A Bible question!!

[grumbler]

That's not how the law works, however. Maybe you could construe the Ninth Amendment "to mean "people can start fires without restrictions," "people can get wasted on drugs whenever they like" and "people can dance in the middle of busy traffic intersections," but no one with an understanding of how law works would do so. Your argument isn't about the law; it is about your ignorance of how law works.

Learn something about the law, and the history of the law, and you will see how absurd it is to argue that the Ninth Amendment can be construed to be about people having the right to start fires without restrictions.

[Elok]

So...where exactly is the secret handshake or Masonic symbol that indicates the Ninth Amendment is carte blanche for the SCOTUS to make up rights only when they pertain to women and/or their reproductive organs? Is it a well-known part of the English common-law tradition that one-sentence disclaimers put into legal documents to shut up a paranoid faction can be used to justify a radical expansion of power by the judiciary, but only with regards to certain subjects?

[Elok]

Oh, and kudos for that helpful "you need to study law" response. No specific subjects or authors, just "you need to learn about [general subject that has to occupy about an eighth of the entire Library of Congress]." Am I supposed to enroll in law school to achieve closure on this argument with a random stranger I met online, or what?

[Felch]

I'd wager that Grumbler's area of expertise is lex avis.

[giblets]

So...where exactly is the secret handshake or Masonic symbol that indicates the Ninth Amendment is carte blanche for the SCOTUS to make up rights only when they pertain to women and/or their reproductive organs? Is it a well-known part of the English common-law tradition that one-sentence disclaimers put into legal documents to shut up a paranoid faction can be used to justify a radical expansion of power by the judiciary, but only with regards to certain subjects?

Well, according to the Wikipedia article on Roe v. Wade, the supreme court rejected the ninth amendment rationale, and claimed "the right to privacy" stems from the due process clause in the fourteenth amendment.

I haven't read this thread, so this might have already been mentioned.

[Elok]

It wasn't. But I don't see anything in the fourteenth that could be construed to have anything to do with abortion in even the most tenuous way either. Now, the fourteenth amendment to the constitution of Ireland apparently has a lot to do with abortion--oh, the things you learn from Wiki-hunting...

[giblets]

Okay, I think this is what the decision says about the "right to privacy":

