trc@hou5a.UUCP (Tom Craver) (09/27/84)
Carl M. Mikkelson: >I disagree. The constitution and bill of rights are vague, and therein lies >their strength and longevity. I disagree. The Constitution is not really all that vague. It uses terms without defining them, and this has provided some openings for "interpretation". It is quite specific on most things, such as form of government, and powers of government. The Bill of Rights is somewhat vague. EG it uses terms like "unreasonable searches and seizures", "just compensation", "excessive bail", "cruel and unusual punishment", etc. These things are ultimately decided by the Supreme Court. Sometimes they abuse this power. I might support an amendment that clarifies such vague terminology. In any case, it is not the vagueness of the Constitution that gives it its strength - it is its clarity. Your statement is akin to saying the cracks in a wall hold it up. Dont confuse the fact that constitutional vagueness allows the federal government to gain *power*, with the strength of the constitution. The strength of the constitution is applied in *restraining* the power of government to govern by whim, and in inhibiting changes to itself by requiring a hard process of deliberation on the merits of an amendment. It is this latter process which was applied to ERA. Regardless of its objective merit or lack thereof, it has been *considered* to lack sufficient merit by those considering its inclusion in the constitution. >By leaving the law imprecise, it can be >interpretted based on the values and conditions of the future. This is true - and a horrifying prospect! Do you really *want* a govt by whim? If men were in a huge majority, would you want them to legislate women as property on the basis of a "vague" anti-slavery amendment? >Of course, I >am favoring vagueness that maximizes the legal basis for challenging >discriminatory behavior. How can vagueness favor something? Vagueness only allows re-interpretation of the author's intent. If the authors dont know what they really intend, or know but dont want others to know, I'd say they should get out of the business of writing law, or be put out. Only to the extent that a law is *not* vague can it be used as a solid basis for anything. Otherwise, it is simply up to the whim of whoever has power - be it a majority, or be it a very popular leader who secretly wants to be a dictator. >Even though the current social context may be so >restrictive as to define women as being only slightly equal, over time, with >the increased oppurtunities derived from even that small decrease in >discrimination pressure, women will have more impact, become more visible, and >eventually everyone will "of course" know that women are totally equal. Slightly equal? Do you mean "nearly equal"? Or "very unequal but not totally out of the ball park". If your goal is vagueness, you seem to have achieved it admirably. In fact, I could interpret it in a way that would mean that ERA is unnecessary, because women arent heavily oppressed without ERA, they already have a chance to "have more impact..." and so "eventually everyone will...know that women are totally equal". A little vagueness can go a long way - you can use it to support ERA, I can use it to oppose ERA - everyone is happy - right??? My remarks are meant solely in opposition to the idea that vagueness in law is good, and are not meant to imply I am opposed to women having rights equal with men's, as citizens of the United States. I do oppose the creation of vaguely defined "rights", which can be interpreted to cover anything enough people want to call a right. I dont have the text of ERA in front of me, but I would say that a proper form for ERA would be so similar to the 14th amendment that in fact, the 14th amendment would seem to cover whatever ERA might properly propose (right down to using the non-sexist "persons" instead of "men" in its text!). Could someone post the text of ERA, and explain what they think is gained by this amendment? If it is "no private discrimination allowed", I would oppose it. While I dont like bigotry, until that bigotry leads the bigot to violate the moral rights of another, I dont want the govt to interfere. (By "moral rights" I mean those rights that a government *should* legally enforce. Now, we could debate what "moral rights" are...) For example, I would not want to force an anti-black bigot to go to a black doctor, but I would want to force him to refrain from assaulting that doctor. Tom Craver hou5a!trc
chabot@amber.DEC (Chevrolet Chabot) (10/01/84)
About bigotry: Tom Craver's > For example, I would not want to force an anti-black bigot to go to a black > doctor, but I would want to force him to refrain from assaulting that doctor. As a side point, this unfortunately reminds me of the question: would you want to force an anti-black bigot doctor from treating a black patient? An interesting question! The physician who introduced blood transfusions died because the hospital nearest the scene of his unnecessarily fatal accident refused to admit him, because he was black. He bled to death. Assault is an action, and yes, preventing bigots from performing actions endangering the lives of the objects of their hatred does sound like something worthy of "forcing". But if medical treatment is an action, then not-treatment is not an action, and if we were to force bigots to treat the undesirable patients...gee, well mightn't it be in the patient's best interests to find an unbigoted doctor whose unprejudiced nature would allow better medical care? (Hard to do when you're expiring.) Of course, this is a moral matter: people are entitled to medical care (?) and doctors should not be prejudiced. (!!) At least, they're entitled to medical care if they can pay: in my home town of Lancaster CA there is a large hospital which will not admit emergency patients who do not show evidence of having medical insurance, but will tell them to high-tail it to the V A hospital (a mere 75 miles away) [we've known this for years, but they also tried it on my sister]; sometimes if you wave dollars at them and insist you've got a steady job you might be able to convince them to treat your broken loved-one. (Hard to do when you're the one expiring.) The two cases, black and poor, are not unrelated: they're both examples of bigotry, which is a double bind if you're black since they'll assume you're poor (or at least shiftless) in many, many neighborhoods. And the poor are assumed to be without dignity: without the dignity to appreciate good medical care, and without the dignity to even want to pay their incurred debts. But you're right, things are better in some neighborhoods. Vagueness won't force bigots to do much at all. On the other hand, vagueness allows us generality to grow into--someday. We can hope the bigots will be gradually loosed by the gentleness of the vagueness from their tight iron band(s) around their skulls, and can then think and see the freedom around them. It's hard to convince old dogs to like the new tricks you've forced them to learn. L S Chabot UUCP: ...decwrl!dec-rhea!dec-amber!chabot ARPA: ...chabot%amber.DEC@decwrl.ARPA USFail: DEC, MR03-1/K20, 2 Iron Way, Marlborough, MA 01752