Liberty, privacy are not limitless

As I read the student’s March 3 letter in favor of the nationwide legalization of marijuana, I noticed several problems with her analysis, one of the more important of which (the problem of the damage that marijuana use causes) I will not bring up in this letter.

First of all, the principal of liberty, as identified in the Declaration of Independence, is not limitless. It does not require that anything not specifically prohibited in the Constitution be legal. The Fourth Amendment does not guarantee an unrestricted right to privacy; it merely states that searches must be carried out legally, not arbitrarily. It certainly does not mean that anything in a person’s possession is legal by virtue of its status as private property, as the writer suggests.

The reference to Roe vs. Wade is also problematic because, as schools today apparently fail to teach, there are significant problems with the Supreme Court’s decision on the case. The weak case of a “right to privacy” is one, but even more important is the massive infringement on a baby’s right to life that abortion presents. If we really believe in the inalienable right to life, as the Declaration of Independence says we do, how can we deny it at life’s beginning?

Peter Scougale

Everett

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