The Right To Privacy In The U.S. Constitution.

I'm repeating some things here. But I think I will still put it all in a new thread. This thread is also about my research into the topic of the right to privacy.

In 1995 I bought the Law Dictionary by Steven H. Gifis. I never thought of myself as an actually lawyer. I've always known my limitations, all my life really I think. But I am beginning to find I know more than the average American on some issues. Which is sad. But the Law Dictionary by Steven H. Gifis talked about the right to privacy. It was first conceived of in an essay in 1890 by Louis Brandeis. And then Brandeis was appointed to the Supreme Court in 1916 by Woodrow Wilson, where he fought for things like the right to privacy and racial justice, often being the lone dissenter in some cases. Brandeis didn't invent the idea. He even told people he wasn't the first to use that word. Actually George Washington probably would have called that right a man's home is his castle, going back to an English case in 1604. And like the Supreme Court said in 1965, the right is even older than that. The ancient Romans recognized it.

Anyways, I soon became interested in this right, just by accident like I said (perusing that book by Gifis). Everyone started talking about it around then. I guess there were a lot of cases involving it in the news at the time. And Bill Clinton would be appointing all the Supreme Court justices then, which probably had something to do with it. "The Right to Privacy" by Caroline Kennedy came out around this time. I also found out a lot more about it, in books like Kennedy's. It goes back to at least that essay in 1890 by Brandeis like I said. And the Supreme Court first recognized it, in part, in Supreme Court cases like Meyer v. Nebraska and Pierce v. Society of Sisters going back to 1923. Cases that said that the government has no business intruding into our private homes, our family, or our rights as parents.

And now it is found or created (and let me state this carefully and be accurate, so others have their information right) by zones of privacy. Zones of privacy created by specific constitutional guarantees found in the "general thrust" of the Bill of Rights (Steven Gifis, and 381 U.S. 479), and specifically the First, Third, Fourth, Fifth, Ninth and 14th Amendments (also from Law Dictionary by Steven H. Gifis.)

Original intent judges totally reject the right to privacy. Because they say those words are nowhere in the Constitution. Well, there's a lot that's not in the Constitution. Sometimes the framers of the Constitution just didn't have room to include everything. The right to a lawyer means your lawyer is competent and he represents your interests. He shouldn't show up to work drunk every day and conspire with the prosecution. The Supreme Court said both of those things are okay. But that is what our founders clearly meant when they gave us the 6th amendment right to an attorney. And some rights are implied, like the right to freedom of thought and belief. Because how would the freedom of speech and religion make sense if you couldn't hold those views and beliefs? Some rights have been logically extended. Like the right to peaceably assemble obviously includes the right to freedom of association. And some rights have been expanded. Some have been expanded to give us more freedom, and some have been expanded to include more people in their original scope. And frankly some rights have been found to only exist in certain Supreme Court rulings. Like the rights to engage in any lawful occupation and to acquire knowledge. Both which the Supreme Court found, or created, in a their 1923 case. And let's be very frank. A lot of things have changed since the federal constitution and the Bill of Rights were ratified. Punishments were brutal, confessions could be coerced, women and minorities had no rights. Really, I've read in more than one place, there is no such thing as true original intent. It would just never work. It is just another judicial philosophy. And and very radical one, to be clear.

But original intent judges say they don't believe in any of that, what I just explained above. And yet they think the Second Amendment, which clearly says a "well regulated militia", should apply to private gun ownership. And then they used the doctrine of selective incorporation (which they also oppose) to apply their weird new definition of the Second Amendment to the states in McDonald v. City of Chicago in 2010. (You know like I tell people, if the original intent nuts on the Supreme Court all needed abortions, we'd be all set. Clarence Thomas needs porn. And Rush Limbaugh needed illegal drugs you know.)

Anyways, in conclusion. I found around 2000 that most modern conservatives, even ultra conservatives (except original intent judges), would agree there is at least a general right to privacy in the Constitution. Protecting things like contraception, parental education choices and your freedom to read and view what you wish in your own home. The freedom to an abortion might be taking that right a little too far. Italy, I learned, is the only other country that has ever found that right in their constitution, the right to an abortion. And only when the life of the mother was in jeopardy. But like John Kerry said in 2004 and Hillary Clinton in 2016. Roe v. Wade is (or at least was) established law. So you have to deal with that now and accept it. Even if you don't agree. And BTW Brett Kavanaugh lied in 2018 during his confirmation hearings when he said he'd never overturn Roe v. Wade. He was planning it then, and he knew he was lying. Okay, so did everyone else. But lying under oath is grounds for impeaching a judge, even if he is a Supreme Court judge. But that's never going to happen, so who cares I guess.

 

BTW like Warren Burger, the very conservative Warren Burger, pointed out. The Second and Third Amendments are just historical footnotes and oddities. Like a law that says you must have your house visited by a chimney sweep once a week. Or many people don't know, in Michigan when your horseless carriage reaches an intersection you must park your car, get out and fire your rifle three times in the air to warn other drivers approaching. The original reasons for those two amendments don't apply. Actually what they feared would happen with them never even happened. The federal government never tried to encroach on the military power of the several states and the government never tried to quarter troops in our houses in times of war. (I think soldiers live in military barracks now anyways.)

Actually the Third Amendment has been found to show that the civil authority should always be superior to the military. Like in Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer in 1952. That is part of why the Supreme Court included the Third Amendment in their general right to privacy case of 1965. And now the originalists on the Supreme Court think it's time to expand the Second Amendment to let people own whatever fire arms they want, even ones that didn't exist in George Washington's time. And that the Second Amendment should be applied to the states, even though they are breaking their own rules with that one. If you say so.