Does the provision of Philadelphia’s Bill 170963 intended to curb the use of bulletproof glass in stores run afoul of language in the Pennsylvania constitution asserting “inherent and indefeasible” rights of “defending life” and “protecting property”? Our earlier post (and see update) mentioned that Eugene Volokh had written about the contours of a constitutional right to self-defense, and now the UCLA lawprof (at the newly un-paywalled site of his Conspiracy) has sketched a possible argument against the Philly Plexiglass measure along those lines.
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This is a bad bad law. Is it unconstitutional? That’s hard to say, but requiring store owners/employees to risk their necks in order to continue a business is evil. And government just doesn’t get to act that way in a free society.
It’s cute that you imagine that we still live in a free society.
Technically, I didn’t say that it is a free society. I just related how the state of being a free society precludes this sort of government action.
I am a big fan of the movie, :”Heat.” Jon Voight said to Robert De Niro (on Val Kilmer setting off on his own): “It’s a free country, brother.” We don’t really say that anymore.
From my perspective, as a child of the 60’s, a lot of what this government does in our names and the cause of security looks much like what we called out as bad in russians… They spied on their own people, they tortured prisoners, their people weren’t free. Anyone else see the resemblance?