gives the states the right to define 'the people' who have the right to keep and bear which 'arms' correct? Therefore it seems reasonable that according to the US Constitution the States have the right to determine for themselves whether or not the people are defined by civilians with state-issued IDs and background checks and permits to keep and bear arms. Right?

So with this said, and knowing that I believe it is perfectly reasonable for the State of Minnesota to decide whether or not photo IDs should be required for either the right to vote or the right to carry a firearm as per the US Constition, how do you think these two ideas compare? Don't you think even a little that enacting laws to require IDs for things like voting will set the precedence that IDs should be required for everything else? Of course, everything else already DOES require an ID, but adding one more ID requirement doesn't help, right?

How about a facetious question: Do you think the MN carry law would be more reasonable if they only allow people carrying firearms to be stopped to verify that they are not in the country illegally?

I think my view that the stop to ID portion of the MN carry law is reasonable will put me in a minority group on this forum, but there it is.

[fuller malarkey]

"The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state ....'

The Constitution mentions "the right to vote" five times. The Voting Rights Act of 1965 did away with putting stipulations of possessions on the right to vote.

The Declaration of Independence will affirm that liberty is an inalienable right. Nonetheless, certain crimes will put you in prison, which deprives you of liberty.

Does that transform liberty from a right into a privilege? No.

None of our rights are spelled out specifically in the constitution. It states what won't be denied or abridged. Note, post World War II, we imposed a constitution on Japan providing that "universal adult suffrage is guaranteed." I wonder why they felt that necessary to declare.....

Edited to ad content

[infidel]

[quote=Fuller wrote:]"The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state ....'

The Constitution mentions "the right to vote" five times. The Voting Rights Act of 1965 did away with putting stipulations of possessions on the right to vote.

The Declaration of Independence will affirm that liberty is an inalienable right. Nonetheless, certain crimes will put you in prison, which deprives you of liberty.

Does that transform liberty from a right into a privilege? No.

None of our rights are spelled out specifically in the constitution. It states what won't be denied or abridged. Note, post World War II, we imposed a constitution on Japan providing that "universal adult suffrage is guaranteed." I wonder why they felt that necessary to declare.....

Edited to ad content[/quote]

Since illegal aliens do not have the same rights as citizens, not everyone is entitled to the same "rights".

[ferric021]

So assuming they are both rights, is there a legal difference between the act of legally voting and the act of legally carrying an open firearm that would either way justify a requirement for a state-issued ID for one of these actions but not the other. I already mentioned in the other thread (now I regret trying to migrate this discussion to a new thread to prevent a derailment of ideas) that I agree with your assessment that driving with a license more appropriately matches carrying a firearm with a license than does the voter ID law. But at the same time, driving seems to me to be what SHOULD be the 'least' protected action of the 3, yet its the one with the strictest non-intrusion protection.

[infidel]

ferric021 wrote: How about a facetious question: Do you think the MN carry law would be more reasonable if they only allow people carrying firearms to be stopped to verify that they are not in the country illegally?

You cannot conceal driving a car. If you do get pulled over without an ID, you are going to spend some time trying to identify yourself regardless.

ETA: I misquoted the wrong member.

[Heffay]

Since illegal aliens do not have the same rights as citizens, not everyone is entitled to the same "rights".

So, you're saying not all men are created equal?

[fuller malarkey]

Fuller wrote: How about a facetious question: Do you think the MN carry law would be more reasonable if they only allow people carrying firearms to be stopped to verify that they are not in the country illegally?

You cannot conceal driving a car. If you do get pulled over without an ID, you are going to spend some time trying to identify yourself regardless.

I didn't post this facetious question.

[fuller malarkey]

So assuming they are both rights, is there a legal difference between the act of legally voting and the act of legally carrying an open firearm that would either way justify a requirement for a state-issued ID for one of these actions but not the other. I already mentioned in the other thread (now I regret trying to migrate this discussion to a new thread to prevent a derailment of ideas) that I agree with your assessment that driving with a license more appropriately matches carrying a firearm with a license than does the voter ID law. But at the same time, driving seems to me to be what SHOULD be the 'least' protected action of the 3, yet its the one with the strictest non-intrusion protection.

