The Objective Standard Blog
Topics: Individual Rights and Law
Tuesday, August 17, 2010
The Right to Immigrate and the Legitimacy of an Objective Screening Process
The question of how to reconcile the right to immigrate to America with an objective screening process has arisen in several forums lately, so I’d like to address it here. Because I answered this question in a reply to a letter to the editor in the Summer 2009 issue of TOS, I’ll simply post that exchange:
To the Editor:
In “Immigration and Individual Rights” (Spring 2008), Craig Biddle says that immigrants should be required to pass “an objective screening process, the purpose of which is to keep out criminals, enemies of America, and people with certain kinds of contagious diseases.” But would it not be a violation of the rights of immigrants to force them to pass such a screening process? Obviously, criminals, terrorists, and people with infectious diseases should not be allowed to roam free, but would not a screening process presume immigrants guilty until proven innocent? What is the difference between forcing immigrants to pass screening measures and forcing citizens to do the same? Immigrants may represent potential threats insofar as criminals and disease-carriers may be among their ranks. But unapprehended criminals and disease-carriers exist among U.S. citizens, too. Why should immigrants but not citizens be forced to undergo a screening process?
Michael Labeit
Richmond Hill, New YorkCraig Biddle Replies:
We need to unpack several issues here. To begin, Mr. Labeit is conflating a conditional requirement with the initiation of force, but these are not always the same thing, and in this context their difference is pivotal. Requiring would-be immigrants to pass an objective screening process in order to enter the United States is not the same thing as forcing them to undergo a screening process. If they do not want to go through the process, they are free not to do so—and thus not to enter the country. Unless they are terrorists or criminals or seek to spread an infectious disease, however, there is no reason for them to object to such a policy. People come to America to enjoy the (relative) protection of rights within our borders; they cannot have that value and buck it too.
Nor is an objective screening requirement for immigrants comparable to a screening requirement for American citizens. Saying to would-be immigrants, “If you do not want to be screened, you are free not to enter the country” is entirely different from saying to American citizens, “If you do not want to be screened, you are free to leave the country or go to jail.” Whereas the former policy does not involve initiatory force, the latter clearly would.
Nor does an objective screening policy violate the presumption of innocence principle. The purpose of the presumption of innocence principle in the American legal system is to ensure that suspected criminals within that system are not punished unless they are first proven guilty in a court of law. This principle does not apply to the question of whether would-be immigrants should be screened before entering America, for at least two reasons: (1) Would-be immigrants are not yet within the American legal system, and (2) such screening is not a punishment but an objectively warranted safety measure.
Like all political policies, those pertaining to immigration are properly formed and applied with respect to the relevant context. Part of the context surrounding immigration policy today is that tens of millions (if not hundreds of millions) of Islamists want to kill Americans (or see us killed). Our government has a moral and constitutional responsibility to stop these would-be killers from waltzing into America. (More essentially, our government has a responsibility to destroy the states that breed and sponsor these killers; but until it embraces that responsibility, we are faced with the problem of jihadists seeking to kill us, and we have to deal with it accordingly.)
Another part of the relevant context is that immigrants generally do not come here from the equivalent of Virginia; many of them come from third-world countries where deadly contagions are rampant and medicine is virtually nonexistent. Our government has a responsibility to take reasonable precautions to protect Americans from such objective threats. There are, of course, significant differences of kind and degree among diseases, and an objective immigration policy must take these differences into account. For instance, whereas we obviously should not permit someone with smallpox to enter the country and walk the streets of Manhattan, nor should we prohibit someone with herpes from doing so. As I wrote in endnote 2 of my article:
Carriers of deadly contagious diseases such as cholera, diphtheria, infectious tuberculosis, smallpox, yellow fever, and severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS)—who would thus pose an objective threat to the lives and health of Americans—are legitimately forbidden entry to America (unless they are being safely transported to a private facility for medical treatment). Exactly where the line should be drawn regarding the immigration of people carrying less-dangerous contagious diseases is a technical matter to be determined by medical and legal experts.
The details of an objective screening process for immigrants are a complex matter that I have not worked out. But the purpose of the process is clear-cut: to protect Americans’ rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. The right to life is the fundamental right, and when an alleged right—such as a foreigner’s “right” to enter America without being objectively screened—is in conflict with this fundamental right, then that alleged right cannot be a right. Morality is not a suicide pact.
