The Bill Of Rights Do Not Give You Rights

Exactly! This is a point I've been making for a long time now. The US Constitution does not "give" us anything. It isn't even addressed to us. It is a document FROM We the People to the Federal Government. It isn't the government telling US our rights, it is a document telling the Government which authorities and responsibilities we are willing to relinquish to them "in order to form a more perfect union".

In the States, you have the Constitution to further protect you. Free speech is only free as long as it does not bring down the government, unless the administration is evil. But in Canada, we have a bill of rights, and those rights are being abused by others to silence Christians, for example. So a bill of rights is no good unless there is a higher law that protects against abuse. So what we have to have in Canada is a set of laws equal to your constitution that tells that one cannot silence legitimate protests.

The rights in the BILL OF RIGHTS come from God, not the government. The BILL OF RIGHTS is merely an acknowledgement by the government that its citizens possess these rights. This is to make it clear to any tryant wannabe who should desire to trample on or deny those rights, the citizens are completely justified and even duty bound to resist.

No! I am the highest law of the land! Without me the constitution is nothing! The constitution is simply the highest guidelines/codes of the land! Those laws were meant to defend and protect my best wishes and interest! And if peradventure they are not, then I have the inalienable right given to me by the Most High One to disregard the laws! Therefore, I am, in essense, the law!

I've never believed in the concept of "God-given rights" or "inalienable rights". It's a silly ideal dreamed up by men who were tired of oppression, and relied upon by people who fear oppression. Rights are endowed by people when if we feel it's convenient for us to have them. If they were God-given or inalienable, then they wouldn't be so easily stripped away. Humans feel entitled to things, it's in our nature. When the governments take away our rights, we feel that we should fight for them to get them back, because we feel we should be entitled to certain things. The right to life, the right to free speech, the right to be secure in our possessions - we feel entitled to these rights because we feel they are in our best interests, not because we are somehow destined to have them.

You are right the bill of rights just stops the governement from violiating these basic rights that are not given becaues something given can be taken away it is more of a protection of these rights that every human has for just being a human being. No government gives people the right ot freedom of speech or any of the other rights in the Bill of Rights they are given by the hightest power that being God or someother religious/spirtual person... So yeah.

Well said. The constitution merely defines our rights and outlines the limitations and function of the United States. It is a contract in essence. A contract created by the states that created the United States as a subserviant agent of the states. It is a government by consent of the states and people. As long as the United States governs under the condition of this contract, we, the people and states, grant them the authority to govern and perform very specific funtions and duties. Parated2K wrote up a really nice piece detailing where our rights come from a while back, dig through the archives, it's there somewhere. but he pretty much said the same thing. these rights are granted to us by our very existance and are not granted by the government. WE, the PEOPLE are the ones who do the granting in granting the government our conditional permission to administer governance. Too many havce become so shamefully complacent and ignorant to that fact, that we have become a nation under the false assumption that the federal government is the all powerfull authority superceding everything else.

Well technically you are right. They are just stating what your rights are and that they are protected. I've never heard it put that way before though!

As a political science major I tend to think that might is what gives us rights at least in an indirect way. In truth governments only become legitimate through the majority of people's acceptance that it posses' the only legitimate means of using violence as a tool within that society. This is what prevents us from living under anarchy within the borders of our nation. Violence is the ultimate and last method of enforcement and without enforcement all rights are illusions. This is why I do not believe in the legitimacy of international law because no supernation/ or globalnation is recognized as legitimately monopolizing violence worldwide so it has no real enforcement mechanism.