The way the above quote is constructed, it is difficult to address without chancing a mis-intended response. I could be trying to answer a question that wasn't asked, to explain a situation that wasn't given.

But I'm game.

I'll start with the above in red. In this example, [a good one, BTW] the rights that come into play are covered in the Fourth Amendment, and apply to our rights of privacy. Driving isn't a right. However, simply being out of your house is not a forfeit of the rights we do have. No one questions that the State may require the licensing of those who drive on its highways and the registration of vehicles which are driven on those highways. If it [the state] may insist on these requirements, it obviously may take steps necessary to enforce compliance. The reasonableness of the enforcement measure chosen by the State is tested by weighing its intrusion on the motorists' Fourth Amendment interests against its promotion of the State's legitimate interests. The State's primary interest, however, is in traffic safety, not in apprehending unlicensed motorists for the sake of apprehending unlicensed motorists.

I contend the same rational applies to the licensed/permitted carrier of a weapon. I also have made note that Minnesota jealously guards the citizen's rights to privacy and to travel unimpeded, as evidenced by it's decision to find motorist checkpoints a violation of the constitution, and that by statute, cause must exist in order to initiate a police stop. Minnesota also has not enacted any "stop and identify" statutes, all indicating a high value on personal privacy, protections from unwarranted intrusion.

Several years have passed since the enactment of the Minnesota Personal Protection Act, and in that time, I'm finding little if anything that could be used to support the need for the verbiage in the statute that requires citizens to prove their innocence by allowing unwarranted intrusions and allow them to fully experience the provisions of the Fifth Amendment.

[infidel]

Fuller wrote: How about a facetious question: Do you think the MN carry law would be more reasonable if they only allow people carrying firearms to be stopped to verify that they are not in the country illegally?

You cannot conceal driving a car. If you do get pulled over without an ID, you are going to spend some time trying to identify yourself regardless.

I didn't post this facetious question.

My apologies Fuller. I did misquote you. The quote should be attributed to the OP. I will correct the post.

[jshuberg]

Sorry, didn't mean to stir up trouble. My problem is one of language and of terminology when discussing "rights".

At the time the constitution was ratified, a right was recognized as something granted by the creator, not by the legislature, and it applies to all people everywhere (although not all governments recognize all rights). A right is something that you can exercise without requiring anyone else to perform an action in order to exercise that right. A good government will recognize these rights, and understand that because they were not the grantors of the right, that they do not have the power to restrict or otherwise infringe on that right without some form of due process, or else they become tyrannical.

A privilege was something granted by the legislature, not by the creator. It is a man made construct, or something that is performed within a man-made framework. Because it is granted by the legislature, the legislature can limit, restrict, infringe, or even eliminate the privilege at any time.

There was a very distinct difference between a right and a privilege, and this is evidenced in the founding documents. Ours was the first (and I believe still the only) government that acknowledges in their core documents that a right is granted by the creator (or inherent in being a human being for the atheists out there) not the legislature, and any attempt to infringe those rights would be an act of tyranny. This recognition that the government is not all-powerful is one of the main reasons that the US flourished and became a symbol of freedom for oppressed people all over the world.

At some point though, the distinction between a right and a privilege was muddied. People now refer to what were simply called rights as "fundamental rights" and what were called privileges as "legal rights". Most of the time the distinction is lost all together, and the term "right" is simply used without clarifying which modern sub-type they are talking about. In the 1800s if you asked someone what the difference between a right and a privilege was, chances are you would get a pretty good answer. If you were to ask someone today the difference between a fundamental right and a legal right, changes are you'd get a blank stare. Most people in fact don't even realize that there are 2 sub-types of the modern term "right", with significantly different meanings.