Our government’s proper purpose is to protect the rights of citizens and other individuals within our borders. So long as the screening process for immigrants is limited to reasonable measures aimed at keeping out enemies, criminals, and people with certain kinds of contagious diseases, it is not only consistent with this purpose of government; it is mandated by it.
Craig Biddle
Laguna Hills, California
Image: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:United_States_border_at_Naco,_Mexico.jpg
Posted in: Foreign Policy and War, Individual Rights and Law
Thursday, July 29, 2010
Why Harry Reid Loves Social Security
“Social Security is the most successful social program in the history of the world,” says Harry Reid, the Democratic senator of Nevada. Investors Business Daily replies:
Successful? A program that socks future generations with trillions in higher taxes and lower standards of living? A program that’s already running in the red and whose unsustainable finances promise to push the U.S. to the verge of bankruptcy?
Investors Business Daily is of course correct. By any fiscal standard, Social Security has been an abject failure. But what the IBD editorial staff misses is that politicians such as Reid are not concerned with that standard. They are concerned with a moral standard—specifically that of altruism, the idea that being moral consists in self-sacrificially serving others.
To those who embrace altruism, Social Security must be regarded as successful. Why? Because Social Security, like all welfare programs, demands sacrifice. It forces some Americans to sacrifice for the sake of others, enshrining in law the view that no man has a right to exist for his own sake. This is why individuals such as Reid love it—no matter the consequences for America.
Related Articles:
Related Posts:
- Altruism: The Morality of Logical Fallacies
- Altruism: The Morality of Suffering and Death (Exhibit 347R: Organ Donation)
- Altruism vs. America
Image: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Harry_Reid_SCHIP.jpg
Posted in: Individual Rights and Law, Philosophy
Friday, July 23, 2010
Did Obama Ask the SEC to Assault Goldman Sachs?
In a previous blog post I showed how the Securities and Exchange Commission has wielded power, assaulted businesses, and ignored fraud. Now it appears that the SEC colluded with the Obama administration to assault Goldman Sachs, boost the administration’s chances of passing the financial “reform” bill, and line the coffers of Obama’s reelection campaign. Quoting the Washington Examiner:
It seemed a little odd last week when the Securities and Exchange Commission settled its lawsuit against Goldman Sachs within two hours of Senate passage of the Democrats’ Dodd-Frank financial reform bill. After all, who could ask for a more perfect backdrop than a successful prosecution of the investment colossus of Wall Street and a prime mover in the economic crisis of 2008? But this one looks stranger still considering that the SEC action was announced on April 15 of this year, only a week before the legislation was brought before the Senate, thus neatly bookending debate on the proposal. And it gets even stranger. On the same April 15, President Obama’s campaign organization, Organizing for America, purchased a Google ad directing people who Googled “Goldman Sachs SEC” to donate money at my.barackobama.com.
Whether or not evidence of collusion in this case is conclusive, the sad fact is that there is no reason to put such corruption past the SEC or this administration. Fortunately, as John David Lewis has argued, the brazen evil of Obama and company is providing a kind of political clarity that could lead Americans to see that our alternatives really are capitalism or statism.
Related Articles:
- Obama’s Atomic Bomb: The Ideological Clarity of the Democratic Agenda
- Review of David Einhorn’s Fooling Some of the People All the Time
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Posted in: Business and Economics, Individual Rights and Law
Tuesday, July 20, 2010
Larry Downes Interviews Steve Simpson on Free Speech in America
Here’s a great interview with Steve Simpson in which he argues that Americans need to recognize freedom of speech not as a permission to be granted when it suits social purposes, but as a right to be protected at all times. (The interview is in the first hour of the July 17 podcast.) For more on this subject, see Simpson’s article “Citizens United and the Battle for Free Speech in America,” which is also available in audio.
Posted in: Individual Rights and Law
Tuesday, July 20, 2010
Government Intervention: It’s Not Just Bad for Business
In a recent article in Investor’s Business Daily, Thomas Sowell explains why Obama’s economic policies are bad for the economy:
The current issue of Bloomberg Businessweek has a feature article about businesses that are just holding on to huge sums of money. They say, for example, that the pharmaceutical company Pfizer is holding on to $26 billion. If so, there should not be any great mystery as to why they don’t invest it.
