[Peace-discuss] Free enterprise

[illyes at uiuc.edu]

I should point out that the issue of whether or not there is such a thing as "free enterprise" is connected to whether human rights are inherent in the human being or created by government.

To assume that human rights are creatures of government is a alippery slope. What the government gives, the government can properly take away. What the goverment has not given, the government cannot properly take away, as was argued in the Declaration of Independence.

The corporation, of course, is a creature of government that should never have existed. Freely trading the product of ones work is a completely different mater, and is an activity that is prior to government, although legal protection for property is usually helpful.

Bob