Rights!

In 1789 when the most progressive, radical and unprecedented “rights” endowing document in Europe was penned, I did not have the right to vote, own property freely, or to form a political group. I was not given an adequate education. I was relegated to the private sphere of life, public life being way above my understanding and capabilities. I was defined by my husband’s or father’s status.   The Third Estate did not include me in demanding equal rights, because I am a woman.¹  The Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen was just that; rights for men.  And not all men; Jews, slaves and even Protestants for a time were prohibited from being complete citizens with the right to participate in the political arena of France.²  Typical of Europe, and most countries, at the time, law, life and religion was decided by men for men of their ilk.  Noble, titled men with similar status and similar issues held all the cards that exploited the considerable remainder of society. 

                Today, in the United States, all people are created equal under the law; equal political and civil rights for everyone has benefitted society greatly.  However, I believe the pendulum is dangerously swinging too far to include too many rights with too many inclusions, exceptions, and caveats to the law.  The Age of Enlightenment led to great intellectual and political thinkers developing ideas of natural law and natural rights.   Diderot, in his definition of natural law states, “that laws should be made for everyone, and not for one person”.³  Once the idea of rights for all were consumed by the people, discontent and desired reform bubbled under the French surface until the perfect storm of bankruptcy, hunger and failed reform erupted into the French Revolution and the rise of the Third Estate.  The popular “common man” appeal to government raged not only in revolutionary France.  In the United States the call of the 99% is being sounded.  People are demanding more rights, less taxes more distribution of wealth.   This is almost identical to the revolutionary period of France, Europe, the Americas and Japan in the eighteenth century.  But today, so many rights exist and where is the line drawn to separate human rights from human entitlements? 

                I believe in the American Bills of Rights. But recently political rights and civil rights are not enough to quell discontent.  Social rights are the new cry of many Americans trying to equalize society.  America is a capitalist society, driven by the desire to improve and be rewarded accordingly.  To continue to augment civil rights with more and more social rights, will slowly obliterate capitalism.  Some social rights are appropriate, but I believe the issue is where to draw the line. The Achilles heel of implementing rights documents has always been in its application to human beings in real world situations. Who should hold the power to deny someone? What are the criteria set forth and how is it defined? These very questions faced the implementation of the Declaration of Rights of Man and Citizen.  Even though this cutting edge document gave new rights to its citizens, it was hugely exclusive.   Since the Revolution era in the eighteenth century, people of all countries have struggled for freedoms and rights and excellent progress has been made in the West. The Middle East currently is erupting demanding the same rights from their governments, even if it means over throwing long standing regimes.   Overall, human rights benefit everyone, but when laws are written and humans are involved in the implementation of rights, exceptions and inequality still appear so that every human does not have an equal experience. 

¹Lynn Hunt ed. The French Revolution and Human Rights A Brief Documented History. (Boston, Bedford/St. Martin’s, 1996), 18-19.

²Ibid.

³ Dennis Diderot, Natural Law (1755), in French Revolution and Human Rights: A Brief Documentary History, ed. Lynn Hunt (Boston: Bedford/St. Martins, 1996), 37.