Talk:Homework One Answers - Student Ten

For the sake of discussion, I would like to challenge your response to my answer to "Were the Puritans right to be strict and expel people of other religions?" You wrote "Good answer, but slightly incomplete because it does not address the fundamental right of 'freedom of association.' If it was wrong for the Puritans to expel folks, then what is left of the freedom of association? Though not expressly in the Constitution, it is recognized as a fundamental First Amendment right."

This is true but the question was not "did they have the right?" but rather "were they right?" The question indicated an answer based on morality, not legality. Also, the First Amendment did not exist during the Puritans so it would not have applied then.

AddisonDM

Good points, but isn't freedom of association a moral right as well as a constitutional one?

Let's take an analogy. Suppose the leader of a church decides to expel or excommunicate someone, and you were asked if he was "right" to do so. Isn't the ordinary answer: "yes, under the authority of his leadership!"

In other words, it seems to me that groups typically have an inherent right to decide who can remain in the group. It's an automatically "right" if done in a manner consistent with its authority and without any odious discrimination, isn't it?

Even you disagree, the fundamental right of freedom of association should be addressed carefully in any attempt to declare an exercise of that freedom to be wrong.--Andy Schlafly 18:23, 14 February 2011 (EST)

Okay, good point. Then I would revise my point: while may have had the right to exclude other religions from their community, they certainly did not have the right to perpetrate violence against them. AddisonDM 14:26, 15 February 2011 (EST)

Apparently some people insisted on imposing themselves on the Puritans, and returning to their communities after having been peacefully expelled. What should the Puritans have done then? House and feed them at the Puritans' expense?--Andy Schlafly 21:22, 15 February 2011 (EST)

You just said above that free association is a right, if exercised "without any odious discrimination," and violence (even execution) has got to be at least as bad as "odious discrimination." If people who were expelled came back, the Puritans should have simply not associated with them. No one would have to "house and feed" them.

But even so, when does free association give licence to commit violence? I would think that freedom of association ends at the same place as the freedom to swing my fist. "The right to swing my fist ends where the other man's nose begins." This same principle would logically apply to free association.

AddisonDM 22:12, 15 February 2011 (EST)