Reply #116: 'k [View All]

[DoNotRefill]

"Tried exercising your right of free speech lately by publishing a book without paying for the printing? How's the legal aid situation in the US? Doesn't everybody have a "right to counsel"? Shouldn't everybody be provided with the services of, oh, F. Lee Bailey on demand?"

As you say, you're mixing apples and oranges. If you want to publish a book, the government doesn't charge you for that right. The only associated fee that goes into government coffers is sales tax, which is uniformly applied to all things sold at retail, and only charged to retail businesses. If you print your own fliers, or something similar, there's no charge by the government. Everybody does NOT have a "right to counsel" at state expense. What a ridiculous statement. The ONLY time a person has a right to counsel at state expense is if they're charged with a criminal act that carries possible jail time. You should know that.

""This 'right' to possess firearms, surely even you have to agree, is not quite like the right of free speech, or the right to vote. There are legitimate, justifiable burdens on that right that don't come into play for most other rights -- like restrictions designed to prevent people with violent criminal records or who are subject to restraining orders, or children, from obtaining firearms. There are costs associated with operating a system to achieve those objectives."


Wrong. It's practically identical to the right to vote. With both the RKBA and the right to vote, there are certain restrictions (age-based, conviction based, etc) that are enforced. That doesn't mean that the Government should be able to charge fees to exercise the right. Take this for example: If the government required a fee for people to register to vote in an effort to defray the governmental cost of registration, would that be constitutionally acceptable? Even if the only purpose was to raise revenue to defray the cost to the government for maintaining the voter registration system, it would be unconstitutional, at least here.

"Should the general public be liable for those costs? Even if owning firearms were a 'right', it is still a choice."

So is voting. Nobody HAS to vote, it's still a choice. Would you support a poll tax to pay for election and registration costs? I wouldn't. For that matter, so is free speech. You don't HAVE to exercise that right, either. It's a choice.

"Like I said: cigarette taxes? I have a right to smoke; it's inherent in my right of liberty. I'm being charged an exhorbitant fee by the govt. for exercising that right; I am required to buy my tobacco through the govt.-regulated system, and I must pay enormous taxes when I do."

Smoking is neither constitutionally protected nor a right "fundamental to an order of structured liberty", is it? If it is, could you please cite the part of the Bill of Rights that states "A well-regulated tobacco industry, being necessary for the liberty of a free people, The right of the people to smoke tobacco shall not be infringed." I must have missed that one... ;-)