Eugene Volokh: Positive rights in the Framing era

[Librarian]

http://reason.com/volokh/2018/02/05/positive-rights-in-the-framing-era

I am not a fan of many asserted positive rights (e.g., a right to shelter, to medical care, to a subsistence income), and the Constitution doesn't secure them. But it does secure other such rights, and other well-established American sources of law secure still more.

Let's begin with a quick tour through rights in the Constitution. The word "right" appears exactly once in the original Constitution -- in the Copyright/Patent Clause, which gives Congress the power "To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries."

See also the comments.

[Mute]

Good article. The comments are interesting, especially from those who want to insist on creating rights (apparently through the Constitution no less).

[Davidwhitewolf]

Thanks for posting this, hadn't seen it.