With the Obama administration being on an anti-business kick, boasting of putting their foot on some business’ neck, and the president talking about putting his foot on another part of the anatomy, with Congress coming up with more and more red tape, more mandates and more heavy-handed interventions in businesses, would you risk $26 billion that you might not even be able to get back, much less make any money on the deal?
Of course you wouldn’t. No rational person would. And this phenomenon of businesses hording cash is rampant today for this very reason. Just as Pfizer does not want to risk its cash on investments, so other businesses don’t want to risk theirs on new employees or equipment or innovations or branches. As Sowell points out so clearly, Obama’s economic policies are thwarting the economy.
But Sowell misses the more important point: the moral factor. The fundamental offense for which Obama’s economic policies should be condemned is their violation of businessmen’s moral right to keep and use their wealth and property as they see fit. The crucial point to be made is that for a government to put its boot on a businessman’s neck or to “kick [his] ass” is profoundly immoral. Unfortunately, the worst Sowell and most other “defenders” of capitalism can say about our increasingly enslaved society is that such policies are bad for business.
It is time for Americans to realize that if we want to save this country from the likes of Obama (and Bush for that matter), we must argue not merely for the economic superiority of capitalism, but also, and more fundamentally, for the moral propriety of capitalism.
Related Articles:
- Capitalism and the Moral High Ground
- The California Coastal Commission: A Case Study in Government Assault on Property Rights
Related Posts:
- The Little Dictators
- There’s Nothing “Bright” About the Stimulus Bill
- Capitalism: The Only Moral System
Posted in: Business and Economics, Individual Rights and Law
Monday, June 28, 2010
The Summer Issue of TOS
The print edition of the Summer issue has been mailed; the online and e-book versions have been posted to our website; and the audio version will be posted on Wednesday, June 30. (Due to production setbacks, the print edition mailed a few days late. I apologize for the delay.)
The contents of the Summer issue are:
ARTICLES
Israel and America’s Flotilla Follies (and How To Avoid Them in the Future)
by Craig BiddleWhy Anthony Daniels Smears Ayn Rand
by Alan GermaniHow to Protect Yourself Against ObamaCare
by Paul HsiehThe Montessori Method: Educating Children for a Lifetime of Learning and Happiness
by Heike LarsonA Review of the Korean Television Series Dae Jang Geum
by Sarah BiddleAn Interview with Philosopher of Science David Harriman
Objective Moral Virtues: Principled Actions
by Craig BiddleBOOKS REVIEWED
Freethinkers: A History of American Secularism, by Susan Jacoby
Reviewed by Daniel WahlThe Beginnings of Western Science: The European Scientific Tradition in Philosophical, Religious, and Institutional Context, Prehistory to A.D. 1450, 2nd ed., by David C. Lindberg
Reviewed by Frederick SeilerThe Greatest Trade Ever: The Behind-the-Scenes Story of How John Paulson Defied Wall Street and Made Financial History, by Gregory Zuckerman
Reviewed by Daniel WahlThat First Season, by John Eisenberg
Reviewed by Joseph Kellard
If you have not yet subscribed to TOS, you can do so now and achieve instant access to this new issue and all back issues. Subscriptions start as low as $29. Subscribe online or by calling 800-423-6151.
Enjoy!
Posted in: Announcements, Ayn Rand and Objectivism, Business and Economics, Education, Foreign Policy and War, Healthcare, History, Individual Rights and Law, Philosophy, Science and Technology, The Arts
Friday, June 18, 2010
There’s Nothing “Bright” About the Stimulus Bill
Forbes recently published an argument against the stimulus bill, focusing on its so-called “dark side.”
A little over a year ago the Obama administration passed a staggering $787 billion stimulus package designed to rescue the economy. More than half of that money has now been spent, and the economy is still just creaking along. But now people are realizing that there is a dark side to this spending orgy. It has to end, and then we have to pay the bill.
Yes, Americans are learning that they will have to pay the bill. And hopefully they are learning that government spending is no way to stimulate the economy. But what Americans most desperately need to learn is that such spending packages are not merely economic atrocities but also, and more fundamentally, moral atrocities.
This spending bill, like all welfare legislation, amounts to legalized theft and forced redistribution of wealth. It forces producers—such as those who design and manufacture sofas, and those who design and manufacture video games—to hand over a large portion of their earnings to those who refuse to work and choose instead to lounge around on sofas and play video games all day.