VIII
The Constitution does not explicitly mention any right of privacy. In a line of decisions, however, going back perhaps as far as Union Pacific R. Co. v. Botsford, 141 U.S. 250, 251 (1891), the Court has recognized that a right of personal privacy, or a guarantee of certain areas or zones of privacy, does exist under the Constitution. In varying contexts, the Court or individual Justices have, indeed, found at least the roots of that right in the First Amendment, Stanley v. Georgia, 394 U.S. 557, 564 (1969); in the Fourth and Fifth Amendments, Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 8-9 (1968), Katz v. United States, 389 U.S. 347, 350 (1967), Boyd v. United States, 116 U.S. 616 (1886), see Olmstead v. United States, 277 U.S. 438, 478 (1928) (Brandeis, J., dissenting); in the penumbras of the Bill of Rights, Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U.S. at 484-485; in the Ninth Amendment, id. at 486 (Goldberg, J., concurring); or in the concept of liberty guaranteed by the first section of the Fourteenth Amendment, see Meyer v. Nebraska, 262 U.S. 390, 399 (1923). These decisions make it clear that only personal rights that can be deemed "fundamental" or "implicit in the concept of ordered liberty," Palko v. Connecticut, 302 U.S. 319, 325 (1937), are included in this guarantee of personal privacy. They also make it clear that the right has some extension to activities relating to marriage, Loving v. Virginia, 388 U.S. 1, 12 (1967); procreation, Skinner v. Oklahoma, 316 U.S. 535, 541-542 (1942); contraception, Eisenstadt v. Baird, 405 U.S. at 453-454; id. at 460, 463-465 [p153] (WHITE, J., concurring in result); family relationships, Prince v. Massachusetts, 321 U.S. 158, 166 (1944); and childrearing and education, Pierce v. Society of Sisters, 268 U.S. 510, 535 (1925), Meyer v. Nebraska, supra.
This right of privacy, whether it be founded in the Fourteenth Amendment's concept of personal liberty and restrictions upon state action, as we feel it is, or, as the District Court determined, in the Ninth Amendment's reservation of rights to the people, is broad enough to encompass a woman's decision whether or not to terminate her pregnancy. The detriment that the State would impose upon the pregnant woman by denying this choice altogether is apparent. Specific and direct harm medically diagnosable even in early pregnancy may be involved. Maternity, or additional offspring, may force upon the woman a distressful life and future. Psychological harm may be imminent. Mental and physical health may be taxed by child care. There is also the distress, for all concerned, associated with the unwanted child, and there is the problem of bringing a child into a family already unable, psychologically and otherwise, to care for it. In other cases, as in this one, the additional difficulties and continuing stigma of unwed motherhood may be involved. All these are factors the woman and her responsible physician necessarily will consider in consultation.
On the basis of elements such as these, appellant and some amici argue that the woman's right is absolute and that she is entitled to terminate her pregnancy at whatever time, in whatever way, and for whatever reason she alone chooses. With this we do not agree. Appellant's arguments that Texas either has no valid interest at all in regulating the abortion decision, or no interest strong enough to support any limitation upon the woman's sole determination, are unpersuasive. The [p154] Court's decisions recognizing a right of privacy also acknowledge that some state regulation in areas protected by that right is appropriate. As noted above, a State may properly assert important interests in safeguarding health, in maintaining medical standards, and in protecting potential life. At some point in pregnancy, these respective interests become sufficiently compelling to sustain regulation of the factors that govern the abortion decision. The privacy right involved, therefore, cannot be said to be absolute. In fact, it is not clear to us that the claim asserted by some amici that one has an unlimited right to do with one's body as one pleases bears a close relationship to the right of privacy previously articulated in the Court's decisions. The Court has refused to recognize an unlimited right of this kind in the past. Jacobson v. Massachusetts, 197 U.S. 11 (1905) (vaccination); Buck v. Bell, 274 U.S. 200 (1927) ( sterilization).
We, therefore, conclude that the right of personal privacy includes the abortion decision, but that this right is not unqualified, and must be considered against important state interests in regulation.
We note that those federal and state courts that have recently considered abortion law challenges have reached the same conclusion. A majority, in addition to the District Court in the present case, have held state laws unconstitutional, at least in part, because of vagueness or because of overbreadth and abridgment of rights. Abele v. Markle, 342 F.Supp. 800 (Conn.1972), appeal docketed, No. 72-56; Abele v. Markle, 351 F.Supp. 224 (Conn.1972), appeal docketed, No. 72-730; Doe v. Bolton, 319 F.Supp. 1048 (ND Ga.1970), appeal decided today, post, p. 179; Doe v. Scott, 321 F.Supp. 1385 (ND Ill.1971), appeal docketed, No. 70-105; Poe v. Menghini, 339 F.Supp. 986 (Kan.1972); YWCA v. Kuler, 342 F.Supp. 1048 (NJ 1972); Babbitz v. McCann, [p155] 310 F.Supp. 293 (ED Wis.1970), appeal dismissed, 400 U.S. 1 (1970); People v. Belous, 71 Cal.2d 954, 458 P.2d 194 (1969), cert. denied, 397 U.S. 915 (1970); State v. Barquet, 262 So.2d 431 (Fla.1972).
Others have sustained state statutes. Crossen v. Attorney General, 344 F.Supp. 587 (ED Ky.1972), appeal docketed, No. 72-256; Rosen v. Louisiana State Board of Medical Examiners, 318 F.Supp. 1217 (ED La.1970), appeal docketed, No. 70-42; Corkey v. Edwards, 322 F.Supp. 1248 (WDNC 1971), appeal docketed, No. 71-92; Steinberg v. Brown, 321 F.Supp. 741 (ND Ohio 1970); Doe v. Rampton (Utah 1971), appeal docketed, No. 71-5666; Cheaney v. State, ___ Ind. ___, 285 N.E.2d 265 (1972); Spears v. State, 257 So.2d 876 (Miss. 1972); State v. Munson, 86 S.D. 663, 201 N.W.2d 123 (1972), appeal docketed, No. 72-631.
Although the results are divided, most of these courts have agreed that the right of privacy, however based, is broad enough to cover the abortion decision; that the right, nonetheless, is not absolute, and is subject to some limitations; and that, at some point, the state interests as to protection of health, medical standards, and prenatal life, become dominant. We agree with this approach.
Where certain "fundamental rights" are involved, the Court has held that regulation limiting these rights may be justified only by a "compelling state interest," Kramer v. Union Free School District, 395 U.S. 621, 627 (1969); Shapiro v. Thompson, 394 U.S. 618, 634 (1969), Sherbert v. Verner, 374 U.S. 398, 406 (1963), and that legislative enactments must be narrowly drawn to express only the legitimate state interests at stake. Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U.S. at 485; Aptheker v. Secretary of State, 378 U.S. 500, 508 (1964); Cantwell v. Connecticut, 310 U.S. 296, 307-308 (1940); see [p156] Eisenstadt v. Baird, 405 U.S. at 460, 463-464 (WHITE, J., concurring in result).
In the recent abortion cases cited above, courts have recognized these principles. Those striking down state laws have generally scrutinized the State's interests in protecting health and potential life, and have concluded that neither interest justified broad limitations on the reasons for which a physician and his pregnant patient might decide that she should have an abortion in the early stages of pregnancy. Courts sustaining state laws have held that the State's determinations to protect health or prenatal life are dominant and constitutionally justifiable.

http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/historics/USSC_CR_0410_0113_ZO.html

I don't really get it.

