by Matthew J. Geiger

Created on: October 08, 2009   Last Updated: October 10, 2009

Rights mark the limits of a People's tolerances to accept the will of an authority such as a government. When fundamental rights are violated, a People can no longer endure the domination of a ruling body. Under the umbrella of an International Community, all the Peoples of the world are assured by the powerful they can expect certain fundamental rights.

This means it is the function of any legitimate modern government to protect and uphold the fundamental rights of its citizens as well as their other responsibilities as a governing body.

A fundamental right is a guarantee made to each and every citizen of a country that a government will honor a particular freedom. This is not to confuse a fundamental right for an absolute right as unlimited expression of a particular freedom can infringe upon another person's rights and prohibit a government from exercising its duties as a responsibility body of governance.

If a supposed absolute right to life, liberty, and happiness existed, for example, the police could not protect citizens from those wishing to derive happiness from murdering others, thus the police have the authority to imprison or kill someone who engages in homicide.

Furthermore, the philosophy behind natural, or fundamental, rights only has legitimacy when the powerful endorse and enforce these principles. In the United States, this belief took root when our Founding Fathers recognized the support of the People is an essential element to building and maintaining a successful nation, thus they concluded the People should rule their government.

Although America has faults of oppressive in its history, this doctrine eventually led its People to embrace and encourage the notion of universal fundamental rights.

As the United States grew into a world power then into a superpower, it mostly acted to benefit itself and its allies. Once America helped form what is now the International Community, it become one of our history's most benevolent empires versus a colonel power bent on raping other nations of their natural and human resources for its own benefit like most Western powers did.

This put the United States in a position to exercise military, economic, and diplomatic power to guarantee the rights of its citizens are truly fundamental.

Because world powers like the United States decide protecting the fundamental rights of their Peoples can only be accomplished in a world where all Peoples' rights are protected, the International Community has the power to guarantee fundamental rights. This means governments, which do not protect or represent fundamental rights, can be considered illegitimate.

Of course, a failure on behalf of the International Community to enforce this doctrine also means fundamental rights do not exist. Moreover, the world must protect fundamental right and ensure all governments do the same.

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