This is utterly immoral. It is a gross violation of individual rights. Thus it is profoundly un-American. Americans who care about individual rights should condemn such legislation not merely as economically untenable, but also—and more importantly—as morally unacceptable. Only then will we begin to reverse the statist trend that is leading this once-free country ever closer to tyranny.
Related Article:
Related Posts:
- Government Intervention: It’s Not Just Bad for Business
- Capitalism: The Only Moral System
- The Little Dictators
Image: http://www.flickr.com/photos/astrowoosie/120750647/
Posted in: Business and Economics, Individual Rights and Law
Thursday, May 20, 2010
Does the SEC Care about Fraud?
Anyone concerned with freedom in the financial markets should read this new, internal review by the SEC, in which the Commission admits that it:
- failed to “take appropriate action” related to fraud at Allied Capital, a politically-connected company staffed with former SEC employees;
- did not visit Allied’s offices a single time during their “investigation”—“even though they were located just blocks from the SEC”;
- never investigated “whether Allied was a Ponzi scheme, because of how it financed its dividends” (using proceeds raised from the sale of stock to uninformed investors);
- “inexplicably” deleted the work papers from an examination of Allied in which an SEC employee expressed concerns that the company was engaging in a Ponzi scheme;
- vigorously investigated David Einhorn—the man who exposed Allied’s fraud —both “after Allied met with [SEC] officials” and “without any evidence of wrongdoing” on the part of Einhorn;
- gave clearance to an SEC employee who “supervised the investigation against Einhorn” to register as a lobbyist for Allied immediately after leaving the agency;
- took no action when Allied admitted to the SEC that one of the company’s “agents” had engaged in “illegally obtaining Einhorn’s phone records”;
- concluded soon after the investigation that Einhorn was not guilty of violating federal securities laws but never told him what his status was with respect to the law and whether he was still being investigated “despite his request for such notification.”
The SEC is under new management and, according to The Washington Post, has promised “to fix the problems.” But since then it has:
- sucker-punched Goldman Sachs with charges of fraud for letting sophisticated investors pick what they want to buy from a list of what other investors want to sell;
- continued with the fraud charges against Goldman despite a 3-2 split along party lines among the five commissioners;
- timed the charges to coincide with the push for financial legislation by Obama.
The SEC has not been and is not concerned with prosecuting fraud. Since its inception, the SEC has pursued not justice, but power, and it has used that power to support its political masters. The case against Goldman is more of the same.
Related Article:
Related Post:
Image: http://www.flickr.com/photos/jsmoorman/2298671281/
Posted in: Business and Economics, Individual Rights and Law
Thursday, May 20, 2010
Today is “Everybody Draw Mohammed Day”
Here is the final batch of drawings of Mohammed, in defense of the requirements of human life and civilized society. In honor of “Everybody Draw Mohammed Day,” we have placed all of the drawings together on a single dedicated page, which can be found here.
I wish to thank those who participated in this campaign, and to encourage everyone to distribute this link far and wide today. Let the world know that you will not be silenced.
Drawing of Mohammed by Mark Wickens
Drawing of Mohammed by William Green
Drawing of Mohammed by Amit Ghate
Drawing of Mohammed by Andy Fingerhut
Drawing of Mohammed by David Chayes
Drawing of Mohammed by Jeffery Small
Drawing of Mohammed by Martin Gasser
Drawing of Mohammed by Diana Hsieh
Drawing of Mohammed by Richard Watts
Drawing of Mohammed by Meredith McCurdy
Drawing of Mohammed by Gus Van Horn
Drawing of Mohammed by Kyle Haight
Drawing of Mohammed by Greg Perkins
Drawing of Mohammed by Anne Haight
Posted in: Announcements, Events, Foreign Policy and War, Individual Rights and Law, Philosophy, Religion
Wednesday, May 19, 2010
Drawings of Mohammed, in Defense of Life: Last Call
“Everybody Draw Mohammed Day” is tomorrow, May 20. If you’d like to participate and help defend the requirements of human life and civilized society, please email your drawings to blog@TheObjectiveStandard.com by midnight tonight (May 19).
Posted in: Announcements, Foreign Policy and War, Individual Rights and Law, Philosophy, Religion, The Arts
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