[Elok]

You can ask Darius, I guess. It looks to me like "there's a long history of the courts making up rights, so here's one more."

[grumbler]

So...where exactly is the secret handshake or Masonic symbol that indicates the Ninth Amendment is carte blanche for the SCOTUS to make up rights only when they pertain to women and/or their reproductive organs? Is it a well-known part of the English common-law tradition that one-sentence disclaimers put into legal documents to shut up a paranoid faction can be used to justify a radical expansion of power by the judiciary, but only with regards to certain subjects?

You'll have to do better than mere strawman posts if you want to have a serious discussion about laws. Ranting about secret handshakes just makes you sound like a loon.

[grumbler]

Oh, and kudos for that helpful "you need to study law" response. No specific subjects or authors, just "you need to learn about [general subject that has to occupy about an eighth of the entire Library of Congress]." Am I supposed to enroll in law school to achieve closure on this argument with a random stranger I met online, or what?

Nope. Just do some reading about how laws are formed (and how they interact with rights), and then you can stop all the silly "secret handshake" and "carte blanche" talk.

[grumbler]

You can ask Darius, I guess. It looks to me like "there's a long history of the courts making up rights, so here's one more."

Courts don't "make up rights" (and that you think they do provides some fertile areas for you to educate yourself on). Some rights predate not only courts, but government itself. Others are conferred by legislation. None are made up by courts.

[Elok]

Okay, that's three posts in a row, no actual new arguments, and only a vague tidbit of new information. This isn't Dragonball Z, dude; you don't win by talking about how feeble I am. Please make a real argument.

EDIT: The above is not meant to imply that anyone actually "wins" an internet argument about abortion. I was just yanking MrFun's chain, to be honest.

[grumbler]

Okay, that's three posts in a row, no actual new arguments, and only a vague tidbit of new information. This isn't Dragonball Z, dude; you don't win by talking about how feeble I am. Please make a real argument.

I am amused that you throw out a bunch of meaningless strawmen about how courts "make up rights" and then think that you, and not I, are making the "real arguments."

The explanation in RvW, cited above, explains exactly how the right to privacy was applied in RvW, and why it applied. You don't seem to have a counter based on any facts or even logic. This isn't sixth grade social science class, dude; your arguments have to have actual semantic content, not just hyperbole.

[Elok]

Yeah, it says "previous courts made stuff up, so we can too based on the stuff they made up." No non-fanciful constitutional grounding, my original, facetious point stands, and if you don't like it I stand on my 9th Amendment right to not be bothered by obtuse pedantry on the internet.

[Berzerker]

If you steal from me, you pay me back as restitution.

Not if you forgive me... And you didn't answer the questions, if you punch me and I forgive you, does that mean I'm now required to punch you back? An eye for an eye? What did Jesus say about an eye for an eye?

How could we pay back what other people owe when we owe God ourselves? Someone without sin had to do that which leaves us Christ.

Who said we pay back what other people owe? If God forgives you, there's no need to pay him back... But it appears God does want "restitution" - he wants us to forgive others. You've been arguing that sinners must pay restitution, but then you argue we cant pay restitution because we're sinners - then why are we to forgive trespassers to obtain God's forgiveness? Why does God need someone without sin (himself ) to pay for our sins?

But he loves us so much that he was willing to pay God back for our sins. Even to death on a cross.

But isn't Jesus God? Was he paying himself back? Thats what I said earlier, God took human form and suffered the cruelest of our fates to "join" with us, that was God's restitution. This notion that God had an innocent butchered to pay for someone else's sins is just far too bizarre and immoral for me to accept. There's gotta be more to the story...

Forgiveness must be granted first.

You said restitution comes first

When we found it in his yard, yes, we did. It had to be replaced.

And when they stand on street corners selling cigarettes to children, then I will say the same things about them. The dope pushers have cost me dearly.

You called drug dealers scum because a drug dealer stole a snowblower from your father. When I asked why you were blaming innocent people for the actions of a thief, you then blamed drug dealers for children getting drugs. Obviously some drug dealers sell to children, but most kids get their drugs from family and friends - other kids. So I'll ask again, why are you blaming the innocent for the actions of the guilty (drug dealers who steal your father's snowblower or who sell to kids)? And yes, tobacco dealers are notorious for distributing cigs to kids all over the world, especially the 3rd world. A drug dealer cost you dearly... How can other people pay you restitution for what he did?

No not whatever. We're responsible for the way we interpret God's word. If you're wrong you pay the consequences. What about the many places in the Bible that talk about salvation? Woe unto you.