A proposed Constitutional Amendment: We have The Right to Privacy

[TexasThoughtCriminal]

Look at all the values we hold dear that boil down to privacy rights. And look at how the right-wing nitwits keep harping that there is no right to privacy in the Constitution. Well then, let's put it in the Constitution so there is no question about it. Let's put the neo-Stalinists on the spot and watch them squirm as they come out against a fundamental right most every American assumes as a given. So then, what reproductive choices women make, what consenting adults do in bedrooms, the phone conversations we have, and the emails we write will be constitutionally protected from a big brother government.

[CatholicEdHead]

1. It is already in there

we just have to enforce it.

[f-bush]

5. Thank you, I agree fully

It's pretty much what I would have said and gone a step further....when it is not honored by our president...IT'S TIME FOR AN IMPEACHMENT!!!!

[Charlie Brown]

2. The pro-life cult will never let that pass n/t

[tocqueville]

3. question is if the problem is really there

the right to privacy is only present in the US constitution as an interpretation of a "penumbral" right, that is to say a hidden intention from the authors. Other constitutions have it clearly written like the French or the British.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Privacy

but the problem is mostly the relation between the American people and their government. The American government's interference with citizens life is in general (except for the actual breaches) very little compared to European governments. At the same time most Europeans don't feel that their privacy is violated, because they feel that they have delegated a part of their rights to the government to ensure that society protects them. Any European governmental form would be considered as ten times more "big brother" than the American one under normal circumstances. Americans have very little social rights compared to Europeans. Social rights need a certain invasion of privacy to ensure equity and prevent fraud.

The problem is not really the "spying in the bedroom". The problem is how to organize a relation of trust between the people and their representatives and induce mechanisms that prevent governments to misuse this trust. And privacy doesn't have to be the starting point "of the values we hold dear". Common interest and other rights (equity, welfare) can be the starting point. For example the European abortion rights are motivated from mostly a point of view of health and social rights and only partly from the right to privacy.

[farmbo]

4. The Ninth Amendment clearly preserves a general right of privacy:

"The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people."

Only the goony Federalist fringe of activist judges fails to grasp the true meaning of this key provision of the Bill of Rights. Unfortunately for our Republic, Samuel Alito is one of those Judges. He will bend over backwards to interpret the Ninth amendment as follows:

"The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH."

[TheBaldyMan]

6. the IVth amendment ALREADY has that covered

RW nuts repeat a lie over and over again until people actually start believing.

Bush broke the law and continues to flout it daily.

[TexasThoughtCriminal]

7. I agree we privacy already, YOU agree we have privacy already, but

with the likes of Alito and other nuts on the courts, their narrow view becomes the mainstream. I'm saying take it out of their hands.

Case in point: Same-sex marriage is illegal in all but one state. Did that stop the nuts from writing a ban into state constitutions? In their mind, it was a preventative, a pre-emptive strike to take the issue off the table. I say we do the same with the right to privacy, a right that's hard to argue against.

[TheBaldyMan]

8. IMO think anti-gay marriage bans

were used as a ruse to get conservatives to the polls.

having said that a privacy amendment would get everybody to the polls.