So, I have decided that whenever someone refers to a privilege as a right, or confuses fundamental with legal rights, that I point out the distinction. The reason I feel compelled to do so is that I think it's important for the "common man" to understand that rights are outside the scope of the legislature to restrict or infringe on in any way. This is in fact the core from which all our freedoms and liberties are derived, and I believe that the distinction between a right and a privilege should be emphasized by using different terms. While today it is perfectly correct to refer to the ability to vote as either a legal right or as a privilege (or more specifically as an entitlement), I prefer the term privilege as it emphasizes there is a difference between it and a "fundamental right". I believe that to simply use the term "right" to describe voting is in fact incorrect, as in doing so you are using a term that historically means something entirely different.

People have a right to self defense, and to bear arms to do so.
People have a right to have a representative in the government, which is an extension of the right to own property. When the government takes a persons property in the form of taxation, he has a right to a voice in how his property is used. This right to representation is also described as suffrage.
People have an entitlement to vote. An entitlement being a type of privilege where a process or system is established by the government for the exercising the privilege.
The writ of Habeas Corpus (which is the foundation of our legal system) is in fact a privilege, and is specifically stated to be in the constitution.

The "right" to bear arms and the "right" to vote are two entirely different things. One is recognized by the government, and one is granted by the government. One is fundamental, the other legal. If the state feels that it's appropriate to require an ID to exercise a right, it should not be inappropriate to also require an ID to exercise a privilege.

Here's a similar discussion from awhile back with some links: viewtopic.php?f=58&t=32728&st=0&sk=t&sd=a&start=30#p372886

[ferric021]

Sorry, didn't mean to stir up trouble. My problem is one of language and of terminology when discussing "rights".

I didn't mean to suggest any of your points were trouble, it is interesting to discuss and we obviously disagree which makes it worth discussing.

At the time the constitution was ratified, a right was recognized as something granted by the creator, not by the legislature, and it applies to all people everywhere (although not all governments recognize all rights). A right is something that you can exercise without requiring anyone else to perform an action in order to exercise that right. A good government will recognize these rights, and understand that because they were not the grantors of the right, that they do not have the power to restrict or otherwise infringe on that right without some form of due process, or else they become tyrannical.

This seems to be a statement loaded with philosophical ideas. The problem I have with this statement is that everyone has a different idea of what rights are inherent to all humans.

Would you consider the whole "Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness" to be amongst those Rights granted by the creater as they are declared to be in the Declaration of Independence?
If so, does that mean you must be anti-prison and anti-capital punishment? Capital Punishment would destroy all 3 of those rights I list here, and would also destroy the right to self defense as well. How many inmates on death row are given the right to bear arms against the state or the operators of the state carrying out the execution? Why is the US government not tyrannical for imposing laws that restrict the liberty of men in prison? Do you believe the US government is tyrannical for destroying the life of inmates on death row?
Depending on your personal definition of 'liberty' you may not include imprisonment as something that detracts from a person's control over their actions. But how about mood-altering drugs given to psychological patients? Is that tyrannical?

I guess in the end, my opinion is that anything deemed an 'unalienable right' or a 'basic human right' (such as the right to self defense) is only deemed as such by a governing power, and whomever they choose to credit that right to (whether a 'creator' or all humans based on them being human) is up to the governing body to credit it to, but this does not change its status as a right compared to other rights that are credited to the government in and of itself (such as the right to vote).

[Edit: I do like to hear your perspective, I just fundamentally disagree.]

[jshuberg]

Fundamental human rights can be denied a person by due process of law. A person in prison does not enjoy the rights you and I do. I do not believe that there are any rights that are absolute and cannot be revoked by due process of law.

Rights are things that a person can enjoy without having to compel any other person to action to enjoy the right.
Rights cannot be denied to any class or group of people, but only individual persons by due process of law.
Rights do not require any specific form of government or any other man-made construct to be in place to enjoy.
Rights are not granted by a government, merely recognized by it.

