“The rights to life, liberty and property were not meant to be subject to the vagaries of majority rule.”

—  Ilana Mercer

“Life, Liberty, and Property,” http://www.ilanamercer.com/phprunner/public_article_list_view.php?editid1=497 WorldNetDaily.com and Taki’s Magazine, May 15, 2009. <br class="br">2000s, 2009

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "The rights to life, liberty and property were not meant to be subject to the vagaries of majority rule." by Ilana Mercer?
Ilana Mercer photo
Ilana Mercer288
South African writer

Related quotes

Lewis H. Lapham photo

“By the word "liberty" they meant liberty for property, not liberty for persons.”

Lewis H. Lapham (1935) American journalist

Source: Money And Class In America (1989), Chapter 2, Protocols of Wealth, p. 33

James M. McPherson photo

“What were these rights and liberties for which Confederates contended? The right to own slaves; the liberty to take this property into the territories.”

James M. McPherson (1936) American historian

James M. McPherson. Battle Cry of Freedom http://historynewsnetwork.org/blog/153655 (1988) p. 241 <br class="br">1980s

Ilana Mercer photo

“"In the Declaration of Independence, Thomas Jefferson wrote "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness," instead of "life, liberty and property." With that vagueness, Jefferson undermined the foundation of civilization: private property right."”

Ilana Mercer South African writer

2010s, 2016

Samuel Adams photo

“Among the natural rights of the Colonists are these: First, a right to life; Secondly, to liberty; Thirdly, to property; together with the right to support and defend them in the best manner they can.”

Samuel Adams (1722–1803) American statesman, Massachusetts governor, and political philosopher

The Rights of the Colonists (1772)
Context: Among the natural rights of the Colonists are these: First, a right to life; Secondly, to liberty; Thirdly, to property; together with the right to support and defend them in the best manner they can. These are evident branches of, rather than deductions from, the duty of self-preservation, commonly called the first law of nature.

Lysander Spooner photo

“The science of mine and thine—the science of justice—is the science of all human rights; of all a man’s rights of person and property; of all his rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”

Lysander Spooner (1808–1887) Anarchist, Entrepreneur, Abolitionist

Section I, p. 5
Natural Law; or The Science of Justice (1882), Chapter I. The Science of Justice.

Ilana Mercer photo

“From the fact that most Americans want others to fund or subsidize their healthcare, it does not follow that they have such a right. A need is not a right. A man's life, liberty and the products of his labor were not intended to be up for grabs by grubby, greedy majorities.”

Ilana Mercer South African writer

“The Defunct Foundations of the Republic,” http://www.ilanamercer.com/phprunner/public_article_list_view.php?editid1=528 WorldNetDaily.com, January 1, 2010. <br class="br">2010s, 2010

Clarence Thomas photo

“The majority's decision today will require States to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples and to recognize same-sex marriages entered in other States largely based on a constitutional provision guaranteeing 'due process' before a person is deprived of his 'life, liberty, or property'. I have elsewhere explained the dangerous fiction of treating the Due Process Clause as a font of substantive rights. It distorts the constitutional text, which guarantees only whatever 'process' is 'due' before a person is deprived of life, liberty, and property. Worse, it invites judges to do exactly what the majority has done here.”

Clarence Thomas (1948) Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States

Obergefell v. Hodges http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/14pdf/14-556_3204.pdf (26 June 2015). <br class="br">2010s

Ilana Mercer photo

“A right that can't be defended is a right in name only. If you cannot by law defend your life, you have no right to life. If you cannot defend your property, you have no right of private property. And if you cannot defend your liberty, you are not a free man. It follows that inherent in the idea of an inalienable right is the right to mount a vigorous defense of the same rights.”

Ilana Mercer South African writer

“The Peerless Malevolence of Redcoat Piers Morgan”, http://www.ilanamercer.com/phprunner/public_article_list_view.php?editid1=692 WorldNetDaily.com, January 18, 2013. <br class="br">2010s, 2013

Nikolai Bukharin photo

“The great majority of crimes committed in bourgeois society are either direct infringements of property rights or are indirectly connected with property.”

Nikolai Bukharin (1888–1938) Soviet politician

74
ABC's of Communism

Frédéric Bastiat photo

“Life, liberty, and property do not exist because men have made laws. On the contrary, it was the fact that life, liberty, and property existed beforehand that caused men to make laws in the first place.”

Frédéric Bastiat book The Law

Source: The Law (1850)
Context: Life, faculties, production — in other words, individuality, liberty, property — this is man. And in spite of the cunning of artful political leaders, these three gifts from God precede all human legislation, and are superior to it. Life, liberty, and property do not exist because men have made laws. On the contrary, it was the fact that life, liberty, and property existed beforehand that caused men to make laws in the first place.

Related topics