Human Rights and Human Liberties: A Radical Reconsideration of the American Political Tradition

Basic, natural human rights have been identified as the bulwark against government oppression and tyranny-- by John Locke, for example -- but are always disputed by skeptics on numerous grounds. Human Rights and Human Liberties takes up the challenge of those disputes and argues that human beings do indeed have the fundamental, unalienable rights to their lives, liberty, pursuit of happiness, and so forth -- indeed, to do whatever they will that does not violate the rights of others (even if the exercise of their rights isn't wise, prudent, or civil). That is the meaning of living as free adult men and women, with all the benefits and risks that flow from it. This book is especially germane now that the most prominent legal theorists in the West tend to dismiss basic human rights and even insist they are grants of governments, just as this had been viewed in earlier times when monarchs and such were believed to rule people and grant them some privileges.