Can State Expropriation of Minerals be Justified? Part I – M&M Madeleine Flannagan sets out a common law property rights argument based on Blackstone and John Locke, examining what circumstances, if any, might justify the state taking real property….

You are in fact confirming my point that you mix theology into legal (and probably any) argument to suit your point of view. When talking legal principles (such as the extent of property rights) one does not need to come to a determination where ‘hell’ may be situated only because of the assertion that a certain latin word meant something geographically specific in a certain period. I would suggest you take that point up with the editors of Black’s, probably the world’s most quoted legal dictionary.

I suggest we go back to the actual point and try to argue the question I posed, which boils down to the extent of property rights where the property contains materials of which the ‘owner’ is not aware and neither has the capacity to extract.
Added to that can be the question whether there is a basis for absolute property rights where other uses could be contemplated that do not interfere with the use the ‘owner’ is making of the property (i.e. the principles underlying the ‘bundle of rights’ approach).

How does the point about first occupancy being the foundation of property rights fit in with the idea of right of conquest?

Between 19 and 20 is historic greatness!
These are the fundamental tenets of Libertarianism and find their origins in Christian theology.
These rights may be used not only circumvent absolute monarchy but ought also to prohibit absolute/ socialist democracy. Sadly these truths have been forsaken! (the corruption of State education!)
These are what I appealed to in The Great Waitangi Debate, and what Mathew Hooten denied. Now ask yourself what sort of people do you want running the government? Mps who like me believe you have inalienable rights as individuals, that they are antecedent to the government which is instituted to safe guard these rights… or are you happy with having unprincipled Mps who agree with Matt Hooten and don’t believe we have any sacred rights. They say any ‘rights’ are mere convention and are the gift of the state.
Property rights have been eroded by the Matt Hootens of modern history. They don’t believe we have such things and force us to surrender our rights and liberties at their leasure. This is what social democracy is…a denial of our ‘ascendant rights’ without which we are fully exposed to unlimited democratic whim…a Mobocracy.
A true Libertarian democracy would respect and constitutionally enshrine our rights and set boundaries that the state cannot exceed.

Feser considers taxation as the only means of financing government…that’s a big and costly assumption. And in between 27 and 28 he literally opens the socialist flood gates!
Their can be no just comparison with the starving man in the woods scenario and forced taxation for the needy!
Tim Wikiriwhi

You respond with “ I mix theological points with legal ones to suit my argument” this is a misunderstanding . What I simply pointed out was that inferos did in the Middle Ages refer to hell and that this place was identified with the centre of the universe in medieval cosmology. Moreover, in what a term meant in theology is significant because in the middle ages there was not a sharp division between theology and other subjects, almost all cosmological writings about what was the centre of the universe were done by clerics. Law was also heavily done by clerics, or theologically trained scholars, moreover the universities where law was studied were first and foremost theological seminaries. In fact in the middle ages there co existed both canonical courts and secular courts.

AS to your citation of a dictionary I can give you several citations from actual texts used during the middle ages. A popular version of the apostles creed which states Christ “descendit ad inferos.” ( descended into hell) Popularly understood during this time as Christ descended into hell. Aquinas in the 13th century cites this text alongside various other latin texts to defend the notion that Christ literally descended into hell http://www.newadvent.org/summa/4052.htm. The same phraseology occurs in the Latin version of the athanasisan creed and the vulgate uses the word inferos to refer to hell and certainly was understood to be doing so in the middle ages. So you can cite dictionaries till the cows come home an examination of actual latin texts from the period shows that inferos frequently was understood to mean hell. You can also look into medieval cosmology and you’ll find that hell was understood to be in the centre of the universe.

personally I don’t think the government should be confiscating anything. My initial comment said that UNDER THIS SYSTEM the best way to facilitate collective ownership is through the government. But, as may be becoming clear, I don’t think we live in an ideal system.

Glenn: I repeat: We have very different philosophies of ownership. I realize that builders DONT own the house under our present system. I was talking about whether they SHOULD.

inferos

infer.os N 2 1 ACC P M
inferus, inferi N (2nd) M [XXXDX] lesser
those below (pl.), the dead;
infer.os ADJ 1 1 ACC P M POS
inferus, infera -um, inferior -or -us, infimus -a -um ADJ [XXXAX]
infer.os ADJ 1 2 ACC P M POS
infer, infera -um, inferior -or -us, infumus -a -um ADJ [XXXDX] lesser
below, beneath, underneath; of hell; vile; lower, further down; lowest, last;

There’s no need at all to refer to latin theology, we’re talking legal principles here.

Secondly, Madeleine doesn’t make that alleged point at all, she simply assumes that what is meant by ‘inferos’ is ‘centre’, or (if I were to give her that credit) she is referring to a 19th century english case: Corbet v Hill, that has been quoted for that extension on the factual translation. Note that Black’s (authoritative for the translation of latin into english in the legal context, translates ‘inferos’ as ‘depths’)

Actually , Madeliene’s use is correct. The word “inferos” was common in latin Theology. It means “hell”. What you fail to note and which Madeliene does, is that in the middle ages people believed in a spherical earth and hell was in the centre of the earth. Hence, if a person stated you owned everything down to hell they were refering to the centre of the earth.
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