Privileges are things a person can enjoy that may require another person take some action in order to enjoy the privilege.
Privileges can be denied to specific classes of people without due process of law - non-citizens for example.
Privileges may require a specific form of government or other man made construct to be in place to enjoy.
Privileges are granted by the government, persons or peoples, and they can be restricted, changed or revoked by the same.

Entitlements are a type of privilege where the government is legally compelled to provide a service to those people who meet the criteria of the privilege.

Sometimes determining whether something is a right or a privilege can get tricky. The right to suffrage (or representation) was determined to be an extension of property rights, and that property rights extend beyond the tax collector to the entity that performs the taxation. However, without a representational form of government suffrage may have no meaning, so it does meet some of the criteria to be a right, but not all. Nevertheless, the founders decided to consider suffrage to be a fundamental right.

Voting on the other hand meets none of the criteria for what is a right. It is actually specified in the MN constitution as an entitlement. Only under the more modern, broader definition of "right" that includes privileges (legal rights) is voting ever referred to as a right. It is most definitely not a fundamental right. In fact, while the US constitution in several amendments specifies that the right to vote cannot be denied a person based on a particular criteria (age, race, sex) it is in fact never explicitly stated to actually be a right in and of itself. The fact that the "right" to vote can be denied entire groups of people (non-US citizens) is conclusive evidence that voting is not a fundamental right. It is a legal right, a privilege, or an entitlement.

There have been efforts to try to amend the constitution to explicitly state that the legal right to vote exists, but so far has gone nowhere:

Most Americans believe the legal right to vote in our democracy is explicit (not just implicit) in our Constitution and laws. However, our Constitution only provides for nondiscrimination in voting on the basis of race, sex, and age in the 15th, 19th and 26th Amendments respectively. The U.S. Constitution contains no explicit right to vote!

http://archive.democrats.com/view.cfm?id=12581

A person should be cautious when reading the constitution, or any early documents concerning rights and distinguish that historically the term "right" referred only to what we now call "fundamental rights", and that the term "privilege" referred to what we now call "legal rights". The modern term "right" may refer to the original meaning of the term "right", or it may also mean legal right, or what was historically referred to as a privilege, immunity, or entitlement.

I avoid calling anything a "right" unless it is actually a "fundamental right", so as to distinguish it from being a privilege and eliminate the ambiguity. If we lose the distinction between rights and privileges, then we may find ourselves with a government (or population) that thinks it has the power to legislate away our rights, which it absolutely does not.

[grousemaster]

Since illegal aliens do not have the same rights as citizens, not everyone is entitled to the same "rights".

So, you're saying not all men are created equal?

yea, or something....

[texasprowler]

Interesting explanation of right vs privilege. It doesn't seem to work when you consider that the Brady Act denies the right to own a firearm to noncitizens, thereby making firearm ownership just a privilege, given the aforementioned rules.

[jshuberg]

Interesting explanation of right vs privilege. It doesn't seem to work when you consider that the Brady Act denies the right to own a firearm to noncitizens, thereby making firearm ownership just a privilege, given the aforementioned rules.

I think you misunderstand. What a particular Government does or does not do has absolutely nothing to do with what rights a person has. Some Governments may violate a persons rights, but that doesn't change the fact that the right exists.

For example, people have the right to own property, and to prevent it from being taken from them unlawfully. Under a communist form of Government a person can have their property taken from them by the state. This doesn't mean people living in the USSR didn't have the right to own property, it meant that the USSR was a tyrannical government. It meant that they violated the rights of their people.

All people have the right to bear arms. Everywhere in the world. Under any form of Government. Most Governments in the world today deny this right to their people, or at least infringe on it's exercise. If we denied the right to own firearms to non citizens, it wouldn't change the fact that it's a right, it would indicate that the state is engaged in violating that right.

I also think you're confused about the Brady Act. Non-citizens are absolutely allowed to own firearms. I know several Canadian citizens who own firearms living here in the US. The Brady Act *does* prevent those who had been US citizens who have denounced their citizenship from owning firearms.